Hello,
I am mainly a musician (still in university) and am trying to get a home studio going on the side, mostly for 1-man projects. My projects are either more tratitional Jazz (Sax, E-Piano, Drums[sampled, not recorded], E-Guitar/-Bass) or fairly experimental Electro-Jazz-Mix (Sax, E-Piano, analog Synths, DrumMachine).
This means I am always only recording one instrument at a time and only the Sax is recorded with a mic. However, all my audio (recording and otherwise) is running through my monitors. So for composing, practicing, listening to music ect. everything needs to be able to run through the monitors without my Laptop (macbook) attached (I only use my Laptop when I have to - so only for actually recording/mixing stuff). Another problem is, that for the electronic stuff I run audio signals from the daw into the synths to use them as an "effect section", so I'd need a few outputs on my interface to facilitate that. I also plan on incorporating guitar-effect-pedals the same way.
This means, I need at least 4 line ins for e-piano, synth and drummachine (this means 2 for the drums, 1 for synth and 1 for ep), 6 would be better since I am looking to add another synth and would like to record the e-piano as stereo (it has stereo-effects on rhodes ect.). I also need at least 1 mic in (which ideally should double as an inst. in). My e-piano has a stereo line in, that just routes the audio to the line out together with it's own audio, so that might be a possibility to use one line in for two instruments (but I don't know how bad this is for the audio thats getting routed through).
So the way I see it, I could either get a 8 in 8 out interface with standalone capability or I get a small mobile interface and let the snyths run through a small analog mixer first. The third possibility would be to get a mixer with integrated audio interface.
In the end, I'd like to have a solution that sounds good, is expandable and does not break the bank. I think the first step would be to decide which type of setup is the most sensible choice, so I can then look into the specific components needed.
I hope you can help me with this,
Michael
Edit: This probably should have gone into the newbie section...
I am mainly a musician (still in university) and am trying to get a home studio going on the side, mostly for 1-man projects. My projects are either more tratitional Jazz (Sax, E-Piano, Drums[sampled, not recorded], E-Guitar/-Bass) or fairly experimental Electro-Jazz-Mix (Sax, E-Piano, analog Synths, DrumMachine).
This means I am always only recording one instrument at a time and only the Sax is recorded with a mic. However, all my audio (recording and otherwise) is running through my monitors. So for composing, practicing, listening to music ect. everything needs to be able to run through the monitors without my Laptop (macbook) attached (I only use my Laptop when I have to - so only for actually recording/mixing stuff). Another problem is, that for the electronic stuff I run audio signals from the daw into the synths to use them as an "effect section", so I'd need a few outputs on my interface to facilitate that. I also plan on incorporating guitar-effect-pedals the same way.
This means, I need at least 4 line ins for e-piano, synth and drummachine (this means 2 for the drums, 1 for synth and 1 for ep), 6 would be better since I am looking to add another synth and would like to record the e-piano as stereo (it has stereo-effects on rhodes ect.). I also need at least 1 mic in (which ideally should double as an inst. in). My e-piano has a stereo line in, that just routes the audio to the line out together with it's own audio, so that might be a possibility to use one line in for two instruments (but I don't know how bad this is for the audio thats getting routed through).
So the way I see it, I could either get a 8 in 8 out interface with standalone capability or I get a small mobile interface and let the snyths run through a small analog mixer first. The third possibility would be to get a mixer with integrated audio interface.
In the end, I'd like to have a solution that sounds good, is expandable and does not break the bank. I think the first step would be to decide which type of setup is the most sensible choice, so I can then look into the specific components needed.
I hope you can help me with this,
Michael
Edit: This probably should have gone into the newbie section...