Been gigging my 11r for about a year. Straight to the board via the L/Main out. Very happy with the sound. Many compliments on the tones I get. Anyway,some of the rigs are quite loud and I am taming them as I go. My question is about rig balancing and db.What is a good overall db setting. Half are at 0db. and the rest vary. I would like to set that first and then do the volume by ear. I know I will have to tweek a bit at the gig, but I can live with that. I never record so this is for live use only. Many thanks.

It all depends on the compressor limiter used..
or if you have one!!!
lol
and depends on the ear....
if you are all digital on your amps (no tubes)
always set with "0" as your max spike or have your limiter at 20% below that.
I always use a tone generator, you can use a cd with preset tones.
moss group had a good disc back in the day. 20-20k hz in steps.
and eq the venue to make it flat.....
never try to make up volume at the mixer or at any box.
on digital amped pa flat and clean is good.... yea that will stir up some folks...
now if you have tube outputs then 10% dirty up will give you classic sound. you know the evh brown sound.

so with a good preset that sounds perfect on your head phone jack on the 11r. set levels on the mixer to -1db nom and never spiking the 0 db or just barely every 3 seconds.....

I always have larger amps than needed so you have plenty of headroom for larger venues...

pa distortion is a bad thing.... lol!!

so do you have left right on the pa setup
as in left amp and speakers and right amp and speakers???

I do so I run first channel on mixer as panned left and second as panned right with the left from the 11r to ch1 and right from the 11r to ch2 .
this way I can get the 11r stereo patches to sound cool!!

it is all going to depend on your gear and the venue....
always go larger amps and more speakers you can turn it down!!
a good db meter in the room or arena always helps on output setup and speaker placement....
flat is a hard thing to get to live!!

Thanks Paul. I live on a tiny island in Belize. I play at a beach bar every week. No arena in my future..or digital for that matter. Going straight into a Yamaha 312SC powered head with 2 Peavey PR 15's for mains and god knows what for monitors. We do not run stereo as half the crowd is on the beach and half is in the bar where we set up. I run flat on my chanel and the PA is set up flat unless we have to dial back at 2k on feedback days. One side powers the mains, one side for the monitors. Plenty of power for our needs. Mostly geezer rock with a side order of new (Bruno Mars ect.) some Reggae and a Blues tune or 2. So I need Clean, Clean with a little dirt, and heaven forbid a "Freebird" setting...which seems to happen EVERY Friday! Thought I moved 2000 miles from that one...aparently not!
I will set things at 0.Db and adjust from there. Any suggestions appreciated.

As for the db setting displayed in rig balance I think Pauls answer (while correct) is way too academical. I think it is best to set the volumes of your presets to a rig balance level where you still have a little headroom just in case you need to turn it up just a bit. Don't forget you can still use the big main volume knob if your sound guy asks you to defeat the signal if it's too loud for his inputs. That's the way I do it and it works pretty well. The whole "rig balance" setting in the utility section is one of the most underrated features of the 11R, I think. It allows you to quickly adjust multiple presets directly one after the other while switching to and fro. You call up "rig balance", step through your presets, adjust the volume and when done you leave "Rig balance" which will automatically store all the adjusted levels in the respective preset. Just remember that the last level you have set will NOT be saved, so after making the last adjustment switch back to a preset you already adjusted, do not make any additional changes - and then all changes will be saved.

Thanks Markus. So you do all the balancing at the rig balance and NOT at the Amp Out setting? This would be really handy. I have been spending way too much time... with limited success. I guess I did not get that from the manual. Oh course, as a guitar player, I do not spend enough time trying to figure things out the proper way with instructions. Lucky to have this forum and the helpful souls that hang out here. Really love the 11r. I am getting everything I need to cover my gigs. Very easy to carry on the Water Taxi when I play on the other islands. I may pick up a spare so if this one dies (all musical equipment does by the sea) I will have a spare. At this point I would be heartbroken without it.

What I've done is used dB Volume app on my iPhone to check DB output from a preset I liked and then matched other presets with the same DB output.

I have had bad experiences with adjusting sounds judging by numeric values or even by db Volume apps and the like. Some sounds just SOUND louder than they are. Plus in the band context some sounds simply cut through while others may have a lot of db-pumping lows, but get lost nonetheless. And some just become loud because you play em punchy while others are softer due to the way they're played.
Lesson learned: the only judge is your ear.

every ones hearing is different for sure!!
if you have the bucks a spectrum analyzer with it's own mics calibrated to the unit works if you are wanting to get studio quality results...

I do setups in studios for broadcast radio and tv production where it has to be right on the money... lol that fcc thing!!

in the real world (not Paul's world)by a good trained ear can get you real close...

most hearing is only able to detect 3% to 10% distortion...
unless you are part dog!! LOL!!

There are some real cool spectrum aps for the new phones and pads as well as real good mics that just plug direct on the units!!

I have yet to step in to the year 2000 on the new phones...
lol does a brick phone still count???
grin!!
yes for the venue of open beach mono works great!!
you can run 2 systems on that!!
run the stage as left right and then the remote areas run it as mono. easy to do with 2 mixers or just one large good unit for the stereo and then a real low cost small unit to blend the main out to mono.

there is always a way to get more!!

have you seen the water speakers for the pools???
they are too cool!! transducer for under water use!! navy used them!! kinda cool as if used in a cove or small lake they will resonate on the boat hulls!!