for chibi:why i record to a MD

[johnny j]

Chibi Nappa05-18-2005, 11:14
"i have a yamaha MD8 and were ready to transfer some songs onto a regular MD player, from this i'll put it onto a CD"

Let's back up to this for a second... Why are you sticking an MD player in there? You know MD players use lossy data compression, right? You're hurting your sound.

the reason i record to an md is because thats whats in my set up! i mix a song "live" to the md each time, thus it may take me six or seven attempts to get it right. when i have the right mix i record it to a CD recorder. if i mixed straight to CD recorder id get through no end of CD's

is this really a problem? i know that some people mix down to 2 tracks on the MD8 first then copy that mix to CD or MD, but im not happy doing this, it never sounds as good somehow, for the same reason i try to avoid bouncing if i can, luckily with a straight band set up (2 guitars on 3 tracks, electric drum kit on 2 tracks, bass and vox 1 track each, leaving a track free for solos, backing vox etc) we dont need really need more than 8 tracks.

i think ive learned from the response to my initial post that its ok to put a compressor in line from the 8T to the MD,

whether i'll actually apply any compression in the end is yet to be decided. what i want to do is learn how to fit the compressor into my set up so that i can start experimenting to see whether compression will improve our songs in any way. if they dont appear to sound any better/tidier/ punchier/complete then i shalln't bother. its just that i want to start testing out sonic ideas

thanksto all who replied, it helps a lot

[northsiderap]

Doesn't the CD burner have a buffer, so the audio is only on the internal hard drive marked by a track locator? If it did, then one could just re-try the song a few times...

Oddly enough, I don't think there would be as much flak for putting a MD in the middle if that MD was really a nice (preferably tube) reel-to-reel... That way there'd be nice tape compression too.

[gordone]

Originally Posted by northsiderap

Oddly enough, I don't think there would be as much flak for putting a MD in the middle if that MD was really a nice (preferably tube) reel-to-reel... That way there'd be nice tape compression too.

Seriously, look into using your PC to mix down to. You can save the mix as a stereo wav file (uncompressed) and then burn directly from the PC. You can also do some final processing on the computer. Ditch the mini-disc. Your audio already suffered from the first round of ATRAC in the MD8.

[johnny j]

i should have explained my set up a bit better. i dont have a PC anywhere in my set up. im recording to a domestic (tho high quality) MD recorder and a domestic CD recorder, also high quality

the downside that i can see to recording on PCs is that we often record as a band live, onto 5 tracks at once and we monitor through a headphone amp, as our drummer now has an electronic drum kit we can bash away as loud as we like with no disruption to the neighbours, except for the vocals

is it possibler to record several instruments at once on seperate tracks using a PC? i dont think my friend can on his apple lap top

i appreciate your replies, keep em coming

[dgatwood]

Originally Posted by johnny j

is it possibler to record several instruments at once on seperate tracks using a PC? i dont think my friend can on his apple lap top

With an external audio interface, yes. With the built-in audio hardware, no.