no right channel on Line-in

  • Thread starter Thread starter Layla Nahar
  • Start date Start date
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Layla Nahar

New member
Can anybody help?

I want to plug my Alesis synth directly into my sound card, but when it plays across the PC's speaker, only the left channel is comes out.

I did some 'sanity checks'
I reset the Alesis.
I played it on my head phones- left & right channel were equally balanced.
I played it on my stereo, same thing, both stereo channels present.
I plugged it into the forbidden MIC jack in my sound card - got my left & right channels!

Its just wen I plug it to the Line in on my sound card that I only get the left channel.

um (makes a sheepish expression) ...something just occured to me. Is that expected behavior?

If so, what all the hype about not using the MIC jack in your sound card, and only using the line in?
 
The mic in on a soundcard is mono. Make sure that you haven't mixed up mic in and line in :)

Slackmaster 2000
 
Slackmaster2K said:
The mic in on a soundcard is mono. Make sure that you haven't mixed up mic in and line in :)

Slackmaster 2000
Click to expand...

Really? Cause the only jack on my soundcard that give me left & right from my synth is the mic - & the Volume control sliders also show mic selected as the input - when i get two channels

anyway, this stuff is driving me insane.
ONly on the one channel input can I keep my recordings from my synth back into sonar synced with the original midi tracks.
When I use the line in, I get just the left track, but it stays synched with the midi tracks that generated it.

I've been trying so hard to get this to work and I just end up chasing my tail.
 
I would check your cabling first off. You might think that you hear left & right when you plug into the mic input, but it should just be mono (coming out of both speakers). Thus, if you were using an incorrect cable (like a mono cable), you would hear sound out of both speakers when you plug into the mic input (but the same thing out of both speakers) and only out of one side when you plugged into the line input, which is truely stereo.

Slackmaster 2000
 
Typically, yes...count the rings on the plugs...a stereo phono plug will have a tip portion, a ring portion, and a sleeve portion (TRS). A mono plug will just have a tip and a sleeve (TS).

Make sure that your cable and any adapters are all stereo.

Slackmaster 2000
 
stereo cables (TRS)

Just thought I would mention just how rare these things seem to be. Headphones come standardized with the jack usually. But when it comes to cables almost all of them are mono. I've been to numerous music stores in this city, and when I ask for stereo cables, only 2 out of 6 stores I went too carried them, and at that they still raised an eye when I asked for them.

You either need one of these or two mono cables rigged with adapter doohickeys to achieve stereo with a single input like which you have. The thing with adapters I have found is that some of them aren't neccesarily stereo either, in that they cheat, so I would avoid that route. If your alesis has only one out your better off with the stereo cable anyway.

From my own presonal (yes PREsonal) experiences with the soundblaster cards, the mic in is mono and the line in is stereo. The mic in is noisy as hell, and thats why you want to avoid it, unless you like background annoying hissing kinda noise that is.

Here's a link showing pic's of two different cables. The top pic is TRS (stereo) and the bottom pic is mono. (Scroll to bottom for pics).

http://www.homerecording.com/bbs/showthread.php?s=&threadid=74244&highlight=TRS
 
You guys are fantastic.

Really - without this message board I'd be in the bottom of the drain!

I found a nice stereo cable from Radio Shaq (its PURPLE!)

now i'm rockin


next - I have to record the vocals - that's me yikes
 
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