Choosing reference monitors is a matter of trust. You have to be able to trust them. Re: the Behringer MS20, it was used to play music from an Ipod and yeah, hindi nagdi-disperse ang kick drum and bass guitar sounds...as long as wag mo lang lakasan beyond the physical capability ng puny 3 inch woofers nya. At the end of the day, Physics should be on your side.
Yes Studiophile BX5's are a good choice. Don't even think about getting anything smaller like an MS40 (with 4 inch monitors) it will not give you a correct idea of the bass response. Again, physics na ang kalaban mo dun.
Other not-so-expensive monitors that you can trust are the Samson Resolv 65a and 80a series. I can hear stuff on these that are "invisible" to hi-fi systems...lam mo yun ultimo sabit ng gitara na hindi dinig sa ordinary sound systems, litaw dito.
One more not-so-expensive but good choice is the Alesis M1 Active monitors.
What seems to be the holy grail of not-so-expensive reference monitors are the KRK Rokit 5 and up series, sama mo na newer models. I've read reviews of these and while the Rokit5 only gets a moderate thumbs up because of its high bass cutoff frequency, its bigger sisters get a standing ovation.
You can also try the Samson Rubicon series. These have been bench-tested against other monitors and held their own. They're more expensive than others but well worth the money.
You can also try to audition the Samson Mediaone series. They're relatively inexpensive as monitors go.
For the room, note that you should not position your speakes closer than 3 feet from a wall, otherwise you will get a bass-heavy sound, more like double than what the speaker is actually putting out. So you have to set-up somewhere in the middle of the room.
Again, don't get anything less than 5 inches. Mabibitin kalang. Teka that sounded so gay...
Thanks for the replies!
about the bass traps, i'll be renovating the 'room' (its actually the sala) sooner or later and already have plans about acoustic treatments. (nothing grand of course) sort of incorporating the treatment to the design to minimize high freq reverb. (some units of architecture actually helped on this)
Regarding the bass heavy mix, thanks. i'm really having a hard time recognizing the amount of bass i'm supposed to apply on those projects. again, it may be related to the monitor/speakers and the room. it sounded pretty bass 'flat or even dehydrated' from here since i try to remove most of it knowing the stereo system is inclined to go 'bass-y'. (even on the flattest setting it can get) another problem is i have a couple of bassists for 'critics and consultants' to the mixing process.
other than bass heavy, any other problem with the mix? are the tracks clear and detailed enough? i believe these versions are too loud. i wasnt able to trim it down before sending it to the 'client' due to a deadline...
anyway if not the ms40, any other suggestions that wont kill my wallet? how about the maudio bx5a? its over the budget but if the quality is really different then i may able to work something out...