Output volume

Quad Cortex
1

Hi All,

I have 2 questions:
1-Am I the only one?
2-Is this normal, or did I change something without knowing?

Now, context:
normally when I make a chain, I go from input 1 to output 1/2 95% of the time, but I realized yesterday that if I choose output 3/4, it is much more louder in my headphones monitor.

Context #2: Nothing is actually plugged in any output, so it might only affect the monitoring (?) in which case I could file a bug.

Or is it some sort of hardware limitation between TRS jacks and XLRs ?

Cheers

2

Have you tried swiping downward to get the I/O page and checked out the levels of the outputs?

3

I did, they were all to default

did you try and got similar results?

4

I just tried mine and get the same…3/4 are louder to the headphones than 1/2. All outputs set the same 0dB

5

do you think I should file in a bug?
Is the sound louder if you are actually plugged into monitor or powered speaker?

6

I tried it. If you use 1/2 and then switch a chain to 3/4 it sounds louder through the headphones. If you then swipe down to the I/O page tap on the headphone output you will see it will have level controls for outputs 3/4 as well as the headphone out and if you have bumped up the HP level the 3/4 level will be bumped up by the same amount (mine was 6db).

If you reset this dial to zero (just the one for 3/4 on the headphones page) it will work as expected thereafter (i.e. the volumes will be the same for other presets). It’s probably a minor bug of some sort that causes the output to track the HP level on first switch… but once you adjust it on your unit it will be fixed.

7

I confirm it is weird that the output was set higher in the headphone for them, I had no touch anything.

CASE CLOSE

8

Neural said this is due to the balanced outs having higher headroom than the unbalanced ones.
Not a bug.

1 Like
9

Just to clarify – XLR OUT 1/2 are balanced outputs while OUT 3/4 can be balanced or unbalanced, depending on what cable you are using. The spec in the manual shows:

OUT 1/2 XLR: Max Output Level: +9.5dBu
OUT 3/4 TRS: Max Output Level: +15.5dBu balanced, +9.5dBu unbalanced

This is why some people see the XLRs as lower output than the TRS when using balanced cables.