soundcard as sound source

S

saxman

New member
I'm not sure if I can articulate this question accurately, but here goes: Can anybody give me a quick rundown on the pros/cons of using a soundcard as your sound source for hard disk recording?

I'm planning on recording my sax along with some MIDI sequences onto my hard drive, and taking them to MP3 and putting them on the web.

I'm not clear about how good/bad my results will be using my Tropez soundcard for the MIDI sound source. I know when played back through my computer speakers it sounds cheezy, but the same sequences through an external MIDI keyboard sound acceptable. My problem is that the keyboard doesn't have a MIDI out, so I can't use it as the source for recording.

It also seems that software synths are reasonably priced, would that be a better alternative?

I'd appreciate any thoughts on the matter.
 
Hmm, not sure I've understood the problem here, but why, if the sounds are good, don't you midi up the keyboard (soundcard midiout to keyboard midiin) and then record the audio output from the keyboard back into the audio in of the SC (keyboard lineout to sc linein). Then have sax on a second audio track...

Feel free to re-ask the question!-)

matt
 
OK, I'll admit it, the keyboard is a cheap home-use Yamaha with built in speakers, so no MIDI out or thru, only MIDI in, and the only audio out is the headphone jack.

As much as I'd like to use the sounds, I'm afraid that this setup is just to poor to record back to the HD, although I have had success recording to MiniDisc out of the headphone jack.

I may just give it a try, although I'm still wondering if the sounds from the soundcard will record with better results than the playback through the computer speakers would indicate.
 
Hello again,

Ah! I see.

Well, I have a tropez too, and the sounds, whilst being fairly good at the time, are now old and tired, and will just not give you anything like a half-decent synth.

On the other hand, have you got memory on board the Tropez? 30 pin simms? Because then you can load your own samples into memory and play them back via midi... This means you could get samples of the web, or buy a sample CD or whatever! I've actually got some simms lying about somewhere, let me know if you don't have any.

But I would definately give the headphone out a try - there shouldn't be any difference in quality between recording direct to MD or HD!

Hope this helps,

matt
 
Thanks, Matt. I guess I might as well give it a go before buying any additional hard or software. What have I got to lose besides an afternoon?

Thanks again.
 
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