M Audio? Anyone?

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nihilism

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Firstly sorry for making this so long.


I have just gotten into recording and am pretty interested in it (as a hobby of sorts). And as I have a band, I thought that I would record the demo my self. I tried to record song like this:-


DAW Software: Acid pro 5.0
Sound Card: Built into Motherboard, very very basic...("Intel(r) 82801BA/BAM AC'97 Audio Controller" is what MY AUDIO DEVICES shows)
Computer: Compaq Deskpro en/p733


Guitars, Bass---->Guitar stomp box-----> line in on comp---> Acid pro

Keys------>Line in on comp(didnt know what the heck midi is before i visited this site)-----> Acid pro

Vocals----->An OK philips mic(xlr to normal audio jack converter in the mic cable it self)----->microphone in on comp---->Acid

Drums....I programmed the drum track on guitar pro (as midi) and exported it as a wave file and imported it on Acid. (Now I know i could have directly imported the midi track)


And as you can guess the sound sucked. And none more so, as the vocal track. So I have decided to go and upgrade my equipment. But there are a lot of things that come under it (SHURE sm58, a Korg AX1000 Guitar processor, etc), so the budget is tight.

As for the comp I have upgraded it quite a lot already except for the sound card. So as i was net-searching for one with the specifications that I need, I came up with these two options:

DELTA 1010LT
wwwDOTm-audioDOTcom/products/en_us/Delta1010LT-mainDOThtml
(replace DOT with . )

A sound card, with everything that i need...but it doesnt specify whether it is suitable for instruments (guitars) to be plugged in, so i guess i would have to do impedance matching. Also i am not sure that i can add a sound card to my motherboard, as it has one built in. So this is my second option


FAST TRACKS PRO
wwwDOTm-audioDOTcom/products/en_us/FastTrackPro-mainDOThtml
(replace DOT with . )

A usb audio recording interface. It states clearly that you can plug in XLR, MIDI, and INSTRUMENTS. But will this help me cause i have a strictly ok sound card (however I do not intend to do some fancy 5.1 recording or anything like that, just a good enough heavy metal demo disc). If I buy this I dont have to buy a new mother board a new processor a new everything nearly.....so this is my first choice.
 
Please help me decide between them, or uggest somthing applicable in my position.
 
Between those two I'd go for the 1010LT. It doesn't have Hi Z inputs though so you'd need a seperate unit if you want to record direct.

Do you have firewire? Check out the Presonus Inspire, and Firebox units. They have built-in pres, Hi-Z inputs etc. and you don't need to open up the case
 
Ditto...USB is probably the last thing I'd consider. Being a Delta1010LT owner, I'm happy with it and naturally recommend it.

On the other hand, firewire is getting popular and recieves some good support from a lot of the folks here.
 
IMHO, that's like choosing between a douche and a turd sandwich.... :D

The 1010LT isn't bad, but I think there's something odd about either the clock or the analog section. I wasn't ever able to get the same clarity with that as I've gotten with my more recent FireWire interfaces.

I wouldn't go with anything USB in general. The USB audio spec is just one colossal hack job.... Talk to any engineer who has ever had to support USB audio hardware and they'll make you want to cry in the first five minutes with talk of vendors cutting corners in really horrible ways, fundamental flaws in the 1.x specification, multi-year delays getting the 2.0 spec final, and just an incredible pile of devices whose behavior is all broken in subtly different ways....

I'm not saying that all USB audio devices suck, but to hear them talk, I think that the only thing wrong with such a statement is a missing "nearly".... :D

There are a lot of interfaces I could suggest, depending on your needs. How many inputs do you need? How many preamps do you need?

Oh, and I wouldn't suggest an SM58 for vocals. It's okay as a live vocal mic, but there are plenty of better mics at a similar price that would be better for recording, IMHO. Check out the AT2020, for example. Not my go-to mic for vocals by any means, but a huge step up from the SM5x series (and much better as a general purpose mic for things like acoustic guitar, guitar cabs, etc. as well).

The absolute bottom of the line interface I could recommend in good conscience is the Edirol FA-66:

http://buyeretail.com/product.asp?i=EDIFA66

I would also feel comfortable suggesting the Echo AudioFire 4.

http://www.floridamusicco.com/proddetail.asp?prod=echo_audiofire_4&partner=froogle

You might also look at the Mackie Tapco, but I have no idea if it is any good. It costs about what a Delta 1010LT does:

http://www.zzounds.com/a--2676837/item--TAPLINKFW4X6

Remember that the interface is probably the most critical part of your signal chain to get right on the first try. You can always try a different mic, and eventually, you're probably going to end up owning more than one decent mic and using different mics for different instruments, voice, whatever. Your interface, however, you'll use on all of your tracks. Thus, if there's anything even slightly amiss, the problem will compound itself because you'll have it on every track.
 
In that range I'd go with Echo Audio.

Small company that hasn't over extended itself with a thousand different products that it now has a hard time supporting. You will get good support and rock solid drivers with Echo.
 
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