A few quick noob questions.

[TunaTheFish]

Hi, i'm relatively new to recording, need to ask a few quick questions.

1. As i have a slight delay when recording could my soundcard be a cause of this (atm i have a CRAP sound card, i cannot install my good one until i re-order new drivers) If yes, then will a better sound card fix this?

2. Does the length/make of cables (guitar cables, midi cables etc...) effect recording in any way e.g. sound quality, delay (for longer cables)....??

3. I have a CASIO CTK-651 keyboard, but is this a good keyboard to start recordig with? Or has anyone used it before?? ( i am planning on recording mainly guitar with backing tracks, not in a band)

4. Will my computer effect any recording time/effects or anything???? what i mean is is it fast enough to avoid any problems that you may get with a slow computer, i have AMD Athlon XP2000+, 768Mb ram, GeForc4 4 MX440 128mb card, and 1.5mb internet

I would appreciate any help, thanks

 

[LfO]

1) A pro sound card will almost certainly reduce latency to an acceptable level. Getting bad latency from crap cards is common.

2) Longer cables pick up more noise. If you have a typical one-room studio, and you use cables that are only about as long as you need (lots of 6' and 10'), you shouldn't have a problem. There's a lot of discussion about whether expensive cables truly sound better in general, but if there is a difference, I think its fair to say you have to have very good ears to notice.

3) If it sounds good enough to you, it is good enough. Casio typcially means "toy," but it looks like this is one of their higher-end models. I haven't heard it, but I suspect you'll grow out of it. Should be fine for now.

4) My machine is 1 GHz with 512 RAM, and it runs Sonar 4 Producer acceptably well - yours should have NO problems with average projects.

Hope this helps!

 

[snow lizard]

1. It could if it was not designed for recording. Latency issues with some systems will give you a delay. A low latency soundcard or recording interface will greatly reduce the delay so it becomes less noticeable and intrusive. Search for reference material on phase issues and how to correct for them. DAWs will allow the painstaking process of lining up the tracks so they're in sync. If you can put a count-in at the beginning of each of your tracks and tap along with it before the performance begins, this might help you to line up the tracks later on. If the delay happens when monitoring your signal through headphones or whatever while recording, a higher quality setup will help. For older Soundblaster type cards, the only clock speed for the card is 16 bit, 48kHz. Any other setting (like 44.1) will add latency as a conversion from this rate is necessary.

Check this out:

https://homerecording.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=171645

2. Yes. Depending on what you're recording, cables can make a difference. MIDI cables don't handle any audio signals, so things should be ok there. You should know the difference between balanced vs. unbalanced cables to know what you need to hook stuff up properly. How the balancing act is achieved will make a difference in sound quality. There are also different signal levels like +4 line level, -10, mic level, etc... There's also a difference between high impedance vs. low impedance signals that will make a difference if you're trying to connect something to something else that has a drastic mismatch here.

For unbalanced cables, anything under 20 feet is generally acceptable; shorter cables might give you better results under certain circumstances. As LFO suggested, anything from 6' to 10' or so going between unbalanced connections should give you no trouble. Microphones are a bit different, because the weak signal will start to loose its strength beyond 20 feet in an unbalanced cable, but most mics these days have balanced output. You can do much longer cable runs with balanced circuits.

You shouldn't experience any delay issues unless you're running miles of cable.

These issues have been covered on this board every day for 6 years or so. There's lots of information for you if you do a search and read.

3. I'm not sure what model they're using, but most of the music at http://www.homestarrunner.com/ was recorded with a Casio keyboard.

4. Different software and different audio interfaces will have different requirements for computer horsepower. Generally, 7200 RPM hard disks are best, more RAM is better, and faster CPU speeds will allow more tracks and processing. There are also system tweaks that can help to optimize a computer for hard disk recording, but I'm not exactly sure where to find them offhand. Go look at the manufacturer's specs, but I think your system should have adequate horsepower to run nearly everything on the market these days.

My recording setup never touches the internet.


Good luck,


sl

 

[TunaTheFish]

Ok thanks for all the help.
1 of my cables is short and one is a long crap black one, i think i will get a better one, but i have also been reccomended some Audiophile mu401 card (dont bite me if that is wrong i am writing this from memory), and i have a few questions about this again
is this designed for recording?
Will it work with Cubase? ( i have an older version SX2 which i just bought so still getting used to
What can the card handle as in inputs (as a min i would want midi in/out, and to be able to record guitar (maybe 2 guitars simultaneously) and vocals.
Where can i go about getting one (Im in UK)

Sorry if these questions are stupid but i am still getting used to all this recordin stuff
Thanks

 

[LfO]

You should probably browse around some of the online music stores to get a feel for what interfaces are available. The MAudio Audiophiles are designed for recording, but they don't have preamps, so you would have to buy a seperate preamp for your mic (I think this is true - just glanced around at zzounds.com, so I could be wrong). There are really so many options, you should decide what you want first, then pick some contenders, and search/ask about them here. Here's a good starting point:

http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/cat--Audio-Interfaces--2418

You'll need to consider whether you want USB, Firewire, PCI, etc.

Here's one that's at the low end cost-wise, but seems to be well spoken-of around here:
http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/item--TASUS122
Its USB, has MIDI in/out, stereo audio in/out (guitars are typically recorded in mono, so you can still record 2 at a time), and phantom-powered XLR inputs so you can use any type of mic. This has a decent baseline feature set, so I'd use it as a point of comparison, at the least.

I don't know what shipping costs would be like, but zzounds.com, music123.com, and americanmusical.com are all reputable online stores.