I have a few different ways I can sum in my studio. I would like input on which sounds better.

I threw together a 1 minute song that is 4 bars looped. There are 12 stereo tracks that I set up in such a way that I would be summing 24 tracks. (I did this by reducing the stereo field on all 12 stereo tracks thereby sending some right signal to the left and some left signal to the right. I used the Flux Stereo Tool on all 12 tracks to do this.) I recorded/rendered this result in three different summing manners.

In an editor, I trimmed and normalized the 3 tracks, compiled them, and then master compressed/limited the compilation.

What I would like to know is which of the 3 versions sounds better or worse to you and why? Please ignore the composition and mix, and concentrate on over-all sound quality between the 3 versions.

Here is a link to the wav file. If you want to transport this file to a non-internet playback platform, you may right-click the link and "save-as."

http://www.sensawehr.com/wav/Summing%20Test%20v3.4a.wav

If you are a member of another forum that would be willing to help with this test, please re-post this there and provide a link in this thread so that I can follow the results.

After getting feedback on this I will post info on how I summed the tracks.

Remember, there is no right or wrong answer, just personal preference.

Thanks

Russell