just got my new gear, help!!!

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N8theGr8

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ive been asking lots of questions on this board for a while, and its been very helpful. i just got my 2 SM57s and a behringer 802A EuroRack mixer. I said this before, and some people thought the behringer was good, others said dont get it. since i didnt have much cash, i went with the behriner. the point is, nobody told it doesnt have track selectors!!!!!! im hooking it up to my comp, and all it does is turn all 4 mics into one track. i am a little new to recording, but how the hell am i supposed to use this mixer? any suggestions would be great :) thanks. by the way, i've got the 2 RCA "2-Track output" hooked to the line in on my soundcard, cause i remembered somebody saying i needed the RCA's. this is probably the problem, there are two other outs: Main Out, and Ctrl R Out. both with 2 1/4" jacks. if i were to plug the main out to my soundcard, would i al least be able to record a few tracks at once?
 
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I use the Main outs to go into the soundcard.

From your Main outs you will need to either have a Y-cable with a stereo end on one end. That stereo end will will need a 1/4" to 1/8" adapter to plug into your soundcard (at least that's what I have to do). That will give you 2 tracks to record stuff into your computer.

I use the control outs for my monitor speakers....


I hope this helps...
Vice
 
thanks, 2 tracks sounds good. how do i tell the mixer which mics go to which track then? and if i installed a second soundcard, could i get more tracks, and how would it work?
 
In your recording application setup 2 separate mono tracks to record. In cakewalk you can assign the mono tracks either left or right. What I do is assign track 1 in cakewalk as a mono channel for the Left and track 2 as the right. The mixer channel 1 is hard panned left and channel 2 is hard panned right. Depending on what I am doing I can run a mic through channel 1 of the mixer and and mono signal from my keyboard into channel 2 of the mixer. Then I record. After I record I can start editing the resulting wave files in cakewalk. I hope that helps...

Vice
 
so theres absolutely no way to record 2 tracks at once, say, a snare and a bass drum?
 
Sure you can... one channel for the snare, one for the bass drum.. pan one hard left to have it come out the L output, the other hard right to have it come out just the R output. But then you're out of outputs.

The cheapest mixer that has individual channel outs is quite a bit more costly than the 802A. If you only need four tracks at once, though, like I do, the 1604A or the two smallest Mackies can works because they have two busses, the main mix stereo pair plus an ALT 3-4 pair (actually I'm not sure that statement applies to the Mackie 1202-VLZ, if I'm interpreting what the "02" in the model number indicates).
 
SWEET! i didn't quite get it the first time around :). im gonna need a few suggestions on what i should do with my band. ok, i've got a guitarist, bassist, sax, vocals, and drums (me :)). I was thinking pair the 2 guitars together (pan left and right like you guys said), then sax alone, then vocals. I've got 4 mics total (2 SM57's, 2 RS's), i'll only be using all of them when I record me on drums. SM57 on snare, SM57 on bass, and the 2 RS's for overheads. now, to cram this into 2 tracks is a little tricky, i was thinking either snare and bass together on one, overheads on another; or maybe snare alone, then everything else. this is gonna be great, thanks a lot.
 
Since your limited to 2 inputs and 2 tracks, I'd use the mic's like your suggesting, only submix them to 2 tracks. So take your overheads into 2 XLR inputs on the board, pan full left and right, or 9:00, 3:00 if that seems like too much. Play with the positioning of the overheads to pick up the toms as well as possible. Connect the snare and kick mic's to XLR inputs 3 and 4. Pan those center. Send it all out the main outs to the inputs of your sound card.

Once in software, pan the 2 tracks hard left/right.

This will take a few run throughs to get the balance good for the kick/snare/overhead volumes in relation to one another etc. You may want to do some eq'ing as well on the individual mic's since this will be your last chance for individual control.

With some trial an error you should end up with something usable.

You could also overdub different parts, but it tends to become unnatural sounding, as well as difficult to pull off. Toms you can get away with overdubbing usually. All depends on the style of music your playing I suppose. If the drums are straight ahead rock, kick on 1, snare on 2 type deal, you may be able to go back and record just the snare hits, add some reverb to it and blend that in with the submixed kit you recorded. Rambling on.
 
ok, i think i get what you're saying. that would mean 2 monos in n-track, 1 with left overhead, snare & kick, 1 with right overhead snare and kick. but everything would be mono and center in n-track right, and thats why i should pan left and right? oh man, im such a newbie, hehe. ive got 3 band eq on my mixer, 80hz, 2.5khz, 12khz, and a low-cut filter of 75hz. would it be smart to eq a little bit on each mic while i still have control over them? i was thinking boosting lows about 3db on the overheads to get the toms better. anything else?
 
You would have two tracks in N-Track, panned hard left and right yes. But it would be the stereo submix from your mixer of the 4 microphones. As far as EQ, more a matter of experimentation. What you could try maybe to save some time is do a run through recording just the kick and snare flat into 2 tracks in n-track. Run these back out of your sound card, through into channels one and two of your mixer there, and EQ them to taste. Leave the EQ's where they were and do a take with the OH's in the mix. OH's shouldn't need as much or any EQ as your kick and snare may. Since you don't have parametric EQ I'd be more tempted to leave it flat and adjust the OH positioning until it sounds best (something you will do anyway). Maybe a touch of high boost on them.
 
sounds great, thanks a lot everyone. to connect the computer to go out to the mixer, line out to "2-track in" right?
 
You could do that but you wouldn't have much control over that signal in your mixer unless you are just using that to monitor by sending the signal to the control room outs. I sometimes use channel 7 & 8 (or 5 & 6), to bring a signal from the computer soundcard to the mixer.

Vice
 
i gotcha, so pretty much take the same wires as i would use to record, except take the 2 1/4" from the main out, put em in channel 5/6, and put the 1/8" in line out of the soundcard? about monitoring, i've got a few different options. I have a $100 pair of Sony headphones, which i could hook into the mixer while recording or the comp once everything is in n-track; i could use the top of the line computer speakers that Cambridge Soundworks makes (about 3" by 3" cubes, along with a good-sized subwoofer), or i could take a pair of Infinity speakers that are lying around in my room, all i know about it is that the speaker cone is around 5-6".
 
You are limited by your soundcard. Check into getting an Echo Gina, or Echo Layla. You can get a 20 bit gina on ebay now for around $200-250. You are really limited in sound, inputs,quality, etc by using a soundblaster or something similiar. This should be your next purchase, then get your self some decent, entry level monitors like yorkville ysm-1s. What software are you using?????

Good Luck!

Mr SM 57

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im using n-track, oh yea! i tried cakewalk, never got used to it. what would be best for monitoring with the stuff ive got now? im using an esoniq PCI, which i known to be cheap but have good recording quality. sure, its no delta 66, but what would i need those extra ins and outs for other than monitoring?
 
When I record "live" which isn't too often (usually one track at a time) my ins to my soundcard (layla) go like this

1- vocal
2- vocal

(above panned hard left and right through my mixer as described above)

3 - direct bass In
4 - guitar ( miked at amp)
5 - guitar (miced at amp)


so there is 5 right there - however, due to space, the ability to isolate everyone, one track at a time is the way to go - if you are just concerned about drums - the above solutions should work.

also - I have a 802a, here is how I monitored recording through my headphones before I had an amp/ysm-1 monitors -(or, how I make a buss!)

I go from the soundcard out to channel 1 in
I go from the Aux send 1 to my soundcard in (pre fader), you could use 2, I suppose.
Then, turn down the aux 1 in channel 1 ( the one you have coming from the sound card)

Then use the aux 1 on the channels you are recording to adjust the levels.

A roundabout solution, but it allowed me to adust the levels in my phones as I was laying down tracks. ALso, the layla lets you adust levels to you monitor outs track by track, which is nice.

Good Luck!

Mr SM 57

PS: do a search on monitors, yourll get al the info you need!
 
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