Tracking guitar direct sounds great in headphones when playing ... BUT

bluesfordan

Member
like the title says, I had a nice happening sound (finally) going direct. Great. Think I'm going to hear what went in come back out ... eh, nope. :eek::cursing:

recording solid body electric direct, wearing headphones, getting good solid sound without fartiness. nice fat waveforms in the audio tracks.

Then I play it back, through the same headphones, same output, not changing any levels. The output of the recorded signal is way less than what shows when I'm playing.

nature of the beast?
 
Need to know more about I/O and setup to help any

+1 If using a 'generic' USB device (or even the internal soundcard..Ghaaa!) the record and playback levels are at the mercy of Windows Sounds&Devices.

Common problem. I have the appropriate screen grabs on hand....er? SOMEHWHERE!

Dave.
 
2012 mac mini. OSX 10.12.6 Garageband 10.1.3, Behringer UMC404HD

Strat into DI box, with split off to Tech21 SansAmp, so two instrument inputs for one guitar. DI box went to a dry no effects audio track, SansAmp went to a vocal track (hey, it works) with several EQ and comp. Satisfied with sound on both. Sounds great while playing, not so loud and thinner on playback.

what other info can I supply (besides CC number and SSN :)
 
Don't know GB or the Behr, but are you monitoring the tracks or your inputs? My suspicion is you are direct monitoring the inputs, and the Behr is not the converting the sounds well.
 
I know the Behringer interfaces get a good rep here and other places but I would not trust them to have the drivers right for EVERY mac OS iteration and GB version.

No doubt one of our mac mods will be along shortly? "Hia know no-thing.."

Dave.
 
Don't know GB or the Behr, but are you monitoring the tracks or your inputs? My suspicion is you are direct monitoring the inputs, and the Behr is not the converting the sounds well.

Oh? Monitoring tracks or input? Ah ... I don't know:o

Obviously there's a difference but what's the reason for it? The manual doesn't say why you want that capability and I don't know which I am hearing.

Sorry for being so dumb but I'm really grateful for the information I learn here.
 
What [MENTION=39487]mjbphotos[/MENTION] said - I too think you might be monitoring the input and not the DAW. Where's that MIX knob set on the Behri?

You can open up the GarageBand project in Finder (right click, Show Package Contents, open Media/Audio Files), then put the actual tracks on DropBox or something like that and post links so we can see the actual record levels.

You can also just add another audio track without setting it up as a vocal track - not sure what you mean when you say the 2nd input "went to a vocal track?" Are you starting with a new, empty project and just adding 2 tracks with the "Choose a track type" dialog (attached - this is GB 10.2.0 BTW)?
 

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Oh? Monitoring tracks or input? Ah ... I don't know:o

Obviously there's a difference but what's the reason for it? The manual doesn't say why you want that capability and I don't know which I am hearing.

Sorry for being so dumb but I'm really grateful for the information I learn here.

Well, I don't know macs but..Most AI/DAW systems are setup (if you do nothing about it) as a "Unity Gain" system. That means the signals exiting the line outs (jacks, RCA, XLR? when recording will be identical in level when you replay said tracks.

Clearly this is not happening in your setup but as I say....I don't know macs!

Dave.
 
Monitoring input or track is all about signal flow. When you are recording there is an input from mic/line then into the computer. What you are listening to("monitoring"} is usually selectable between the input signal before the computer/daw or after the daw. The benefit of input("direct") monitoring is the lack of latency since what you hear as you are playing hasn't been delayed by going in then back out of the computer and converted twice. The drawback is that you aren't "hearing" what is actually going down in the daw until you play it back. Sorry if you already know all this basic stuff but in order to find out what you are hearing when you are recording I would suggest listening to the output after the DAW with the lowest latency buffer settings just to get a better idea of what is actually being recorded. Once what you have it set up so that you are getting the sound you want on the tracks then you can go back to "direct" monitoring the input when recording
 
I don't know about GB but I think every other DAW I have used has a built in waveform generator (often under 'Tools') This can record a sine tone of a specific frequency, for a specified time(usually in mSecs) and, most moot here, at a specified level.

So, find the genny and record 20secs of 1kHz at -6dBFS and let us know the result. I have to get dinner now but will attach such a .wav (well MP3) later if you wish. ...REFERENCES! We all need 'em!

Dave.
 
To follow up [MENTION=196554]Gtoboy[/MENTION]'s comment, you need to make sure that your interface is set so the headphone output is from the DAW, i.e., the MIX control is turned to the right, and not from the input (MIX control turned to the left). AND, you must have input monitoring enabled for both channels you are recording, and make sure both are recording. I would change the Track Header configuration to include the Record Enable button, so you know which ones are actually tracking when you press the red record button at the top. When a track is recording, and input monitoring enabled (button is green), it will play back in your headphones from the DAW. (If a track is not recording, even with input monitoring enabled, you will only hear it back from the DAW when it is the selected track.)
GarageBand for Mac: Turn on input monitoring for audio tracks
Screen Shot 2018-04-08 at 12.09.29 PM.png
 
Monitoring input or track is all about signal flow. When you are recording there is an input from mic/line then into the computer. What you are listening to("monitoring"} is usually selectable between the input signal before the computer/daw or after the daw. The benefit of input("direct") monitoring is the lack of latency since what you hear as you are playing hasn't been delayed by going in then back out of the computer and converted twice. The drawback is that you aren't "hearing" what is actually going down in the daw until you play it back. Sorry if you already know all this basic stuff but in order to find out what you are hearing when you are recording I would suggest listening to the output after the DAW with the lowest latency buffer settings just to get a better idea of what is actually being recorded. Once what you have it set up so that you are getting the sound you want on the tracks then you can go back to "direct" monitoring the input when recording

no, that's ok no need to apologize. I didn't know about that difference.

This part here, how do I accomplish that?
listening to the output after the DAW with the lowest latency buffer settings just to get a better idea of what is actually being recorded

by turning the monitor mix knob all the way to PB (playback)?

BTW - did some googling and there was mention of using options in GB preference that allowed for "minimum latency when tracking live instruments etc". My GB preferences offer no such option. The source was a 2008 youtube video so it was an earlier version of GB. why would they take away that option in a later version? Trying to force people to 'upgrade' to Logic ?
 
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BTW - did some googling and there was mention of using options in GB preference that allowed for "minimum latency when tracking live instruments etc". My GB preferences offer no such option. The source was a 2008 youtube video so it was an earlier version of GB. why would they take away that option in a later version? Trying to force people to 'upgrade' to Logic ?
They probably did it to stop people from totally screwing things up and then having questions about why it didn't help, or got worse, etc. GB is supposed to be simple. Do you have latency problems when monitoring from the DAW?
 
screw things up? how likely is that going to happen, LOL? *they must have seen me coming and decided to CYA "quick, disable everything, don't let him muck it up."
 
screw things up? how likely is that going to happen, LOL? *they must have seen me coming and decided to CYA "quick, disable everything, don't let him muck it up."
Haha. Well, don't give yourself too much credit is my suggestion. I used GB for a couple of years and never knew there was a buffer setting. I use Logic Pro X now (and the new GB is essentially a de-featured version of that), but I've still never mucked with buffer sizes. I do hear latency sometimes, but often just restarting Logic makes it go away. Failing that, I do use "low latency" turned on during tracking (unfortunately, not an option I see in GB - maybe it's on by default?).

If you're just starting out, it never hurts to try some other DAW. Reaper has a huge support community and you can try it for free. DAWs are all doing the same thing, but done with different points of view. One or another might make more sense to you, e.g., the way it's laid out.

If you're on a Mac, BTW, I've found that 16GB of RAM makes a big difference over 8, which is passable for tracking (sans plugins) but can be challenged at mixing a lot of tracks, depending on the plugins. 4GB, well, that's just asking for trouble.

Putting projects on an external drive helps any configuration IME, especially if you can keep the interface and drive on separate busses. (This applies to any computer, but, of course, if you don't have any problems, don't unnecessarily change things!)
 
I am more or less just starting out, at least in the digital realm. Yes, I'm using GB because it's on my Mac. I did max out the RAM to 16. I have an external HD that I use for backup and I never really did anything special i.e. nothing at all in terms of configuration. I've seen videos of Reaper and it is probably the DAW I'm heading to next. I wanted to practice on GB for a while. I've been having at it since about Dec of '16. I hardly think that I've mined it for all it is worth but even with my limited knowledge I seem to be learning of its shortcomings as much as I am of what it can do.

I think it may be time to switch. Once I begin recording in earnest, I'll have a lot of material I want to mix and that doesn't look to be a strong point of GB
 
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