Live Studio

Most USB microphones with a headphone socket, and every audio interface, are two devices at once: a microphone going in and a sound card coming out. Their headphone socket plays your own voice — routed internally, with no delay at all — plus whatever the computer sends them.

1. 1 Set Headphone output to your microphone or interface. This only changes what you hear — what goes to air is a separate path and is not affected.
2. 2 Switch Hear yourself off. Your device already gives you your voice with no delay. Leaving this on means hearing yourself twice, slightly apart, which is worse than either on its own.
3. 3 Find its Mix, Blend or Direct/USB control and set it around the middle. That is the balance between your voice and the music. Some devices set this in their companion app rather than on the hardware itself.

The music and jingles then reach the same headphones as your voice, and the Headphones fader sets how loud they are against it.

Running the whole show through a mixer

With a RØDECaster or any desk doing the mixing, the studio should pass its output straight through rather than treat it as a voice.

1. 1 Set Input to Line in and pick the mixer as the device. Stereo, with no filter or compressor added, and the decks are no longer turned down while it is open.
2. 2 Push the Line fader to 100. That passes the mixer's level through unchanged. Set your levels on the mixer, and keep its meters out of the red.
3. 3 Listen on the mixer's own headphone socket. It hears everything with no delay. Leave Hear yourself off.