
A Reel Person
It's Too Funky in Here!!!
Chris,
The Tascam 414mkII is the current mid-level Portastudio, and is a fine place to start recording. Many people have 414mkII's and love them. The 414mkII Portastudio is a worthy and decent 4-track recorder, and you can take your basic recording to a relatively high level, with the 414mkII alone. If you have the 414mkII, you're fine to start recording, in basic 4-track format.
Production on the basic 4 track Portastudio is a little limiting [than having more tracks would be], and you will have to combine certain parts down to one track, but that's normal, under the circumstances.
4 tape tracks gives you the basic environment to lay down drums-bass-guitar-vocal arrangements pretty directly, with other more complex production techniques being tricks of the trade, like "bouncing", or "packing the tracks". The step-by-step procedure of recording on the 4-track Portastudio, such as the 414mkII, is not hard, but may be a little more complex than can be explained on a bbs. Consult the Tascam manual for recording, starting off from scratch.
Once you've recorded a little on the 414mkII, you may record your mixed down work to wav files on the 'puter, then burn CDs of the songs, and that's relatively easy.
If you want to start recording on the 414mkII, then transfer 4 individual tracks to a computer, continuing the multitrack process on the 'puter, then you're getting back into the realm of computer/DAW recording, requiring special software, and a multi-in-out soundcard. This type of transfer, or production method, would be a more advanced technique, or idea.
Recording tunes onto the 414mkII, in 4-track cassette format is very easy. Then, mixing down your Portastudio 4-track work to basic stereo wav/song files is also very easy, requiring little more than an RCA-to-1/8" stereo adapter cable.
Without embellishing any more than that, the 414mkII is the currently new, mid-level Portastudio, and is a fine place to start recording music and composing, etc. Good Luck. /DA
The Tascam 414mkII is the current mid-level Portastudio, and is a fine place to start recording. Many people have 414mkII's and love them. The 414mkII Portastudio is a worthy and decent 4-track recorder, and you can take your basic recording to a relatively high level, with the 414mkII alone. If you have the 414mkII, you're fine to start recording, in basic 4-track format.
Production on the basic 4 track Portastudio is a little limiting [than having more tracks would be], and you will have to combine certain parts down to one track, but that's normal, under the circumstances.
4 tape tracks gives you the basic environment to lay down drums-bass-guitar-vocal arrangements pretty directly, with other more complex production techniques being tricks of the trade, like "bouncing", or "packing the tracks". The step-by-step procedure of recording on the 4-track Portastudio, such as the 414mkII, is not hard, but may be a little more complex than can be explained on a bbs. Consult the Tascam manual for recording, starting off from scratch.
Once you've recorded a little on the 414mkII, you may record your mixed down work to wav files on the 'puter, then burn CDs of the songs, and that's relatively easy.
If you want to start recording on the 414mkII, then transfer 4 individual tracks to a computer, continuing the multitrack process on the 'puter, then you're getting back into the realm of computer/DAW recording, requiring special software, and a multi-in-out soundcard. This type of transfer, or production method, would be a more advanced technique, or idea.
Recording tunes onto the 414mkII, in 4-track cassette format is very easy. Then, mixing down your Portastudio 4-track work to basic stereo wav/song files is also very easy, requiring little more than an RCA-to-1/8" stereo adapter cable.
Without embellishing any more than that, the 414mkII is the currently new, mid-level Portastudio, and is a fine place to start recording music and composing, etc. Good Luck. /DA