monitoring overdubbing

[dobro]

Okay, so I'm not a newbie, but I don't know how to do this, so I'm a virtual newbie.

I want to overdub (something I've never done before), and I want to be able to monitor what's already been recorded as well as what I'm recording on top of it. How do I do it?

I record direct to disk: mic > pre > 8 channel soundcard. On the way in, I don't send it through the mixer. I only use the mixer for playback.

So, for example, I record a track.

When I'm done, I set up a second track and overdub, but all I can hear is the first track playing back while I'm recording, I can't hear the overdubbed track as I'm doing it. How do I cable my mixer so I can hear everything?

 

[Emeric]

What sound card do you use? Gadget labs I think?

Can you do routing within the card itself, i.e. if you got the live guitar going into input 3 on the soundcard, can set it up so that output 3 on the souncard is 'listening' to input 3? That way you could send that ouput to an input on your mixer, and control its level there and balance it with the main L/R from the soundcard.

So you have L/R from the soundcard - this is your stereo playback from your recording software going into the mixer.

And you have a your live guitar coming from the output of the soundcard into a spare channel on the mixer.

 

[drstawl]

The way I work this is to direct the outputs that I want to play against in Vegas to a small mixer. On Gina I use one of the extra output pairs for this, and turn off the monitors rather than unplug them from Gina. The live tracks are sent from the pre via S/PDIF to the soundcard. Meanwhile I use the mirrored analog signal from the pre to go to that same small mixer. While I'm playing I listen to the whole mix in headphones from the small mixer. I just use the Vegas waveform display to let me know what's going on.

 

[dobro]

You know, I've had response from three different people on this one (S8-N in a private email), and I think the reason this isn't working for me is because I'm not tracking THROUGH the mixer. I go direct from pre to hard disk when I record.

But I don't see why my mixer won't play everything that's coming through it from the hard disk - both what's already recorded and what's being recorded. Is this too much to ask?

The alternative workaround is to wear my headphones so that one ear's covered and one ear's uncovered so I can hear what I'm playing at the same time that I listen to what's already recorded. I mean, I don't mind being a sad bastard. But it seems to me that having spent two years on this board, I ought to be able to wear my headphones like they do in the real world and hear the mix that's coming through, including what I'm recording.

Just a thought.

Thanks you guys.

 

[drstawl]

>I think the reason this isn't working for me is because I'm not tracking THROUGH the mixer

Read my method one more time. The mixer used to supply me with a headphone mix is NOT used in the recording chain.
Tracking is from the pre direct to the soundcard. Going through the mixer might be necessary if you don't have dual outs on the pre but it makes sense to keep the path as short as possible no matter what kind of equipment you're using. And that one pants leg on one pants leg off method of using your headphones will bite you in the ass by providing a very weird extraneous signal on your tracks. Keep your headphones in place to minimize mic bleed-through.

 

[dobro]

Okay, Emeric gets the prize. I clicked around for a while, and found that the soundcard has a setting that enables/disables each channel for monitoring. Two or three clicks and HEY PRESTO! I'm in business.

Because the Wave824's full duplex, and because I could hear everything through any channel on playback, I'd assumed that it was set up for automatic monitoring as well. WRONG. Also, I'd assumed I was setting up the mixer stupidly or something. Wrong again.

Thanks, Em.

Doc, is there a similar monitoring setting on the Gina? Are all soundcards like this, is what I'm wondering.

 

[drstawl]

Sure- I can open up the Echo Console and fart around with the buttons until they do what you want them to...

Basically toggling my main monitor outs between muting the track being recorded and not muting it.

But then I miss out on all those extra LEDs on the mixer.

And the cords that connect the soundcard and pre to the mixer bridge half the linear gap between the PC console and my imaginary recording booth, so the headphones don't require an extension cord.