How to do this cheap?

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buda69

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I'm sure this has been asked time & time again but I must ask anyway. I want to take some analog 4 track recordings and bring them into my computer to edit and remix them. The computer that I have has a PIII 900mh, 512mb of ram, soundblaster 5.12 Live! sound card. I bought Acid 3.0 that came with Vegas LE, which is what put the idea in my head in the first place. I haven't had good success with the Vegas LE program. The timing of the tracks falls apart half way through the song. I just tried a song using a trial version of n-tracks which sounds better.
I guess what I need to know is do I have the right equipment to do this kind of project? If not what do I need? Also which program should I go with.
 
what do you mean by the timing falling apart?

are you trying to transfer the tracks individually (4 different tracks) or just the mix?.....
 
I recorded the 4 tracks in seperate through the line in. The first part of the song sounded great. Then somewhere in the middle the timing of the tracks fell apart so they were all out of sinc.
 
first suggestion....record to the computer in the first place.....probably can get better quality than the 4 track.....

secondly i would think that if the first part is in sync then it should be in sync all the way thru....that one boggles me.....

thirdly, if you must record with the 4 track and transfer, you could try a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz card...they go for $60 and youd be able to transfer all 4 tracks at once and theyd sync for sure......
 
i see you said transferring 4 tracks separately....you can transfer them 2 tracks at a time by using a 1/8" stereo plug into the line in and recording a stereo track.....

also to help line up the tracks record a click or hit at the very beginning of the tape across all 4 tracks...then when you have the 4 tracks in your software you can see where there hits are and help you line them up....
 
outta sync!!

yea i had the same problems with cakewalk and with acid pro 2.0. ive had good luck with sound forge, but when you dub over it in acid, i get waviness and turns to mush. kinda upsetting. so what type of sound cards are you guys recomending? im looking into spending some decent money... why does the recording become almost tremolo like? is it the sound card or the software or both? thanks guys,
 
Gidge has got it right on.What I do if I am bringing them in one or two at a time is leave a good 30-40 seconds between each song on the multitrack,buss a mic to all the tracks,kick it into record and tap the mic with a pencil or something to get the click.Then I'll just cut each track to the start of each click and insert them in the multitrack view in CEP with the cursor backed all the way up to the start.With a little care,you can get them very precisely aligned
 
hello,

unless you are going to bring all 4 tracks in at one time, don't count on the timing matching up... EVER... it just never will due to inconsistencies in tape speed with each playback...

you might get them close... but I used to do this and after I thought I had them lined up and sounding pretty good, I went back to the 4 track and played the song, then played on the computer (brought in 2 tracks at a time) and there was deffinately a big difference in timing of some parts...

you will need a card that will allow you to bring in all 4 tracks seperately at the same time.
 
With a cheap casette machine,you are probably right.With a good recorder,I haven't had any problem with speed inconsistencies to be noticeable so far.Bringing them in at the same time is definately a timesaver and a sure fire way to keep them in sync.
 
the power of digital is that you can push or pull each of those tracks into place until they line up perfectly....in drastic cases you can even stretch/reduce the track......
 
Use an audio editor (SoundForge, Wavelab, Cool Edit, etc.)

Break up your tracks into shorter phrases (you may have to be creative here depending on the breaks in the music.)

Bring your phrases in your sequencer (N-Track is great; that's what I use). Use the grid set to the bpm of the song and a dummy click/drumhit track set the length of the song will help as a guide.

Now you can jog your phrases around until you can get them to line up with each other.


- It's going to be a pain, but if you REALLLY want to transfer those songs you can do it. Be patient.
 
Thank you for excellent suggestion, Gidge!
I've been wondering, how should I most effectively align 16 audio tracks. Now I will add a short bang at the beginning of each track (which I can do with precision of 1/96 of a beat), align and delete. Perfect.
 
In all of my failed attempts in the past I was using the Vegas LE that I have. I wanted to use this program because I've spent a lot of time using Acid 2.0 & 3.0 so I'm very comfortable with how the program works. For the hell of it I downloaded N-tracks to try that. The tracks recorded much better. I found one of the tracks started a little late so instead of trying to play with the n-tracks too much I opened the wave files in Vegas. It actually sounded good. I don't really know why one program records better than another but I am happy with any forward progress. I think I need to go with a new sound card so I can record all the tracks at once. The Turtle Beach card looks pretty good but I don't know if it will work with the Vegas program. I just came across the Maya 44 card. Does anyone know if this thing is any good? If not any other suggestions?
 
VERY SIMPLE SOLUTION!

Do the click at the beginning of all the tracks as earlier suggested . . . using a pencil, hand-clap, fart, or whatever.

Then be sure to record another one AT THE VERY END. Record each track separately through your sound card.

Next you will need to use a time-stretching program or tool to stretch or condense the time of each track so they all match from beginning click to ending click.

1) Choose one of the tracks as your reference track. Highlight the selection from the very beginning of the first "click" to the very beginning of the last click. There should be a time feature that will tell you exactly how long the highlighted portion of your track is (I use sound forge, and this is displayed at the bottom). Write down the length of the track.

2) Go to each of the other tracks, one by one, highlighting the same section.

Most time-stretching tools will display the time of the highlighted portion as the "starting time/length." There will also be another time which you must enter as the "destination time/length." (which you should enter as the length of your reference track)

3) Apply the time-stretching feature on each track to match the timing of your reference track, so that each track is the same length from click to click.

I use a separate program called Time Factory, but your current software may also have this feature built-in.
 
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