EDIT: would this be a good soundcard for my rock band to buy? http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/item--THKMIMD662 (not looking for any uber proffesional stuff... will it solve my problems described below?)
Well, first let me describe my setup: Casio Privia 400 Digital Piano , 1.8 ghz, 384 RAM, onboard soundcard, using Cakewalk Sonar 3.
Here is a recording I made: . This is the plain piano recording, except I added a bit of compression to get rid of some minor clipping in some places, and i added reverb and some EQ adjustments.
I made this recording by taking the 1/4 inch headphone out of my keyboard directly to my soundcard line in, and used a 1/4 to 1/8 inch adapter here. This method of recording sounded better than using the keyboard line out to the line in of the soundcard, and it also sounded better by hooking up my keyboard to a mixer, and then the mixer to the soundcard line in. This confused me, because I thought that the line out of the keyboard should produce a better sound, but instead found that the headphone outs produced a better sound... is this logical?
Anyway, as you probably noticed, the sound clip isnt as great as it could be. There is a lot of noise at the beginning, you can notice it especially in the beginnning when i am not playing, but it continues throughout the whole song. How to I get rid of this noise? Is a better soundcard the solution?
Also, the recording is not loud. This is as loud as I could make it without tons of clipping. I was reading that the audio bits might have something to do with this. My soundcard only supports 16 bit audio, but i was reading that with higher bit supporting soundcards (like 24 bit audio) would be able to record at higher volumes without clipping. So is a better soundcard also the way to go to make my recordings louder without clipping?
Basically, I am wondering if i need a better soundcard to fix these problems, or if some other tweaking with my current setup will in any way improve my sound.
PS: i was also reading about direct boxes. I understand that they are used when plugging an instrument directly into the soundcard as I am. Would a direct box or a soundcard be a better buy for me? Or should i get both? Thanks!
PPS: that recording was my composition! Despite my few messups and rushing to finish it at the end (sped up too much in tempo), how do you like it?
Well, first let me describe my setup: Casio Privia 400 Digital Piano , 1.8 ghz, 384 RAM, onboard soundcard, using Cakewalk Sonar 3.
Here is a recording I made: . This is the plain piano recording, except I added a bit of compression to get rid of some minor clipping in some places, and i added reverb and some EQ adjustments.
I made this recording by taking the 1/4 inch headphone out of my keyboard directly to my soundcard line in, and used a 1/4 to 1/8 inch adapter here. This method of recording sounded better than using the keyboard line out to the line in of the soundcard, and it also sounded better by hooking up my keyboard to a mixer, and then the mixer to the soundcard line in. This confused me, because I thought that the line out of the keyboard should produce a better sound, but instead found that the headphone outs produced a better sound... is this logical?
Anyway, as you probably noticed, the sound clip isnt as great as it could be. There is a lot of noise at the beginning, you can notice it especially in the beginnning when i am not playing, but it continues throughout the whole song. How to I get rid of this noise? Is a better soundcard the solution?
Also, the recording is not loud. This is as loud as I could make it without tons of clipping. I was reading that the audio bits might have something to do with this. My soundcard only supports 16 bit audio, but i was reading that with higher bit supporting soundcards (like 24 bit audio) would be able to record at higher volumes without clipping. So is a better soundcard also the way to go to make my recordings louder without clipping?
Basically, I am wondering if i need a better soundcard to fix these problems, or if some other tweaking with my current setup will in any way improve my sound.
PS: i was also reading about direct boxes. I understand that they are used when plugging an instrument directly into the soundcard as I am. Would a direct box or a soundcard be a better buy for me? Or should i get both? Thanks!
PPS: that recording was my composition! Despite my few messups and rushing to finish it at the end (sped up too much in tempo), how do you like it?
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. Also, the major problems of the recording i mentioned above were the high noise level and the quietness of the recording. I was not concerned with anything like a bad instrument sound. The sound of the instrument is fine, and i would not think that purchasing a higher end keyboard would decrease noise or allow me to record at higher volumes without clipping.