Recording interfaces for drums

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Kapo_Polenton

New member
So here I am, wanting to take the big step of recording drums in my home studio. (yeah a spare bedroom like most other folks) . I've got a presonus inspire 1394 (only two mics XLR out), an sm57, and two behringers for overhead. (think they were c-1 not sure it has been long since i busted them out) In any event, i am thinking of trying those gls sm57 "clones" to round out the toms and then look for a good kick mic', but I am then still stuck with trying to figure out how to get it into cubase. I thought maybe mixing it down on an external mixer might work, but then you can't really effectively filter anything afterwards to compress or give it more punch. Can you guys offer up some suggestions on how to do this or how many tracks you would mix each drum part to before sending it into a comp for mastering? I thought maybe hooking up an analog mixer to my presonus but i am not sure how flexible this will be..

Thanks!

Also- I am tryign to avoid paying 500$ + on something like a firepod and then 2000$ on microphones. I figure i can color the sound using programs like drumagog that are free.
 
a delta 44 gives you 4 ins and is only 150 bucks, combined with your two channels gives you six. you could run overheads, kick and snare, and two tom mics this way (for a 5 piece kit you can mic between the rack toms)
 
I doubt you would be able to get the presonus and the delta to work together but I could be wrong.

I got the Motu 896HD with the intention of recording drums. Let me say this, whatever you get make sure it either has pads on each channel or you have inline pads to use because if your mics don't have pads and the preamp doesn't go low enough (which is often the problem for heavy hitters) you end up having to back mics way off and that just plain sucks. I eventually got some inline pads for my MOTU and added an ADA8000 for 8 more channels.

If you have a mixer you could get away with making a stereo mix of your tom mics to free up inputs. I recommend an 8 channel interface to get the job done right. 8 ins would go something like this, kick, snare, ohL, ohR, tomsL, tomsR, room mic and that leaves you one extra for a bass or guitar to record along.
 
Yeah i don't think those two interfaces would run together at all as Cubase looks for a specific driver with which to "communicate". So with say an 8 track/xlr equipped mixer, would i do something like send the mixdown of everything but the snare to cubase and have a seperate snare track? This is where I feel I am limited.. cause the levels would have to be just perfect before sending them into cubase for editing.
 
jamacian said:
I doubt you would be able to get the presonus and the delta to work together but I could be wrong.

I got the Motu 896HD with the intention of recording drums. Let me say this, whatever you get make sure it either has pads on each channel or you have inline pads to use because if your mics don't have pads and the preamp doesn't go low enough (which is often the problem for heavy hitters) you end up having to back mics way off and that just plain sucks. I eventually got some inline pads for my MOTU and added an <B>ADA8000</B> for 8 more channels.

If you have a mixer you could get away with making a stereo mix of your tom mics to free up inputs. I recommend an 8 channel interface to get the job done right. 8 ins would go something like this, kick, snare, ohL, ohR, tomsL, tomsR, room mic and that leaves you one extra for a bass or guitar to record along.
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I second the behringer ada8000 I use that along with my emu 1212m and that gives me 8 nice mic pres for drums and two 1/4 line ins for guitar/bass and whatever else that is line level. Emu=150 ADA8000=220 can't beat that with a 400 dollar mixer. It gives you all that plus firewire spdif midi and more. Remember you can't use drumaog unless you can multitrack the drums. You said you had a not-so-good room so i dont think youd want a room mic but you would rely more on close micing (dynamic mics). As far as laying 8 tracks down with mic pres I think this is probably close to if not the cheapest way to go. Remember as far as asio goes you probably arent going to be able to hook up twenty different interfaces depending on how they are running and ofcourse which software u have.

As far as getting it to the computer if you buy a 500 dollar mixer youre going to kick yourself in thinking 16 channels with 12 decent mic pres mixed down to two tracks is going to be better than 8 mic pres with 8 channels of audio tracks. I'm not sure how much you know but as far as firewire and adat go youre probably going to have to buy a card to read it.

go to kvr.com that website is a godsend for people like me (vst heaven)

also make sure that u understand that mixers with USB arent going to send more than a stereo mix to your computer.

good luck and welcome to hell (recording drums)
 
Thanks guys.. my presonus is firewire and I have to say I really like the way it can send two individual feeds into cubase and allow me to manipulate them. Also the latency is killer... its an excellent little unit which made me realise that firewire is the way to go for computer recording. I think I will have to look at the firepod or the berhinger you suggested. Soo far for mic's, there have been some excellent suggestions and some of the recordings I have heard from just overheads sound pretty damn good too! Should be fun.
 
cant the inspire be dasiy chained, just buy another one. that will give you four inputs, two overheads, kick and snare.
 
Yes they can.. but what I might also do is get an extra inspire + a four channel analog mixer with effects on it and mix down things like overheads and a room mic and send it through one channel.. this gives more possibilities which is why i was also thinking about a peavy analog mixer with say 8 -10 mic lines and the ability to mix it down to 4 busses. At somepoint i can then add another interface like a sound card.. options really. I do notice that analog is warmer.. that is a given. This might be the solution. The Firepod and other interfaces do not get glowing reviews from what i have seen soo far on harmony central.

And to the USB point, seems like a total rip.. what is the point of that? mix everything down to one track and send it that way? Lame. I guess what i really need to decide is how happy i am with the sound of the drums without too much processing or "studio magic".
 
I don't mind spending the 500$ canadian to get the firepod unit new or something comparable like the one from Alessis BUT what i worry about is how good the quality will be. Allot of the harmony central reviews seem to indicate that these are not consistent and there are problems with them or the sound is just plain not up to snuff. Anybody using analog to comp here?
 
Thats cool but as far as drums go I don't ever need really really expensive preamps because I want a true uncolored sound that I can color while mixing. Drums are alot of time the thing that you are going to need to have control over each track especially considering the problem most people have -poor acoustics. If youre relying on four tracks I wouldnt say its a bad idea but your sound will be defined alot by your room if youre going to use a mixer and mix toms in with the overheads make sure you fix any phase problems and what not. Alot of the problems i think in typical behringer gear is the crappy AD/DA converters but somehow I dont see that issue with my ADA8000 like i do in my POS UB1222FX Mixer, which is for obvious reason strictly there for mixing the output on my sound card to my speakers. Before I got my ADA8000 i was lookin on soundclick and found a guy who was using his ada8000 for drums some pg drum mics and no triggers. The sound was great but I hear alot of people with much better equipment getting alot worse sounds and they are still constantly asking that question "what can i buy to make my recordings sound better?" -I say a book maybe
 
Well, I think I am going to take a LEAP of faith and grab the firepod.. I have used it before without issues though we used crappy mic's (rented for 20$) without overheads so the final mix was a bit crappy. There were no latency issues though.. I figure if i have to buy a mixer for 300$ and then eventually upgrade to get more channels in the comp, I'll kick myself for not having spent the extra 250$ canadian (damn tax) to just get more inputs to start with. I don't plan on moving it much so it shouldn't suffer from some of teh complaints i had read abotu on lien abotu people taking it to gigs and such.
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
Well, I think I am going to take a LEAP of faith and grab the firepod.. I have used it before without issues though we used crappy mic's (rented for 20$) without overheads so the final mix was a bit crappy. There were no latency issues though.. I figure if i have to buy a mixer for 300$ and then eventually upgrade to get more channels in the comp, I'll kick myself for not having spent the extra 250$ canadian (damn tax) to just get more inputs to start with. I don't plan on moving it much so it shouldn't suffer from some of teh complaints i had read abotu on lien abotu people taking it to gigs and such.
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You can also piggy-back up to 3 Firepods for 24 tracks total! Rock and/or Roll!
 
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