Home Recording Startup

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dustinself

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Hello all. I am completely new with home recording, and am looking for now just to get digital tracks from my Boss Br-532 to my computer, and from my computer to cd. The Boss recorder has a digital out, but i don't have a digital in on my computer. I have a cd burner on my computer.

Do I have to buy a whole new sound card for home recording, or is there some sort of optical adapter for my current sound card?

Do I have to immediately purchase some sort of home recording software, or is there a basic software that comes with most computers that will let me save and handle some basic manipulation of those digital tracks?

If I have to buy a new sound card and home recording software, what package would you recommend for a beginner looking to want to get serious with home recording? (Meaning I don't want some podunk software that I am going to have to replace 6 mos. down the line when I outgrow it.)

Any help and advice would be awesome! Cool site - exactly what I was looking for!
 
This is an easy one. The BR532 uses a flash memory card to record on. Get a card reader that will plug into your computer (no doubt your computer has USB ports, which are popular for the readers) and download the recording exactly like you'd download photos from a digital camera.
 
Sorry I missed this part of your question.
Fairly cheap interfaces are available for input through USB ports (I just bought a USB hub: I've got a USB trackball mouse, a USB keyboard, a USB recording software controller, a USB MIDI interface.... It's pretty easy to find what you need. Edirol has the UA-1D, which features a Toslink interface to USB, for about $100 from mailorder shops. The card reader is cheaper.
Also: You can download many demo versions of recording software from Syntrillium.com, digidesign.com and other places. An inexpensive one is Cool Edit Pro 2000. I use CEP 2.0, which is very nice, but a lot pricier. CEP 2000 should be adequate if you are basically "parking" the tracks on the computer until you burn a CD from them.
 
lpdeluxe said:
Sorry I missed this part of your question.
Fairly cheap interfaces are available for input through USB ports (I just bought a USB hub: I've got a USB trackball mouse, a USB keyboard, a USB recording software controller, a USB MIDI interface.... It's pretty easy to find what you need. Edirol has the UA-1D, which features a Toslink interface to USB, for about $100 from mailorder shops. The card reader is cheaper.
Click to expand...

Although you can connect all those USB devices to a PC at the same time, it would not be advisable especially if you are bringing in digital audio. USB bandwith is already very limiting and once you chain all those devices together, they all share that same bandwith which could be detrimental to the audio coming in.

I agree with lpdeluxe, just go out and buy a $50 cardreader and be done with it.
 
brzilian, you're right and I should have clarified. I don't use USB for signal path...for that I've got ADAT lightpipe. But USB shore is easy to pluginta.
 
dustinself, I'll third the recommendation for the card reader - by far the cleanest, easiest option. There are a bunch of shareware/freeware audio editors, Goldwave being one of the more popular ones.

...and welcome to the board :D
 
Thanks for the advice guys! I am going to do the card reader, for now. For future reference, how would I go about recording directly to my computer harddrive from the Boss recorder.....via optical cable?
 
No that I understand what exactly you are trying to do (or why, for that matter), but as lpdeluxe said - the cheapest Optical In port for a computer is the Edirol UA-1D.
You can also use a Sound Blaster Live or Audigy with a digital daughter-board. If you already have an SB-Live, it may be worth getting, because these boards cost like 30-40$. If you don't have an SB-Live, the Edirol thing is probably cheaper.

Oren

www.edirol.com - This is the Edirol website
www.hoontech.com - These guys make the daughter board. Amongst other things.
 
Thanks Aren! I believe that answers my question. As you can probably tell, I'm completely new to this....so let me know if I'm way off base in any of my thinking. What I am looking to do is to use my computer for storing tracks instead of recording to the SmartMedia card of my Boss recorder......if that is even possible. I run out of space too fast on those cards. That and I just want to skip the step of transfering from the card to my computer when I am ready to burn a cd.
 
Oh.....also, another thing - am I wrong in thinking that I may have wasted money on buying a Boss multi-track recorder when I am looking to eventually use my computer to edit tracks/compose songs/add effects/etc? It seems that is also in the function of the Boss recorder....so all I really would have needed was some way to record tracks from vocals/guitar/drums to my computer....and I didn't need all the "fancy" editing tools of the recorder itself. Oooops....did I waste money?....should have come here before I started buying stuff........
 
Dustinself -

Using the Boss just to get tracks in the computer does seems like a pretty expensive way to do it... I wouldn't say a waste, though. There probablt be situations when you'll be gratefull for the Boss' portability, and ease of use.
It seems like what you want to do can be achieved with any of the solutions that were offered to you.
For a good inexpensive multi-track program, you might want to check out N-Track. www.fasoft.com

Good luck!

Oren
 
What you'll find is that you will expand your collection of stuff as you identify needs...and spend money. I started 2-1/2 years ago with a new computer, a Lexicon soundcard, a CD burner and Cool Edit Pro SE: I now have a digital mixer, a tube mic preamp (had good mics all along), everything hooked up via digital optical, and beaucoups of plugins. Not to mention twice as much RAM, another hard drive, an extra cooling fan.... It's the old home mechanic's rule: buy a tool when you need it, and then it'll be on hand the next time you need it.
regards
 
A couple things just to clarify:

While you can move files from your BR-532 to your computer via the SmartMedia card, they will be in a proprietary format. Good for storage/backup, but unusuable by any other product (including software editors) except the BR. If you want to edit your BR tracks on the PC or burn them to a CD, you will need to convert them to wav files using the free software on the Boss webpage:

http://www.rolandus.com/products/details.asp?catid=12&subcatid=48&prodid=BR-532

Look under applications and tools.

Btw, there is also a firmware update you can download and install via the SmartMedia card there as well. Reduces some noise and does a few other good things.
 
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