alright...... I'll get a patchbay......
or maybe just reconfigure the ones I have. For just the small amount of analog equipment I have, I already have two full 16 row patchbays.....
Ok...then just connect all your equipment I/O to the PBs...and then patch what you need for a given situation. If you want to do some normalling, fine, but I only do that with a couple of things, and the rest is all just straight inputs and outputs that need to be physically patchaed.
Miro- I remember reading how you use the patchbays as a way to organize your thoughts when you were recording... kind of thinking through the process.... (.....see...... I told you I was creepin.....
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I think what you are talking about is my saying that without using too much pre-connected or normalled gear...it makes me see and think about what's going where...etc...so I'm always conscious and deliberate about my signal chains. When stuff us pre-connected or normalled...you tend to forget about it, and/or take some things for granted.
Yeah...it requires more patch points not to normal anything...but it's not that big a deal, and IMO, is always the most straightforward way to go.
Only when I went I switched to the Trident console a couple of years ago did I bother including some normalled connections...and that happened mostly because with the console I also acquired some patchbays with all the cabling... basically almost all the cabling that goes to the back the of the console.
Some of that was already configured with normalled points (like the output of the tape returns to the Trident monitor section...and the console direct outs to the tape deck inputs...so I just went with this time, but if I had wired up the PBs myself from scratch, I probably would not have done that.
Why...?...because I have a hybrid setup...so today I'm tracking to the deck, and using the console for monitoring...but maybe tomorrow I will tracking to the DAW, and wanting to use the console for monitoring, so then I still have to patch and break the normal connections.
The whole thing about normalled points is if you have some very specific I/O setup that you will use like 90% of the time... but if you are going to be breaking those normal connections a lot...then why bother with them...just setup the bays as straight patchable I/O.
Anyway...that's just me...you can set them up how you prefer.
I also read that you took the tracks right off the tapehead to the mixdown. Can you do that simultaneously on the same computer?...... My thought is to come out of the DAW=> Audio Interface=> Patch to 4 Track Recorder=> mixer => separate (or maybe the same?) Audio interface=> back to computer to record mixdown (something like Audacity)... Is this possible?
Mmm...I'm not quite following your here.
The way I usually will track is to the tape deck, the DAW isn't even on. When tracking, I use the console purely for the cue monitoring of the recorded and live tape tracks...unless I want to use a console preamp during tracking, then I patch through that.
Once I'm done with that...I fire up the DAW, set up my sync system...and transfer the tracks from the tape deck to the DAW...the console is not part of that.
When I finish my DAW nonsense...I break out the DAW tracks to my console, and do the final mixing there, with my outboard processing.
That said....I've already done a lot of edits and processing and pre-mixing in the DAW before I come back out to the console...so during final mixdown, I'm working the tracks and processing both in the DAW and at my console and outboard. So it's a very hybrid thing. I don't just go from one to the other...I'm actually using both simultaneously when I do the final mix.
Not sure if that made things clearer or more confusing...