BR-8 vs. PC-based recording system

  • Thread starter Thread starter gordholio
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gordholio

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Hi everybody:

Okay, I'm pretty new to this whole recording thing. I'm currently auditioning a BOSS BR-8. It's pretty cool (for my purposes), but I think I'll be aching for a PC-based "studio" pretty soon. We have a garage band (playing in a garage!). We're all saddled with mortgage payments, etc., so we don't have tons of money. :-(

Anyway, the question I have is (and this is a real newbie question): What do I need apart from the PC to do a good job of recording our band? I don't need advice on building the PC aside form the sound card, and I think I know the mics I'll be using. But what else do I need apart from this? Do I need an external mixer, or can everything be done through the PC and a good sound card with breakout box?

Thanks in advance for your advice! I need all the help I can get.

gordo
 
Hey there,
I went from a br-8 to pc recording and i made sure to sell the br8 right away so i would have no choice but to figure out how to compter record. If i had the br8 i wouldve went back to it and thrown my whole computer in the ocean. The br8 only has 2 inputs by the way so I dont know if you could your band without an external mixer. It has very decent effects, very simple to work and really is plug n play which is so convenient for beginners who just wanna record. And its easy to put the music onto a cd. It doesnt have alot of recording time so forget about recording a live gig with it , or pushing record play and practising for 2 hours. Never gonna happen. And Its hard to edit the music afterwords cuz you cant really SEE what you recorded.

Computer recording on the other hand is a whole other ballgame. Its like going from baking a cake from a cake mix and baking from scratch. You need to buy all the ingredients separately. You may need an external mixer depending on your soundcard , if you need preamps, phantom power (although youre probably using dynamics for your band) good software for recording and editing, (i started off with cakewalk homestudio and now use sonar 5xs the price), you'll want to install a cd burner i guess, and then you'd have to get all the effects;reverb, (that means NO reverb in yuor headsets while recording unless you get a small external reverb,)compressors, delay, guitar effects, etc and install them and the editing is tricky and computers arent predictable, they freeze, they crash, they have fits (oh thats me) and the software can be confusing. So, Basically if you have a week or two to learn the software you get, or have someone work with you and you can set it up that you plug in your instruments into the mixer, turn on the computer, open the software, get a level for the mikes, arm tracks and record in less than 5 -10 mins, than go for it cuz you can do much more with the computer and the br8 is really limiting.

Ok , hope that helps
Shana
 
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