Setting up an Audiophile 2496 with a Mackie 1202 VLZ Pro

  • Thread starter Thread starter ChoppinBroccoli
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ChoppinBroccoli

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Hi there,

I'm really really new to recording, and I need a little help in setting up my Audiophile with my Mackie mixer. Basically I want to use my midi keyboard with my audiophile for recording, record guitar and bass through my mixer into my audiophile and use some sort of multitrack software (such as Cakewalk) to mix. And also playback regular mp3's with my regular stereo speakers.

What in your opinion would be the best setup? I.e. what exactly ports on the mackie should hook up to what ports on the audiophile, where should my speakers hook up to, and what type of cables would I need?

Thanks in advance,

ChoppinBroccoli
 
RCA Stereo out of mixer to RCA Stereo ins of audiophile. Tie your keyboard to midi in & out of Audiophile and patch the audio outs of your keyboard back to mixer. You can literally patch anything to your mixer to record to the audiophile. Will take trial an error to set up trim, levels, etc...
I use the RCA stereo outs of the audiophile for monitoring. I tend to use 2 or 3 different audio systems for playback monitoring so as not to depend on one source.
As far as software, Cakewalk is ok or any moderately priced sequencing software such as Cubase, Sonar, Logic Audio.
 
Excellent, that makes sense.

Just one other thing though, would I use the Tape In/Tape Out of the mixer to go to the RCA ins/outs of the audiophile?

And would I be using the main outs or the control room outs of the mixer to go to my speakers?

Thanks
 
I use a Tascam mixer and dont use the tape in & outs for anything. I always use the stereo out jacks to tie to my audiophile. Or in your case perhaps the main outs if it is a stereo pair L-R

I always use my audio outs of the audiophile for monitoring and speaker connects. The card offers 0 latency which gives me real-time monitoring so no need to monitor directly from mixer. If your multitracking, you will not hear the pre-recorded tracks on your mixer, unless your outputing the audiophile back to the mixer which I dont recommend because this will result in looping problems. I like to keep it simple. It will take some time & practice to find a procedure that works best for you.
 
Nice,

I think i'll try the monitoring directly out from my sound card then.

And yeah, the Main Outs would make more sense to use than the tape outs, but the Main Outs are 1/4" TRS jacks. So I guess a 1/4" TRS to RCA cable is needed to use those then.

THanks for the help, much appreciated!
 
That is correct on the cable issue...not a problem. You can pick up a good set for $15-20
 
Nice,

I think i'll try the monitoring directly out from my sound card then.

And yeah, the Main Outs would make more sense to use than the tape outs, but the Main Outs are 1/4" TRS jacks. So I guess a 1/4" TRS to RCA cable is needed to use those then.

THanks for the help, much appreciated!
 
The cleanest signal path out of your Mackie is to use the Inserts on the back. This bypasses the EQ, fader and mix busses so that you arent added unneccesary noise.

The mackie manual and website has some of the best diagrams for hooking up mixers for different applications. They designed the Mackies with a few tricks for routing your signals and their diagrams show you the way the mixer was designed to be used.

The reason that many prefer to monitor through the mixer is that you have a volume know to control your monitor level and a lot more flexibility in setting up a monitor mix.
 
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