[JBroll]

Okay... the value of the NS10s is that if a mix sounds good through them, it'll sound good through ANYTHING. Of course, a subwoofer and a professional tuner will be important if you want to have full detail out of them. I'd honestly ask a friend who works at a studio, or check a recording forum (not one as full of shit as GearSluts, but you get the idea)... hell, even the Sweetwater guy that got assigned to me has a great idea of how to work with what you want, just to have more opinions.

That aside, you're not asking for anything nobody else asks for - a detailed, balanced mix. Also, you haven't given details about your room, the kind of mixes you like to make, if you just want 'flat' or maybe a little leaning towards 'make my mixes sound worse than they should'... I hate to give such a long non-answer, but there's a lot that goes into this stuff.

If I had to pick any... you're not going to take this too seriously, but at that price I'd go for some Yamaha HS80s and start saving for a subwoofer if the bass wasn't enough. You could try the M-Audio BX and the KRKs, but the KRKs might make your mixes sound better than they should, so you'll have to try them and see what sounds worst. (Isn't that an odd bit of advice?) That's of course assuming you have the room treated right and all that sort of thing... more detail on that setup maybe?

Jeff

[MF_Kitten]

i´m not going for the ultimate best stuff ever, just something that represents my mixes fairly, so i can record stuff in my bedroom

so yeah, no superb room here, just a bedroom. it´s mid-sized kinda, not much to say about it. it´s large enough to avoid bad acoustics, like icky early reflections in the highs, and boomy bass development.

and i want my mixes to sound good, but i don´t want to do it the "use speakers that sound icky, so you compensate" kind of way. as i said, i want there to be nice ballsy low end whene there is a nice ballsy low end in the mix, but i don´t want it to be louder and more hyped. i´d like to avoid horrible shrieking high end and high mids for the sake of reverse compensation too, i just want a realistic sound :P

so nothing hyped-sounding, and nothing reverse-hyped to deliberatly sound crummy.

and i´m not expecting things to sound really good through the monitors though, i just don´t want them to sound bad.

i need to be able to hear some really deep low end (not like 20 Hz or something though :P) in my mix, as i tune down quite a bit, and i´m not scared of clear high-end in my sound. i love Bulb´s mixes, and i love Meshuggah´s Re:Nothing sound. also, Sikth´s Death of a Dead Day, and Black Dahlia Murder´s Nocturnal. also, i like the fatness/thickness of Korn´s Untouchables, but that´s more to do with their sound :P

so yeah, i´m not that specific about my sound really, i just know what i don´t want :P

an example of my music: SoundClick artist: MF Kitten - groovy, heavy, athmospheric, moody, ambient

this mix sounds pretty good on my über-hyped speakers (i think there´s a mental 85 Hz bump in them, among other things :P). this one is extremely low-tuned though, and it´s as low as i´ll ever tune.

[JBroll]

I'd be tempted to go for the ones you're looking at or the M-Audio BX8As. Get some monitor pads, and cover the walls behind the monitors too... world of difference.

Jeff

[MF_Kitten]

Originally Posted by JBroll

I'd be tempted to go for the ones you're looking at or the M-Audio BX8As. Get some monitor pads, and cover the walls behind the monitors too... world of difference.

Jeff

my buddy has M audio monitors, and while they´re ok, they´re not what i´m looking for. not sure what model it is though.

i´m leaning more and more towards the Fostex PM1 MKII monitors:
PM Series MK II - Nearfield Monitors

from what people say, they don´t sound hyped or under-hyped, and they can reproduce frequencies down to 50 HZ without problems. they don´t roll off till they reach like 38 Hz.