Using two stereo MDs as a 4-track

[JamesW]

Hi (first post!)

I've been looking into buying a small portable digital multitrack device, but of the ones out there, eg. Tascam, Zoom etc, they generally only allow 2 tracks to be recorded simultaneously, not 3 or 4 or more. I basically want to record a band rehearsal with 4 musicians. I know there are machines that allow many tracks to be simultaneously recorded but these tend to be a lot more expensive and they're not exactly portable.

So...... how about using two minidisc recorders, i.e. of the standard (stereo) Walkman variety. Two mics into the first MD and two mics into the second would give you a total of 4 tracks. Then you could transfer everything to a computer for editing, first separating the tracks and aligning them.

Has anyone any views on this? I wonder if two recorders would stay in sync, or if a slight flanging sound might result if there were timing discrepancies. Presumably MDs have quartz timer circuits..just wondering if there's any timing variation when playing back, however slight. If it works, it would be a cheap and portable digital multitrack option for a cheapskate like me. Just wondering if it's worth splashing out another £100 on anotherh MD recorder.

Thanks

JamesW

 

[Nils K]

It is definitely not the way I would go about it...

I don't know your band's setup, but unless you have a really good reason to have every musician on a separate track for a rehearsal recording, I suggest you stick with the one MD recorder you have, and record your rehearsals on that.

Imagine this setup: A mixer with at least four inputs, effects send/return, Instruments, mics, at least one closed pair of headphones (or the possibility to have the mixer and monitor speakers in a separate room), and cables. Four musicians, each having their respective instruments plugged into a separate channel on the mixer.

Use the headphones to get a 'good' sound, i.e. you can hear everything, and the individual instruments sound OK to you. Use pan/EQ to form a stereo image of the band. Bass, kick and lead vocals in the middle, everything else may be panned out to your liking. Record the band rehearsing on MD connected to the mixer line out.

Do several takes of each song, and watch the levels. You may always turn up everything later, but digital clipping (overload) is unforgiving, irrepairable, and sounds bad, too...

When transfering the recording, add mastering limiter to the stereo signal. It makes everything sound more 'tight' and 'together'.

Do this right, and you may even be able to release the rehearsals as the finished record, if they're good!

Alternatively, Get a solid-state multitrack recorder (e.g. a Fostex MR-8) and record one or two instruments at a time, overdubbing tracks until you have the finished article. I recommend the first solution, though...

 

[JamesW]

Thanks Nils. However our band is not too fussed about recording - it's me that wants to record them, with the minimum of hassle.

I would prefer to get each instrument onto a seprate track so that I can go away and mix at leisure, add compression to individual tracks and so on (using n-Track).

Hence the reason four using to MD recorders: I need a solution for recording several instruments on seprate tracks that is also small and portable, and two MD recorders seems like a good idea. My concerns are mainly about if I'd have sync problems or not, due to timing / playback speed variation.

 

[Nils K]

JamesW, as far as I know MD's do not have any way of outputting/inputting the synchronization info stored on the discs themselves. They seem to be fairly stable for modest purposes, e.g. if you try to use eight MD recorders running simultaneously, and capturing an hour-long performance, you might not get away with it without a few woes...

One way to go about it - which I have used numerous times with analog equipment - to some degree of success - is to start and end each recording with a pulse, or 'blip' for later identifying. Then each recording may be transfered from each MD as stereo tracks into e.g. n-Track studio, where the start-'blips' may subsequently be aligned in time. If the stop-'blips' are OK, too, you are ready to mix down, otherwise you may have to strech one of the recordings using e.g. the plugin that comes with Audacity for excactly that purpose. I've used a similar technique for transferring analog 4-track tapes to a PC with but one lonely two-channel soundcard.

For this to work, you need to have each 'blip' recorded on both tracks on both MD's at excactly the same time - while recording the band. This is the tricky part. It will be the only reference you have access to later when editing and mixing the tracks. Of course, the 'blips' is to be left out of the finished recording...

For 'blip', I used to use an 'open' mono jackplug connected to an input feeding all recording channels simultaneously, giving it a whack on the tip to make a unique pulsefor alignment purposes. Remember to record both a start pulse and a stop pulse in order to control arbitrary drift between the MD units.

regards, Nils

 

[JamesW]

Nils,

That's it - using a marker at the start and end is my intention, then transfer tracks two at a time via my stereo soundcard, then align all the tracks together using the marker or blip.

My only concern was that one MD might play back at a slightly different speed as compared to the 2nd MD player. It might only be by a fraction of a second, but it could be enought to get weird flange-like sounds as for example, the saxophone on track 1 plays back slightly faster than the bleed of the same saxophone being accidently picked up on track 3. This is rather like when you transfered 4-track tapes - did you have any 'flange' problems? If each instrument was perfectly isolated on each track (unlikely) then this sort of problem wouldn't occur.

But I have a feeling that these timing differences might be insignificantly small with minidisc playback technology, or even non-existant. So it will probably work. I'll let you know when I try it soon!

James.

 

[JamesW]

Hi Nils,

Not sure if you're following this thread still. Anyway, just to let you know that recording with two minidiscs was successful. Records really well in fact. There are no timing / synching problems at all. And I didn't find I needed to bother with a synch mark (tried clicking drumsticks together at first), as I was able to just line up the four tracks easily by just listening to the tune.

It's interesting to see that mic placement is really quite important. I was recording drums, bass guitar and saxaphone. I had two mics on the drums, one mic for the bass guitar amp, and one mic for the sax. The bass recorded well and without 'boom', but the sax's mic picked up a lot of bass boom, as did the drum mics to a certain extent (this could be eq'd away). Also the sax's mic picked up room reverb of the drums, although listening to the drum's mics only didn't have this effect. So it's all about placement and separation also. I'll need to place the sax player a bit further away perhaps.

Cheers,

JamesW.

 

[Nils K]

Hi James. Glad to see that your takes went well. Your trouble with mic placement really isn't minidisc specific - any 4-track equipment would have given you that... - You just have to experiment some more.

Good luck!

regards, Nils

 

[ededj]

i was going to ask how you got everything without bleed from other instruments, i would recommend a really good condenser mic,
i tried this with a band also but it was not to my likeings i found sectioning each instrument in it's own space helped ,
but not everyone is willing to do this,

have you looked in to a 4 track MD record sony made one a few years back
just a suggestion
peace