What should I get?

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patlang12

patlang12

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Right now I have an mr8. I am thinking about getting a Yamaha mg 10/2 mixer. That way I could get some condenser mics and have more inputs for recording drums and guitar live together. The problem is that I wouldn't be able to edit the individual drums because they would all be mixed together on one track. I am thinking maybe I should get a new recorder. What do people suggest. I don't need a lot of bells and whistles. I don't need onboard effects or eq. I want to do all of them on the computer after I record. It would be nice to have at least 4 tracks recording at the same time, a few more would be even better. Anybody have some suggestions on possible recorders to look into. I don't think I want to get into computer recording because I want to be portable, but if you think this is the best option tell me what you think I should get. Money is a big thing here. I want to do this as cheaply as I can. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a lot!
 
hey pat, im doing the exact same thing I think. I have an MR-8 and i ordered one of those yamaha mixers, should be here within a week or so, i'll tell you how it works out. From what i understand it's a decent idea using them together, just you have to spend alot of time to get the levels right before you record, cuz you cant adjust them again after you record, so if ure willing to spend the time making sure everything is balanced perfect, then it should work out.
 
Yeah the thing is after I record I am going to want to add some eq and stuff I think especially on the kick. I won't really be able to do this unless I have simitanious inputs, but please do report back on how well it works.
 
I did ok for 2 years w/ the mr8, but then I started thinking about recording drums. And adding more dubs than just acoustic g and a vocal. I really never liked having to do a submix before the final mix, it drove me crazy I didn't really get to finish anything.

So now I have the Korg D1600mkii and it's serious. 16 tracks, not 10 w/ 2 or 3 stereo tracks or something. It also has virtual tracks so you can actually have all of your 16 mix down to 2 virtual tracks.

So now I can do multiple takes, even w/out the virtuals and compile if I need.

Also, the CDRW is great b/c I never have to bother w/ a pc at all. :) :) I looove that fact.

you'll be limited w/ mixdown unless you can mix to something else thru the mixer, I figure that's what you'll be doing, the problem is in the outputs of the mr8, you only have 2. If y ou had 4 or 8 then mixing would be thru your external mixer to pc/tape/md/daw/cd etc. Mixer helps on the input, but you still either have to export the tracks for software mixing or use that mix/submix system mr8 forces you to use....

ther are probly some decent 8 tracks out there that you could record 4 tracks and do what you want and mix thru external or pc....
 
patlang12 said:
So does anybody else have some suggestions on what I get?
Click to expand...

Despite the lack of portability (except with laptops), I would suggest looking further into computer recording. If you are going to be mixing on your computer, why not record onto it? That will eliminate any unecessary A/D & D/A conversions. With todays processor speeds and hard drive volumes, you can record virtually unlimited track counts for numerous songs in parallel without having to clear out your drive. Potential for upgrading/expansion of computer hardware and software are also a lot more versatile. Additionally, working on a large-screen monitor is much easier than navigating through menus on a tiny LCD screen that comes with most outboard digital recorders.

If you are really concerned about portability, look into a laptop and/or a firewire interface (like the presonus firepod). With the firewire interface, you could record anywhere you have a computer with recording software and a firewire port.

Plus, computers give you access to porn, which is sorely lacking amongst the outboard DAWs I've encountered. :D

Just another perspective.
 
So how would you suggest I go about computer recording. I don't have a great soundcard so I was thinking maybe I would get a new one. It seems like everything is either 4 inputs then goes to 8 inputs. Is there anything that has five or six inputs?
 
patlang12 said:
So how would you suggest I go about computer recording. I don't have a great soundcard so I was thinking maybe I would get a new one. It seems like everything is either 4 inputs then goes to 8 inputs. Is there anything that has five or six inputs?
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I am not familiar with one. I use a USB interface which only allows two tracks simultaneously (works for me, with the exception of drums). If you want more, go for 8-10 inputs. You never know when you might need them. M-Audio makes reasonably priced PCI soundcards that seem to be very popular around here. I think the Delta 44 and/or 66 can be daisy-chained if you want to start with 4 tracks and add a second card later. The 1010/1010LT look nice as well. In my opinion, it is better to get something with a breakout box, so you don't have to keep fishing around behind the computer to make connections.

A FireWire interface is another option instead of replacing your soundcard. I've read good things about the Firepod, which comes with built-in preamps, if you need that (alternative to a mixer, etc.). There are a number of other choices in this category as well. They are a little more expensive than PCI, but can be easily detached and used with other computers.
 
patlang12 said:
So does anybody else have some suggestions on what I get?
Click to expand...

Yes. Consider a Fostex VF160EX. Easy to learn. It runs about $799.00, comes with a built-in burner that consistently does burns that are error free. It has 2 XLR with phantom power for condensors. It has 16 individual tracks (no stereo pairs). It's very stable, very well thought out, also quite portable (get the case). Also, with a Behringer ADA8000 interface you can go in via the ADAT and record 16 tracks at once. There are other interfaces that will do the same. This is a great machine.

Also consider the Korg 1600mkII. It's also been out a while, is very well understood, no major bugs. Easy learning curve. Won't do 16 at once, but does have 4 XLR inputs and will do a number of tracks at 24bit.

In my view these two machines are great bargains and will allow you to produce excellent recordings without leaving the machine till you have a CD in your hands.

PC's are far easier to edit with, though I did a project with about 350 edits on my VF160... PC's are also noisier, not as portable and prone to latency issues that can be a problem when you're trying to overdub...

If you go the PC route, I'd suggest isolating it and using a special sound dampened tower. Also, make the PC only usable for recording -- don't run other stuff on it.
 
I have a Akai DPS16 for tracking drums. 8 inputs efx all of that stuff pretty good preamps and a couple channels of phantom power. Its pretty good. The Roland stuff is good too but it wasn't as simple. Look for some used hard disk recorder if you can get it and see if the pre amps aren't blown you are probably OK. Fostex made some of the older stuff you could get used as well.
 
My friend has a vf160ex. I will probably borrow that for a little while. If it is true that the m-audio soundcards can be daisychained I may do that. Is it true that with the vf160ex you can only record 2 tracks with phantom power? So If I wanted to record drums and use condenser overheads and then use a condenser on an acoustic guitar I would not be able to do this?
 
patlang12 said:
Is it true that with the vf160ex you can only record 2 tracks with phantom power?
Click to expand...

Yes. Unless you use its ADAT input and the ADA8000 (which goes for about $200.). At a total of $1,000. you'd have 10XLRs with phantom. But alone, out of the box, the VF160 will give you 2. The Korg 1600mkii will give you 4.
 
If I go the computer recording way and decide to get a firewire interface like the presonus firepod does the quality of my soundcard still matter? Also would this idea work? I get a m-audio delta 44 and still use my mr8 at the same time. This way I would have six inputs. Does the delta 44 support phantom power or would I need a mixer?
 
I read through my last post and it doesn't really make sense so let me elaborate a little more.
1. If I got a presonus firepod (or any firewire interface) does the quality of my soundcard still matter? If you use an outboard recorder and then mix on a computer does the soundcard matter?

2. If I get a delta 44 soundcard that will be four inputs. Could I also record on my mr8 at the same time and then line up the wav files when mixing? Do I need a mixer if I use the delta 44? Does it support phantom power?
 
patlang12 said:
I read through my last post and it doesn't really make sense so let me elaborate a little more.
1. If I got a presonus firepod (or any firewire interface) does the quality of my soundcard still matter? If you use an outboard recorder and then mix on a computer does the soundcard matter?
Click to expand...
With a FireWire interface, you are bypassing your soundcard for recording purposes. The only time your soundcard would come into play would be if you were listening back (monitoring) your mix on speakers connected directly to your computer. Most outboard interfaces have monitor outputs, so you can connect your monitoring chain to them, bypassing your soundcard for mixing/monitoring functions as well.

2. If I get a delta 44 soundcard that will be four inputs. Could I also record on my mr8 at the same time and then line up the wav files when mixing? Do I need a mixer if I use the delta 44? Does it support phantom power?
Click to expand...
I don't see any reason why not. As long as the tempos sync up, it shouldn't be a problem. I don't think the delta 44 has built-in preamps, so yes, you would need an external mixer/preamp to supply phantom power and gain before going into the card.
 
Pat

Look I'm sure you've heard before about the way people like to bicker and argue over gear... Gear is important don't get me wrong, but remember not to get caught up in the drama. You will only be distracted. Instead you must do your homework which may suck at times, but overall you can save yourself alot of heartache and money...

Imagine this: You have a really awesome computer... You use sonar to record in... You have a breakout box that sits on top of a desk that has say 10-12 imputs with preamps/phantom...the real deal...Each signal goes straight to a seperate track in the program to be adjusted seperately etc... It sounds to me that this is what you want... This is also what I want...

Also you may have a piece of gear to control the tracks during mixdown much like on one of the small digital recorders. As you bounce the track down you can raise and lower the faders to create bridges etc. during your songs. This is what I'm hoping to do...

Now realize that the setup I've explained either is not here YET or it's still very expensive... YOu will have to compromise... Maybe seperate soundcards would do the job giving you four similtaneous tracks to record with... But you would need quite a few soundcards in order to do what we're hoping to do...

One thing that sticks out in my mind is when you mentioned doing two tracks on the computer and two on your recorder and then mixing them on the computer...This would be a nightmare for anykind of work involving more than one song ever...

There are expensive machines that will do eight tracks at once and you can edit them seperately (although im not sure if editing would be as easy as it is on a computer). The problem here is the cost and the fact that you cannot upgrade portions of your setup independently...

With this in mind I will tell you that you may want to start with a soundcard that has a breakout box such as the M-audio OMNI studio which includes a delta 66... This has pretty nice sounding preamps and you can monitor everything going on in your program through it... Of course this has many downfalls with our goal in mind...

You probably will have to go with a regular mixer and put the work into recording right the first time...Unless you want to buy an eight track similtaneous for over a thousand dollars... Me... I will wait untill the computer components come out over time... I will take one step at a time being sure to only buy gear that I will use in some form or another after I have my dream studio....

Hope this post helps and feel free to email me if you want/need to.... Brett
 
Brett thanks a lot for you post. I don't think I need 10 to 12 tracks yet. I may just get a mixer and try to get it right and then buy a decent soundcard and use the mixer with that. I am really considering the presonus firepod because it seems to be one of the best deals out there right now. Also I may wait because I just found out today that it sounds like my high school is going to put together a little studio and I am going to be the person who reccomends what they buy! I am really excited about this. I may not need to buy a lot of gear right away because I may be able to use theirs. Also I was considering buying this stuff and then recording bands for a small fee to cover some of my costs, but now that they may be able to do it for free at school that plan is sort of out the window. We shall see.
 
DAW all-in-one box vs. PC - from MY perspective.

I've worked for years as a computer tech and network LAN/WAN tech, and I have a few of my own. But now I want to make music, not troubleshoot a computer system for music. You have a lot of choices and a lot of decisions when it comes to using a computer system for your recording. Mac may be better, I don't know, I only know PC and for everything I've ever used a PC for, I'm glad it wasn't music.

Your choices are so many, and so many things can go wrong, that I just decided to go with a system that already had those things worked out for me. It's basically been designed/engineered from the ground up to do the one task that I want it to do.

I don't want to have to design and assemble a computer system on my own to do that. If there is a problem, like a tiny glitch or latency, where would you start to troubleshoot. The hard drive? the hard drive's speed, buffer, the defragmentation of the hard drive, ever look at a newly installed operating system on a hard drive with a defrag program? It's fragmented from the installation, also, the system swap file may also be fragmented, and can you control it and put it up front on the drive where it would be most efficient? Not that I know of, but oh, I'm sure you can find that info burried in some user group somewhere on the internet and they may even have some shareware that can do that job. Go search, not me, I'm already recording out of the box.

Sound cards, there are many, but before that step, how much ram do you need? what processor do you need? can you skimp on any of these things? I have no idea, but I'm sure you can ask some questions and find out that MAYBE you can use and AMD chip that's cheaper than an Intel chip, like the P4 and get away with saving $100, but then, why skimp on the money and hardware? this is your music we're talking about, so go for the biggest, most expensive hardware you can afford.

Software. There must be at least 10 choices here from shareware/freeware to $1000+ programs that will have you using your mouse to move faders, or get a box that usb/firewire will transfer your control surface data to the PC, at what rate? usb 2.0 or firewire? I don't know, but I'm sure there are plenty of people who will give you their advice on which one, so you can decide, oh yea, don't forget that you will always have the option of upgrading parts of your system if you need more power, or if it has a problem.

what could freeze your system and have you reboot and loose you data? (music) Well, let's see, memory corruption, applets misbehaving, oh yea, you wanna use this PC for something other than your music? Like word processing, or internet access, so you need a fire wall or at least anti-virus software, and maybe you need to disable all the software while your music software is running so you don't have any chance of one of those programs messing it up, email?

Do you already know how to assemble a system? What version of what motherboard are you going to choose? how many pci slots? how much ram on the video card? will your monitor be picked up thru your electric guitar pickups? so get a flat screen for 2x the price, how big?

This is only a few considerations, good luck, but remember there's plenty of help onthe internet if you need it....

or spend 800 to $1000 and have a box that is a computer, bTW, but has been designed and engineered from the ground up and tested to work out of the box. Can you do what you can do with plug-ins and software and pro tools or nuendo or cubase or cakewalk? no. But do you want to?

These are only my own thoughts about if I wanted to go the PC way or the all-in-one box way. I got my box, put it on a table, hooked up a mic and recorded all in 2 hours from leaving the house to coming back and working.

Of course if you want to learn pro tools, that's a different story. Do you want to learn about software and computers? do you want to be an engineer? or do you want to record, over dub, mix, burn a cd and go to a real studio when you want better quality and a producer?

I'm not really saying that any one way is better than the other and loads of people want to f around with PC's but I don't, didn't, would rather never have to again....
 
Its true that you can run into problems with PC's when recording music. But it seems that some of the problems you mentioned are already taken care of. If you buy a Firepod, there are outputs for monitoring. Also if you don't want to use the mouse you can get a controller which looks and acts like a mixer/box recorder. Those are the biggest problems and they should be easily overcome with those two pieces of hardware. On the reliability issues etc.., thats a diferent story.

This is from Presonus's site.

""PreSonus Audio Electronics has a history of producing high-value, quality audio products at reasonable prices, and the FIREPOD is no exception. The Firepod is a well though out interface that embodies some of the best product design and build quality I have seen recently. With 10 channels of bidirectional FireWire communication, eight mic/line inputs, MIDI and S/PIDIF I/O, a no-latency monitoring system with separate cue, headphone and control room outputs, two balanced inserts and a the 48-track Cubase LE software for a street price of around $599, it is also an excellent value." - Pro Audio Review Magazine read more"

And a controller isn't really an issue because its not in the recording chain, so you could buy a cheap behringer or something and not affect your sound quality at all.

I have been looking into this recently, because I am sick of my 2 input BR1180CD, even though I like the unit, I don't like the 16 bit sound or the 2 input simul recording limit. For the price of upgrading to a better box, I could get a firepod and a controller. I'll keep my 1180 for quick recording and use the firepod with Adobe Audition for major projectss. As long as you back up your work all the time, this setup should be just fine.

Now what about these stand alone HD recorders that I see around? Like the Alesis ADAT-HD24XR Digital 24-Track Hard Disk Recorder or the Yamaha unt? These look tempting, because they have 24 track recording, no PC issues, and you can swap HD's and use all your existing hardware. These look good to me but are still a little too pricey.
 
Pat

Just wanted to mention that my 10 imput thing was slightly exxagerated... You would want at least 6 though if you hope to get all the drums on seperate tracks though...The real point is that you want these to record into your music program at the same time so you can avoid the hassle of lining up tracks...etc... Also it's not fun to play the same drum piece three times hoping to get the same accents and dynamics each time... YOu want to instead catch the feeling of the moment...This is hard to do when you're playing with computers and technological bs... Congrats with the consultation process with the high school...Sounds cool....
 
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