all analog gear, how do i make a cd?

[1manband]

ok, i have gotten some wonderfull advice from all of you on my many topics of frustration, i have one more question for all of you. i am faced in another thread with a decision on whether or not to go pc or stay with my adat for the whole process, so i ask you all what i would need if i stay adat and not even use the computer, to get my finished product on to a cd (and dont say; send it to a studio ). or can i use my computer and my crappy magix program to simply accept the end result from the adat, (through the line in on the soundcard), and turn it into a cd with my burner? can it be that simple? if so, is there a benefit to doing it this way? i can imagine that for the long haul, my adat will eventually be very high in "hours" and will need major repairs or replacing, so what does everyone think? however with an all pc setup, wont technology cause everything to need updating or replacing soon anyway? not to mention the money spent on all the outboard gear i bought!

[Massive Master]

Fot the most part, it IS that simple. HOWEVER: Consumer CD writing software will NOT write a RedBook CD-R which is *quite* important if you're going to be handing out discs that are going to be played on a variety of systems.

There's a "rant" article on my site concerning RedBook -

http://www.massivemastering.com/html/redbook_cd_s.html

For that, you're going to need (at the very least) CD-Architect or WaveLab.

Obviously, an efficient and "uncolored" way of getting the audio to your computer is pretty vital - If your mixer has a S/PDIF out, you can get a sonudcard with a S/PDIF in and you're set. If not, I would highly recommend getting a card with balanced inputs as a minimum requirement. Echo MIA comes to mind, as they're blowing out the old models for under $100.

There are still better ways to do it, but that'll get you into the game...

John Scrip - www.massivemastering.com

[The Green Hornet]

Yo Play it all at once:]

You have several choices if you want to do CDs.

You have ADAT -- good system. You could get the Masterlink and burn there.

Of course, there are all kinds of CD burners at various prices you can research.

Maybe touching base with Adat users in the Alesis Forum would get you some possibilities?

Green Hornet

[1manband]

thanx for the many insightfull answers yo my problem, first i need to know what a s/pdif is? and secondly someone mentioned a masterlink, what is that?

[The Green Hornet]

Yo ambidextrous musician:

The "someone" is me: Green Hornet.

MASTERLINK is the Alesis CD burner that has a high rating on this board.

You can find out more by going to the Alesis forum and asking for more Masterlink opinions or by going to the Alesis site and sighting it in.

Green Hornet

[fatlittlekozak]

I transfer from analogue tape via connection to audio card. Yor dat will be better quality than cd unless you can record at 24 bits rather than 16. If the magix program you mention is Audio Cleaning Lab then simply record using line in and edit, set your track markers, outo split to 4 second intervals and title your tracks. Print cd cover and burn. Like the real thing. If your looking to archive material for safekeeping and space is an issue check out mp3 as they claim better than cd quality at rates recorded above 128kbps. I have nothing considered above cd quality so have never been able to compare mp3 at 192kbps against a wav. At this rate you can fit about 250 3 min. songs on one cd then pop into a safe deposit box.

[Dyson Steel]

Seems the majority is going computer. I would keep the ADAT. Someone might need to transfere from their old tapes some day when the hard drive crashes and you might make some $$$ there.
Course I have 4 ADATs and they keep getting less expensive on eBay all the time. Tapes are costly though when doing 32 tracks then doing a back up (4 tapes), (gonna need parts in the future and Alesis still refurbushes the heads).

Good luck!

[13th_Omen]

I have a rackmounted "real time" Tascam CD burner. I just run the ADAT at 44.1, all 8 channels to the mixer, mix it up then run the main REC outs to the CD burner. Pretty simple and straight forward!