Fostex 812 Collapsing My Stereo Instruments into Mono?

[0wl]

Hey so I've got a Fostex 812 mixer that I'm using with my Tascam 238. I love the thing?it sounds great and has plenty of routing options. One problem I'm having though is that I cant seem to get it to monitor/record in stereo.

Here's what's happening: I'm recording my MPC1000 via two mono cables from the L and R outputs. I run the L cable into channel 9, and the R cable into channel 10 of the Fostex. I route channel 9 to BUS 3, and channel 10 to BUS 6. But when I turn down one of the faders (i.e. ONLY bus3 or ONLY bus6), the volume just decreases equally in both ears. There's a little tom fill in my track that (when sticking my headphones directly into the MPC) is very clearly in stereo. But whenever I listen to it thru the Fostex, everything seems to be collapsed into the center. It seems I've exhausted all the different pan knobs and routing options, and just cant get it to preserve the stereo signal.

Any ideas?

[The Scum]

How do you have the panning on the subgroups set?

Is there a mono switch on the master section?

[0wl]

The subgroups (assuming subgroup=bus?) don't strictly have their own pan pots, instead you can choose to route them to the L/R output, which doubles as busses 7 and 8. Even when routing BUS 3 to the L output and BUS 6 to the R output, then selecting the L/R button in the monitor section, I'm unable to monitor in stereo.

An update though: After recording to the Tascam, I am able to monitor the returns in stereo. The 812 has switchable inputs. The channels don't have their own pan pots, so when the source is "INPUT," I can't seem to monitor in stereo. But when the source is "TAPE," there's a pan pot that can be assigned to the channel for mixing the return signal. SO after recording, I pan one return from the Tascam hard left, and the other hard right, and VOILA my tom fill is in stereo. I guess it's not too important to be able monitor in stereo as long as I can pan during the mixdown process. Still it would be nice though.