Recording Setup

[Blor007]

Hi,

I have a stupid question,
I would like to record something with my Staudio card
(http://www.staudio.de/produkte/dsp2000.html)
And I would like to know , what the direct-output's are for on the back of the card. I thought it was for adding compression or something or routing it into the mixing desk again but then how do you get back to the mixing desk?

I know it's a weird question , but i need some setup guidelines to connect my mixing desk. ( http://www.gbaudio.co.uk/data/mr24.htm )

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

I'm not familiar with that card, but I'll assume that it's direct outs are standard fare, which would be 1/4" TRS jacks.

The way to use a direct as a send-and-return loop to a compressor (or other outboard processor) is to get a cable designed for such use. Such a cable has a male TRS (3-conductor) plug on one end, and splits like a "Y" cable to two 2-conductor plugs on the other. The 3-conductor TRS plug (the base of the "Y") plugs into the direct jack on the card, and the two 2-conductor "arms" of the "Y" plug into the in and out of your compressor.

The two 2-conductor plugs are usually respecively labled "Tip" and "Ring", indicating which "hot" conductor on you card's direct jack that plug will be talking to. The specs for your card should tell you which conductor, tip or ring, it uses for send and which it uses for receive. For example if it sends va the tip conductor, than the cable end marked "Tip" should go into the Input (receive) jack on your compressor. And vice versa.

HTH,

G.

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Correction To Previous Post!

Oops, I gotta learn to take that damn needle out of my arm before reading some of these posts...

What I described in my previous post was for "channel inserts" and not for "direct outs".

I tried looking up the DSP2000 to see what was up, but being an apparently discontinued model was only able to find information in Danish, which I cannot read. I did however find information in English on the DSP3000, which is apparently STAudio's new flagship A/D I/O device, and I thin may have replaced the DSP2000 (?)

The description of the DSP3000 *did* indeed indicate that it was equipped with 8 channel insert jacks (one per analog input channel). I saw no mention of direct out jacks. Assuming the 2000 - which is also handles 8 analog channels - is similarly configured, then my previous post remains correct (*whew* )

However, if you are indeed asking about true "direct outs", (though I would think those unlikely on such a board) then that is a different matter. A typicl channel "direct out" is nothing more than what the name implies. It is a direct output of the signal going into that audio channel. On mixing boards with direct outs on their channel strips, the direct out is typically post-trim but pre everything else on the strip.

As such, true direct outs are not typically used for effects loops, but rather for sending the audio signals either direct to a tracking recorder, bypassing the aux, EQ and fader sections of the channel strip, or direct to an auxillary mixer (for FOH purposes, for example.)

G.