Can I use multiple mics on drums, but record into the daw with 1 channel?

F

Fojar

New member
This isn't the regular fojar, but a friend.

I have a soundcraft spirit SX and plenty of the right mics (thanks fojar) and I want to record drums. I'm thinking regular 'ol kick, two overheads, toms, snare. The only problem is, I have a horrible soundcard with only one input (oh god.. soundblaster) and I'm not sure how to use all those mics and run them into one channel on cubase, or hell, multiple for each mic if it's possible (it's not, without a good soundcard, to my knowledge).

I'm thinking just get in the "control room," adjust the levels and EQ and such just about right on drums, and start recording into one channel.

How do I do this?

Desperate. Thanks.
 
You will basically just need to run your mics into a mixer, create a mix of the mics, and send a single channel out to your soundcard. You will just need to make sure you are mixing well before you send the signal to your computer as you will not be able to adjust later.

A single channel for something like a drum kit is rough as you will have no stereo image. It would be nice if you could at least mix everthing to 2 track instead of mono.
 
starch said:
You will basically just need to run your mics into a mixer, create a mix of the mics, and send a single channel out to your soundcard. You will just need to make sure you are mixing well before you send the signal to your computer as you will not be able to adjust later.

A single channel for something like a drum kit is rough as you will have no stereo image. It would be nice if you could at least mix everthing to 2 track instead of mono.
Click to expand...

Yes, but could I do that with the soundblaster? I'm sure my mixer is capable.

Also, how would I go about sending it to to the card? Where would I plug the cable coming from the card in the mixer? For recording I just plug it into the output at the very top of the mixer/channel.

Perhaps I phrased what I want to do wrong. All I want to do is use more than one mic on a drum kit and be able to send it to cubase.
 
ok first of all, if you are using multiple mics there is no use if you get them dowm to 1 channel (mono). The whoel purpose of using more than 1 mic is to capture the sound from different room ambience and you need a stereo (2 channels) to achieve that. Ok lets say you have 5 mics, All you have to do now is connect your 5 mics into 5 different channels in your mixer XLR inputs (channel 1,2,3,4,5) Hope you have that many mic channels in your mixer. Then you need to run two wires from the mixer main out (1/4 inch L&R) or the mixer tape out (RCA - Left (white) and right (red) ) into teh soundblasters linein (1/8" socket) If you have the mixer and the mics, all you need to do is get a wire like this
http://www.hosfelt.com/media/60-422.jpg (if you are using tape out)
 
The mixer will have a pair of Stereo Out or Mains Out jacks. These may be XLR or 1/4" (or both).

Plug all your mics into the mixer and pan each channel hard left. Plug a 1/4" cable into the Left Mains Out jack. Get a 1/4" to 1/8" converter from Radio shack and use it to plug the cable into your soundblaster.

If you arm a track in Cubase, you should get all the mics captured onto that track. Not much you can do with it mix-wise tho'
 
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