acid 4.0

[clothespinrifle]

hi, i recently bought acid pro 4.0 for my home recording stuff, but theres something wrong with the way it is set up i believe, and i was hoping someone could clue me in- im somewhat new to the program. when i record my guitar track, it sounds great, however, when i try to record a vocals track over it, i get it recorded, but in addition to the vocals, i get the gutiar track also. now, at first i thought it might be the speakers playing into the mic, but then i tried turning the mic off and it still recorded the guitar track. if anyone knows why it is doing this, i would very much appriciate your help on it. in addition, if anyone could give me suggestions on how to reduce the extra hissing noise that i always get when i record, that would be much appriciated too. i know that since my gear isnt of the quality of a recording studio that i will always have some hiss, but any reduction would be wonderful too.

thanks guys!

 

[manning1]

sounds like you have a sound blaster card or an audigy. ???
please confirm. then i can comment.

 

[bigwillz24]

Are you recording the vocals and guitar on the same track? Try setting up differant tracks?

I honestly have no clue but the manual and the good folks over in the Sonic Foundry part of this site may be of some use.

Welcome aboard!

 

[clothespinrifle]

wow, you nailed it. i have a brand new audigy pro, for the life of me, i dont know how you knew right off the bat... wow....

 

[manning1]

clothespin.
these are common problems with audigy sound cards.
if i remember use line input , and turn off the what you hear option.
i dumped sb years ago because of problems.
would suggest respectfully you might like to look at a delta sound
card some time or a pro sound card.
zzounds.com and music123.com have lots.
heres the chainto run..
mic>>mic pre or mixer>>line in of sound card.
dont use audigys mic input.

 

[bigwillz24]

Kudos manning excellent troubleshooting...

 

[manning1]

thnx. ive seen so many newbie friends of mine have probs with these.
i warn them in advance.

they normally get rid of them, and move on to something better once they get the hang of this recording madness a bit. hence why you see so many
on ebay.

 

[clothespinrifle]

many many thanks, you guys have solved my problem. i really appriciate it, and its great that you guys who actually know what youre doing are around to help those of us who dont. i doubt ill be able to dump my audigy anytime soon, as the computer it is in was jsut built in september and i was told that audigy was the way to go, so thats what i did. once again, many thanks, you guys are great!

 

[bigwillz24]

The audigy is great... if your a gamer

 

[clothespinrifle]

my computer buddies told me, so i guess thats why. its all good, im not going for studio quality. did you guys have any tips on reducing the ambient noise on the recordings?

 

[bigwillz24]

The cheap less effective way...

Hang some blankets around the source you are attempting to record. Use noise reduction plugs in acid.

The right way....

Treat your room. I am in no way an expert at this so...
Have a look around the studio building part of the forum lots of info check this place out too www.johnlsayers.com

 

[manning1]

if you look at your input monitoring meters(when not playing an instrument) you will see the noise level of the audigy. a way to BEAT THE AUDIGY is to after recording a track.....
select a portion of the track where your not playing to get a noise print for the track. then using MILD levels of noise reduction...denoise the track.
if you dont have a noise reduction feature in your software....
tell me, and i'll make suggestions.peace.

 

[clothespinrifle]

i am not sure if ive got a noise reduction feature or not, but ill do some reading and experimenting with acid and see what i can come up with. i also an going to look into some different cables to run from the mixer to my line in on the soundcard, because right now im using speaker cables into a Y adapter into a 1/4-1/8 then into the computer. once again, many thanks.

 

[manning1]

if you want good noise gating, (plus a slew of other usefull effects plus midi etc, ) i use powertracks from pgmusic.com. the noise gate is very effective.
try the demo sometime. just import a wave track into it hilite whole track.
set gate threshold around -25 to -20 db and process. then export. peace.

 

[crankz1]

Yeah Acid has a noise gate included with it.
Also when you are at the Record window you can enable monitoring on the meters. Also, you can right click the meters and change the range to show down to -120db. If you crank up the record level for the Line In, you can get a good idea of what your Audigy's own noise floor is without the mixer connected and total noise floor with the mixer. This can help in setting the threshold for the noise gate. Even better than the included noise gate would be Sonic Foundry's noise reduction plugin, but that's not included.
And yes, get some better cables. Speaker cables aren't shielded.

 

[clothespinrifle]

many thanks crankz1, ill give it a try as soon as i have a chance. ill look into powertracks also, however, i doubt ill spend the money to buy it because i just spent money on the acid software. thanks again guys