Help With Home Recording Troubleshoot

jadoss23

New member
I have been recording at home for years now but have recently hit a wall. I currently have Behringer interface and a 3U audio CM1 Teal mic used with an art tube preamp. I have been getting a lot of distortion with vocals I hadn't got in the past and trying to figure out why. Any idea? thanks
 
I have been recording at home for years now but have recently hit a wall. I currently have Behringer interface and a 3U audio CM1 Teal mic used with an art tube preamp. I have been getting a lot of distortion with vocals I hadn't got in the past and trying to figure out why. Any idea? thanks

Have you tried plugging it in without the preamp to rule that out?
 
I did and tried a different mic. Still distorting when I sing. My levels aren't peaking in garageband either.
 
I did and tried a different mic. Still distorting when I sing. My levels aren't peaking in garageband either.

Okay, so the problem is not the mic or pre and likely not the cable. That makes it either your interface or settings on your computer. Someone else can chime in.
 
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Have there been any updates to the OS recently? I have heard that Apple changes the USB routines with a lot of upgrades. Can you check that the buffer settings haven't changed?

I don't run a Mac, so that's the best I can offer. I know there are others who run Macs online here. Also, which Behringer are you using? That might help.
 
I’ve never heard of OS X updates doing anything to USB. It’s core audio and I don’t know why they would have done anything lately unless OP updated to Catalina or Big Sur where they exorcised a lot of older stuff including 32-bit.

What interface model, specifically?

I’m still on Mojave and don’t see any problems. We need to hear it. Post a link to a file in Dropbox (leave off https:// in the URL).
 
The Catalina update had issues with USB 2.0 on some machines. Not sure which ones were involved. Apparently a fix was issued for this one. There are cases of people having issues going all the way back to Yosemite.

I don't run on Macs, just know a couple of people who do. The two I know are pretty computer savvy, so they tend to track down problems pretty well on their own, or know where to ask when something crops up.
 
The mention of "Behringer" brings to my mind a sad experience I had with that brand of mixer (I don't remember the model number now, since that episode with Behringer issues happened probably four years ago). My point here is that you should examine the output of that mixer to see if it is clean. I suggest connecting a good pair of headphones to the headphone jack on the mixer to see if you get clean audio out of it when you sing.
The model I had was one of their larger mixers with the digital effects processor built in. The first one that I received from the company worked only a day or so, then the effects processor began to make various weird squeaks, white noise, and other strange sounds. I got a replacement for that mixer promptly. I was able to use that unit for several months, then it began to operate erratically. Fortunately, I had purchased a protection plan when I bought it, so I received reimbursement for the unit. The odd thing is that I am running a few of the smaller, simpler Behringer mixers on the stereo installation for my wife and one for me; they have worked beautifully for several years. It was apparently the digital effects processor which "bit" me on both units.
I read somewhere on the Internet back then that the company had at least for a time a problem with "cold-solder connections". Without getting too technical here, a "cold-solder joint" happens when a connection is not heated quite enough for the solder to flow and make a good bond between the two items which are supposed to be joined. That connection might work for some time - maybe even a few months - but it is likely to fail eventually. Once that happens, the unit is likely to malfunction in one way or another.
If everything else you have checked provides clean output, then the mixer should be suspected as a possible source of the problem. Again, I don't know how old your mixer is, but its performance should also be checked in your troubleshooting process.
 
We never got a file so don't know what the problem sounds like, if it's in the file, or just playback (D/A).
 
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