jkstraw
New member
Good evening,
I am trying to get my first "home studio" setup so I can start doing some recording (new to this as well!). I am having some difficulty just understanding how everyhting works together and was hoping someone could help me out?
Here is the gear I have:
Hardware
- Athlon 1400 w/ 1GB DDR RAM
- 80 GB 7200 ATA & 160 GB 7200 ATA HDD
- Sound Blaster Live! 5.1
- Event EZbus recording device/control surface/digital mixer
- Terratec EWS88D ADAT PCI card
- M-Audio DMP3 mic/inst preamp
- Yamaha DTXpress III electronic drum set (want to use as midi controller)
- Roland PC-200 MK II (want to use as midi controller
- Misc mics, instruments
Software
Cubase SX
Sound Forge
+ more but these are what I mainly use.
Configuration:
- Using lightpipe from the EZbus to the EWS88D to get audio to/from my PC
- Using EWS88D ASIO driver in Cubase for audio
- Using USB (virtual midi port) to control software with EZbus
- Using 2 midi ports (2x in 2x out) on EWS88D for controller 1 (roland keyboard) and controller 2 (DTXpress III)
- Using the reutrns on the EZbus to monitor playback
- Using SB Live! 5.1 to monitor midi playback
My goal:
- Record live vocals, accoustic guitar, electric guitar, banjo, mandolin and drums
- Record midi drums, keyboards, bass, and other midi instruments/sounds
Ok - well I am not sure I have things setup properly so I will just ask a few questions and hopefully someone can correct my mistakes and help me understand some of the things I am missing and how to improve what I am doing.
Question 1: Midi physical connections
My understanding is that each of my 3 controllers need a seperate midi port (ie. no daisy chaining). This is because none of my controllers have a "thru" port. i) EZbus = midi in/out x 3, ii) DTXpress midi in/out, iii) Roland PC-200 midi out only.
Am I correct about this, or could I hook my keyboard and drumkit through the 2 unused ezbus midi ports? eg. drumkit midi out => ezbus midi 2 in => ezbus midi 2 out => EWS88D midi 2 in => software
Question 2: Monitoring midi and audio
When I select the EWS88D as my ASIO driver I can no longer use my sound blaster 5.1 card for playback of audio (which makes sense I guess). However, since the midi voices are stored on my sound blaster how can I monitor both my audio and midi together? Is there another piece of the pie I am missing here? My ultimate goal is to be able to monitor my recordings by sending them back to the EZbus returns via lightpipe. I can do this already with the audio - but not the midi (again I *think* this is because I have no sounds on the EWS88D or EZbus for the midi information to play).
Is there a software library I can purchase or something? Please don't say VST instruments - because I have no clue how to use those yet or really what they are!
I was going to write another few questions - but re-reading this I think I will count myself lucky to get some help on the first two!
Thanks to anyone who can lend a hand!
Cheers,
jk
I am trying to get my first "home studio" setup so I can start doing some recording (new to this as well!). I am having some difficulty just understanding how everyhting works together and was hoping someone could help me out?
Here is the gear I have:
Hardware
- Athlon 1400 w/ 1GB DDR RAM
- 80 GB 7200 ATA & 160 GB 7200 ATA HDD
- Sound Blaster Live! 5.1
- Event EZbus recording device/control surface/digital mixer
- Terratec EWS88D ADAT PCI card
- M-Audio DMP3 mic/inst preamp
- Yamaha DTXpress III electronic drum set (want to use as midi controller)
- Roland PC-200 MK II (want to use as midi controller
- Misc mics, instruments
Software
Cubase SX
Sound Forge
+ more but these are what I mainly use.
Configuration:
- Using lightpipe from the EZbus to the EWS88D to get audio to/from my PC
- Using EWS88D ASIO driver in Cubase for audio
- Using USB (virtual midi port) to control software with EZbus
- Using 2 midi ports (2x in 2x out) on EWS88D for controller 1 (roland keyboard) and controller 2 (DTXpress III)
- Using the reutrns on the EZbus to monitor playback
- Using SB Live! 5.1 to monitor midi playback
My goal:
- Record live vocals, accoustic guitar, electric guitar, banjo, mandolin and drums
- Record midi drums, keyboards, bass, and other midi instruments/sounds
Ok - well I am not sure I have things setup properly so I will just ask a few questions and hopefully someone can correct my mistakes and help me understand some of the things I am missing and how to improve what I am doing.
Question 1: Midi physical connections
My understanding is that each of my 3 controllers need a seperate midi port (ie. no daisy chaining). This is because none of my controllers have a "thru" port. i) EZbus = midi in/out x 3, ii) DTXpress midi in/out, iii) Roland PC-200 midi out only.
Am I correct about this, or could I hook my keyboard and drumkit through the 2 unused ezbus midi ports? eg. drumkit midi out => ezbus midi 2 in => ezbus midi 2 out => EWS88D midi 2 in => software
Question 2: Monitoring midi and audio
When I select the EWS88D as my ASIO driver I can no longer use my sound blaster 5.1 card for playback of audio (which makes sense I guess). However, since the midi voices are stored on my sound blaster how can I monitor both my audio and midi together? Is there another piece of the pie I am missing here? My ultimate goal is to be able to monitor my recordings by sending them back to the EZbus returns via lightpipe. I can do this already with the audio - but not the midi (again I *think* this is because I have no sounds on the EWS88D or EZbus for the midi information to play).
Is there a software library I can purchase or something? Please don't say VST instruments - because I have no clue how to use those yet or really what they are!
I was going to write another few questions - but re-reading this I think I will count myself lucky to get some help on the first two!
Thanks to anyone who can lend a hand!
Cheers,
jk