Using a Mackie 24x8 with an M-Audio 1814

[zrxer]

Hi. Brand new to the forum, pretty new to recording etc. Up until now I have been playing with an M-Audio 1814, just using the two balanced inputs on the front that have preamps. Now however I'm looking to record like 6-8 tracks (some guitars, bass, drums, vocals; just some band practices, maybe a little EP) but finding that I need more preamps than the M-Audio has. A friend acquired a Mackie 24x8 analog mixer recently, which I can use. What I'm wondering is what would be the best way to make use of these two pieces of equipment to get the best (for someone that doesn't know what he's doing, recording basement punk rock) sound in the easiest way onto my machine. Being quite a bit out of my depth on this, I'm looking for any suggestions people might have; I need to know even what kinds of cable I would need, etc.

In case it helps, I have: A couple of SM57s, an E609, some other random microphones, the M-Audio Firewire 1814, the Mackie, and I've been using Sonar 6.

Thanks very much for any advice you all have!

[mixsit]

Direct outs from the Mackie is the simplest clean path. Bus outs if you'd like to do any group of mics, sub mixes or use the channel bus switches as a router to asign any number of mics at diferent times without repatching.

[zrxer]

So, I would go from either the direct or bus outs on the Mackie to the unbalanced inputs on the M-Audio? Will the output from the Mackie be "high" enough for the unbalanced inputs on it (that is, can I add gain on the Mackie so that the level is reasonable)? Since the inputs are unbalanced do I just need some short TR cables for these connections?


Sorry for such basic questions.