Preamp, Mixing

[mr ryan]

a few newbie questions:
I plan on recording classical and flamenco guitar onto my laptop. I have two small diaphram Shure condensers (pg81 & ksm109), an Echo Indigo I/O soundcard, and Adobe Audition 1.5. previously i just recorded the pg81 straight into MiniDisc with a Church portable preamp, then transferred everything to CD in order to edit with Audition and cool edit. It actually sounds quite nice. but...

Since I've been thinking about doing everything straight to laptop now in 24bit 44.1 or 96kHz (neither of which the MD could obviously do), it dawned on me that I also have a very slightly used and forgotten analog Tascam Portastudio 424 mkIII in storage as well. My first question is wether it would work for me to connect the 2 mics into the 424 and use that as a preamp before going to the Indigo, bypassing the tape recording feature on the portastudio entirely. ?? If so, would it be better to use the mixer on the 424 itself when recording/editing, or the mixer in the Audition software instead?

Lastly, for a setup like this, would the Church preamp be of any use to me now, since it's technically made for portable things like minidiscs and such.?
I know a dedicated, 2 channel preamp might be the best option, but I'd rather spend the money right now on perhaps getting an FMR RNC compressor instead, which I've heard are quite nice for acoustic/nylon guitar. right?

any thoughts/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

-Ryan

 

[reshp1]

A preamp is way more important than a compressor IMHO. That should come first. Does the Tascam supply phantom power? You'll need it for the condensers. The DMP3 goes for 150 and it's a steal.

 

[mr ryan]

The PG81 can run on an internal battery, and I have a separate phantom power supply for the KSM109 (both borrowed). not sure if the Tascam has any phantom power though.

 

[Massive Master]

Compress the best possible signal you can. Get the preamp first.

There are some good quality models than can be found cheap - M-Audio's DMP3 comes to mind... I think I've seen them for under $200 here and there.

[EDIT] Whoops - I see reshp1 already suggested the DMP3... So there you go. [/EDIT]

 

[BigRay]

If you ever save up some more money and want some mics that will really smoke the flamenco guitar...the dpa 4060s (mounted on a jdisc) running into the DPA mma6000 sounds PRISTINE. yes, the preamp is way more necessary than a compressor.

teddy

a few newbie questions:
I plan on recording classical and flamenco guitar onto my laptop. I have two small diaphram Shure condensers (pg81 & ksm109), an Echo Indigo I/O soundcard, and Adobe Audition 1.5. previously i just recorded the pg81 straight into MiniDisc with a Church portable preamp, then transferred everything to CD in order to edit with Audition and cool edit. It actually sounds quite nice. but...

Since I've been thinking about doing everything straight to laptop now in 24bit 44.1 or 96kHz (neither of which the MD could obviously do), it dawned on me that I also have a very slightly used and forgotten analog Tascam Portastudio 424 mkIII in storage as well. My first question is wether it would work for me to connect the 2 mics into the 424 and use that as a preamp before going to the Indigo, bypassing the tape recording feature on the portastudio entirely. ?? If so, would it be better to use the mixer on the 424 itself when recording/editing, or the mixer in the Audition software instead?

Lastly, for a setup like this, would the Church preamp be of any use to me now, since it's technically made for portable things like minidiscs and such.?
I know a dedicated, 2 channel preamp might be the best option, but I'd rather spend the money right now on perhaps getting an FMR RNC compressor instead, which I've heard are quite nice for acoustic/nylon guitar. right?

any thoughts/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

-Ryan

 

[mr ryan]

thanks for the suggestions.

hmm...the dpa sounds very interesting, but perhaps a bit steep for me right now. (at least dpa has a nice website). what is a "jdisc" though?

I'll probably go ahead and get a dmp3. they seem to be going new online for $160 just about everywhere, and i've been reading some great things about them. does anyone know what the physical size of the preamp is, though?? i can't find the specs on it anywhere in regards to its actual dimensions, and would want to know because I travel a lot.