will this be o.k?

L

liamo

New member
well i'm on a real tight budget and have been putting of buying for ages in the hope that extra money would come along and pose a better setup senario, i really need to buy now though as the band i'm in need to get some stuff down. I really wanted to have the option of at least six ins and outs as i like to get as much of the drummers kit mic'd up as possible. so i decided to go with the Phase 88 from the terratec producer range and the yamahaa mg12/4 for a mixer-can any of you seasoned recorders let me knowif i 'll get good enough resuilts with this or moreso can you see any distinct problem with my choice of gear? i know it's not quite up there compared to some of your setups but as i said money is a prob. any advice you could give would be great.
regards
liamo

below are links to the two roducts
thanks again
http://www.yamahaproaudio.com/

http://audioen.terratec.net/product.php?pid=4
 
For as cheap $$ money wise as those Yamaha's are they are getting a pretty good reputation, better one than Behringer anyhow. Is the yamaha the model with some effects built in? No biggie if it's not you can always buy some rack gear or use plugs.

The Terratec looks real nice, here's the dynamic range spec...# 24 Bit/96 kHz A/D converter with 100 dB (A) SNR*, typically 100 dB (A)
# 24 Bit/96 kHz D/A converter with 110 dB (A) SNR*, typically 109 dB (A)

Not bad, what do those go for? Have you looked at the MAudio delta 1010? Not that the 1010 is any better but many around run 1010's including myself so you wouldn't be short of help if you ever needed it. But if your set on the Terratec I sure don't see where you could be going wrong. I'm sure you'll be happy.
 
thanks for the reply! the terratec goes for the equivalent of $350 which i think is quite a steal for what you get- i was just worried about ot having balanced or symetrical line ins(not sure what the term means) but i was hoping the preamps on the yamaha woul make up for that.
ta
laimo
 
$350....not bad at all. I'll have to pass that on to a buddy who has an Echo Mia who needs more I/O.

My 1010 can do balanced but the direct I/O on my mixer can't so I run "short" unbalanced cables. I think the key here is to run short cable lengths.
 
so i should run very short cables between mixer and soundcard to reduce noise which will someway compensate for not having balanced i/os?
sorry just wanted to mak sure i got it right.
regads
liamo
 
Balanced cables are shielded and should be used for longer lengths. I run 3 foot cables, though I have run up to 9 foot cables with no problem. Not sure of what the length is before you should really consider balanced but 10 feet comes to mind. If that's wrong someone will chime in I'm sure.

There's some guys around here who can explain it better than me. Do a search on Balanced cables here at HHR and you'll find some more detailed info than what I can say.
 
Interesting dialog. I just purchased a Terratec Phase 88. It is recording but it is real noisy. A lot of popping and crackling. I use Cubase SX1. I'm not sure if it is the cables or what. The Terratec site states you need to make sure you do not share IRQ's between PCI slots on the PC. I did that. No success... I'm using both a Yamaha MG20/2 mixer and a old Tascam Porta one. I get the same end results. A lot of noise.

Its interesting when I have the Phase 88 Control Panel up and running with the Digital Mixer -> Input Tabs set. I'm getting a lot of visual noise with nothing hooked up. i.e. no mixer etc... Odd... I'm not sure I understand all of it yet.

Any ideas why the sound card would be so noisy. I also have a Terratec EWS88D I've been running for a few years with no problem. I have the two cards cascading where the EWS88D is the Master card.

Any insights would be greatly appriciated. I've contacted Terratec through their Web site... but no reply back yet.
 
As with most DAW's, the clicking and popping is most likely a result of hard drive problems either in configuration or the hardware itself.
I get the same thing from every soundcard I've used and it's always related to either a latency config or a noisy hard drive causing electrical interference.

Just my 2 pesos worth.
 
deemic thanks for the reply. I believe I have the latency issue worked out. Both Terratec cards share the same IRQ and are in slots 4 and 6. I put them as far away from the Video cards as I could. I believe I need to focus on electrical interference as the potential

How did you isolate the Hardrive issue outside of swapping out 1 drive with another. Is there a recommended way to shield the HD from sound cards and mother board in general.

I have two hardrives in it both are Western Digital 100 GB and 80 GB. It is currently setup where the smaller drive has my OS and applications. The larger drive has my Data files.

If the problem is electrical interferance a second candidate is I have a dual monitors setup, with two video cards, a NVIDA and ATI card. The NVIDA runs off the video controller. The ATI card runs off the PCI bus. I've been suspicious of the ATI controller running off the PCI bus. I've turned it off or disabled the card using XP's ControlPanel->Administrative Tools->Computer Management -> System Tools -> Device Manager, No luck. I have not pulled the ATI card yet. That maybe my next step.

I'm not sure if this means anything but when I'm montoring the TerraTec Control panel I get a lot of noise in the input panel when I type on the keyboard or move the mouse. This points me to the video cards a bit as well.

Another suggestion I've seen searching through the site is the power supply and fan.

What I'm most surprised about is, I've been using the same computer with a Terratec EWS88D for a few years with no noise problems, though it is used differently, I typically use it for input via 8 tracks of ADAT.

Anyway, suggestions on how to best troubleshoot would be appreciated.
 
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