Should I run through FX before record guitar into 880EX?

[musicmaker]

hi, I am a new 880EX owner, since I don't have any DI box and mic preamp, is that a problem for me to record guitar and vocal directly into the 880EX since the 880EX without any dedicated guitar input? Should I run through the FX of 880EX such as compressor before recording? I ask this question is because I noticed from the console view of 880EX that my input guitar signal cannot achieve very strong level(although the sound is pretty good with the weak signal), if I turn the input level knob to more than 3'0clock level, the red light is blink which mean I can't go futher, but I can see from the console view that there is still a big gap remaining before achieve the 'hotest' level, but the peak indicator is just blink, is that I can't record as hot as possible because I don't have the DI box? What is the solution?
Another problem is, I try to listen to the Demo song which is recorded inside the hard drive, can you tell me how to select it and play it?thank you!

[Burton]

You should be able to get a decent signal from your guitar into the VS. You'll have to turn up the input (as you said) if you're not using an external pre-amp. If your peak light is coming on while the signal level is very low, it might be because you have the system parameters of the machine set for peak indicating at -6db or something like that. You can adjust this preset so that the peak lights will light when your signal is closer to 0db.

Whether you use FX while recording is your choice. I usually record dry signals and then bounce with fx so that I can try out many effects to see which I prefer. If you record with FX, you're stuck with whatever you put on the guitar at the time of recording.

The demo songs should be located on partition IDE:0 of your internal hard drive. Chose song select to load them for listening. If you don't see the demo songs, you may have to change the active partition by choosing "drive select".

[wawazzat]

Okay Burton-

How do you know where the 840s peak light...lights !

Well, you know what I mean
__________
wawazzat?
can u change it?

[Burton]

Waz...

I don't recall this feature on the 840. I only because aware of it after getting my 880ex. On the 880ex it's in the system parameters settings. You might check the same place on the 840. Sorry I don't remember/know more.