rob aylestone
Moderator
I dug out a dirt cheap focusrite copy, my elderly Presonus and my Midas M32 - stuffed an SM57 into them and recorded, at a distance with the gains up pretty high. The result was not quite what I expected.
Well lets look at this in the scope of the thread starter. The person needs an interface and the instrument primarily used is a keyboard. First, why not get one that comes with a Keyboard software and sample libraries I guess if you have a full keyboard rig this wouldn't be as important but it would be their limiting options too. Plus the SSL software package comes with Ableton, a keyboard centered DAW.I don't get this at all? Free software is hardly related to preamp quality, it's just marketing - perhaps a great solution when you can't quite make your mind up and don;t have a DAW? This 'quality' issue you mention I just struggle with. Over the years I've had black ones, red ones and all sorts and none were incompatible with dynamics - even dynamics used at a distance? Sure - that last twist on the dial brings up the noise, but it's rare for me to ever get close to that. I'm also a bit startled that the computer audio input could ever be better than a proper interface - Apple inputs and outputs seem better than the typical PC but even the cheapest interfaces I've tested do a pretty decent job. I even had a Tascam in daily use I really liked that I discovered had a very weird spike and dip in it's frequency response - never ever noticed, because noise and distortion is what we listen for - tone, we do with EQ.
Of course some combination struggle - if you are forced into using any device outside it's design area, with another that makes that worse, then the problem was the combination, not the individual device. Until this year, everyone accepted SM7Bs were low output and just paired them with preamps that made it unimportant. Maybe I'll search my gear for both ends of the scale and try them against each other.
If I needed a preamp, Focusrite would not be an issue for me. On the latency front - apart from asio4all, which has latency values measured in days (BUT will at least make virtually anything produce audio) all the others seem to be a combination of the driver and your computer.
Actually, my knowledge is quite great. I'm sure I could dig out computer schematics, even the apple one. In laptops if they are using a charger, it will hum regaudless if its an Apple or a mac. Macbooks use a power supply, PC laptops are shipped with a charger. Technically either one would need a DI. Imacs have a simular power supply and in some cases would ground loop even through the USB/thunderbolt connection.Sadly, your knowledge of computer is a little lacking. As a live sound person, it is very well known that the audio out of a macbook pro is always a safe emergency solution, if a hardware interface fails - hum, noise and distortion is rarely an issue. Do this with a PC and it's a toss up if it works. At the very least, a DI to isolate the audio feed is pretty critical, as absolutely it is the case that all PCs are NOT the same. Experience for me is that certain brands are more problematic. Dell, for example. See one in a venue and you know any attempt to use the built in sound will be problematic. Usually nasty buzzes, and data noise superimposed on the audio. Do that with Apples and they are silent.
I dug out a dirt cheap focusrite copy, my elderly Presonus and my Midas M32 - stuffed an SM57 into them and recorded, at a distance with the gains up pretty high. The result was not quite what I expected.
I completely get where you are coming from but also understand it comes from a perspective of a whole lot of experience. Both opinions are valid. Spend a little more and get something a little better. Lots of people come here and just don't have the coin.Oh now since I have time to comment on this video, its not a very good comparison because its the same mic preamp circuit so the difference parts used is the subtle difference.
We have to look at what your generic Focusrite has for a mic preamp. Because its most likely not what is used in the Focusrite. Because it sounds like the same transistor input mic preamp as the other two. You want another mic preamp that is the same as the other three? That would be a Beringer ADAT. Or a board? Soundcraft Studio/live, 300b or Pesonus Studiolive24. Focusrite went to an opamp based that have a total different behavior and sound. So your video is kind of invalid like a lot of them on youtube that compare X to Y not knowing they are the same circuit. The other types are the instrumentation IC and instrumentation ic with DSP.
Its like the bad capacitor comparison videos where they should have compared electrolyte type (mica vs. electrolytic, vs polyester, vs polypropylene, vs. polystyrene) and across different circuits however, you are not going to tell much between different caps of the same electrolyte type.
Another thing I noticed is most use capacitor coupling or transformer coupling which really isn't needed in a preamp for dynamic mics. The coupling caps themselves induce roll off and phase shift and insertion loss and some noticed the 200% improvement changing to a transformer coupling in an interface, because transformers has always been better AC coupling device when selected properly for the circuit. DC coupling is even better.
I come from an electronics engineering background. So I have a unique view to this all as someone that builds this stuff. I also throughout the years worked in the pro studio world until it kind of fizzled out. I also record myself from time to time in my studio at the house.
I didn't like the beringer ADAT preamps and I was the guy who came up with the preamp bypass mod for it about 15 years ago because the converter is top notch back then and is also used in high end converters like the 4 channel Burl Mothership converters. Even though I ended up sticking the same preamp circuit on it (soundcraft studio/live) it had a better sound due to the parts used in the soundcraft was better than the beringer.
Modifications is another subject, and use case. But I don't agree with Black Lion on stuff and a long time ago they diddn't believe me when I told them to never mod a certain SSL converter they ended up ruining a few hundred of them in the field. In that case, their 'upgraded' opamps which was more of a side grade in quality over taxed the power supply causing total failure of the converter. Most of their clock mods were unnessisary and the few units I came across that had a clock issue I ended up taking the ICs off the board, cleaning the excessive surfacemount glue they glued the chip down and resoldered the same chip back. So the clock chipset had nothing wrong, it was just installed on the board incorrectly that should have been caught at the factory if they had better quality control.
I understand some people can't afford the ultra high end stuff. I know several musicians started with a simple mixer jacked into computer sound cards and didn't have problems. Problem I see is people using reviews which are paid opinions over people who had to deal with them over the years. But the Focusrite scarlette I would never recommend it to anyone. Because of several things beyond a poor quality mic preamp. There are tons of other interfaces out there with better mic preamps in them. Even that cheap Chinese no name interface. Since they don't hold their value, a nice used one could be obtained at a more reasonable price and the only advantage of buying new is if you need to get some software to get you started.completely get where you are coming from but also understand it comes from a perspective of a whole lot of experience. Both opinions are valid. Spend a little more and get something a little better. Lots of people come here and just don't have the coin.
Right on Marto! Now, soon as you can, post a test recording. 30 seconds is plenty but we need sound at your chosen recording level (around -20dBFS) and ten secs or so of as total silence as you can manage, that will allow us to judge your noise floor and make possible suggestions if it is not optimum.Hey, so I received my mic and interface. Plugged it all in, downloaded "focusrite control" and the drivers from focusrite.
I installed reaper and cakewalk to try out both. Inside the daw I set the audio system to ASIO and the ASIO driver to Focusrite USB ASIO (following a tutorial I saw on ytb).
I'm now good to go right? I tried it out and I think the quality is good. I'm also using direct monitoring and that seems to work quite well.
oh perfect, thank you. I understand better nowThe room sound one? I assume that was recorded at the same settings as the one with vocal? If so, your system noise is very low. Dave suggested -20dB as a (I think) worst case recording. Most folk nowadays don't chase 0dB at all because going over is easy to do and crunching the waveform so nasty to listen to. Often people do recording that hardly tickle the meters, nowhere near 0dB, so this reveals how the system noise right at the bottom would be a problem, or not. It's quite interesting to record a quiet signal, then normalise to say, -3dB and then listen to the noise in the background so you can decide if that is workable, or not. Nothing to do with the maximum level for your masters - it is just very important to know when not much, really is not enough for your system. I suspect, listening to the noise floor, that you will be fine.
Hmm, right clicking does not give me an actual "download" option. Some time ago I lost "save target as" and have struggled since!Dave - I just downloaded them by right clicking? worked fine for me?
Tried that Rich and, as expected it just saves the link. I still do not have the audio file to insert into Samplitude.I right clicked and chose "save link as", and it saved the MP3. It was properly uploaded.
Looking at the levels, the vocal level was ok, maybe even a bit to the high side. I saw -1.9dB as highest peak. If you clip of the first couple of seconds of sound from the silent section, the room noise is down at least 55dB, which is really pretty good.
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Its works well with condenser mics like the AT2020 because the mic pre is loading the microphone at mid impedance (3K) which is the low noise loading range of that mic.Hey, so I received my mic and interface. Plugged it all in, downloaded "focusrite control" and the drivers from focusrite.
I installed reaper and cakewalk to try out both. Inside the daw I set the audio system to ASIO and the ASIO driver to Focusrite USB ASIO (following a tutorial I saw on ytb).
I'm now good to go right? I tried it out and I think the quality is good. I'm also using direct monitoring and that seems to work quite well.