Start recording - demo standard

Hi Kachman
I have an Presario 5670 (450 MHz/256MRAM) in the family, used by one of my daughters.
I think that it has enough CPU/RAM power for job with Audacity, but the small 10GB hardrive will be full very fast....

The signal level from the SM57 mic is probably to low for the mic input of your soundcard.
Professional mics as the SM57 has much lower output signal level than simple PC or Karaoke mics.
They therefore normally needs pre-amp or mixer/pre-amp of some sort.
A good and cheap solution ( < 50 $dollar) could be a small Mixer as the Behringer UB802 or the new XENYX 802 http://www.behringer.com/802/index.cfm?lang=ENG .

Yes, you can plug your Acoustic ( I presume that it is an acoustic) Guitar with a built-in preamp directly to the line input of the soundcard, signal levels will match good enough to get a decent sound.
But using a mixer for the guitar is even better.

The signal level from the SM57 mic is probably to low for the mic input of your soundcard.
Professional mics as the SM57 has much lower output signal level than simple PC or Karaoke mics.
They therefore normally needs pre-amp or mixer/pre-amp of some sort.
A good and cheap solution ( < 50 $dollar) could be a small Mixer as the Behringer UB802 or the new XENYX 802 http://www.behringer.com/802/index.cfm?lang=ENG .

Excuse me everyone for not writing in english but this is a kalle specific question about Stockholm music shops.

Jag har funderat ett tag på att köpa en mik och en enkel mixer men vet inte riktigt vilken butik som har bäst priser. Har köpt gitarr och smågrejjer på Jam men antar att det borde finnas andra bra butiker i stan. Om jag t ex. vill ha en XENYX 802 och en SM57 (+stativ med bom) var ska jag kolla då?

Thank you Kalle! Yes its a takamine acoustic guitar with TK4N built in preamp, 3 EQs.

I may just as well invest in the mixer for the mic if it doesn't cost that much, especially if it helps my guitar also. Another question though out of curiosity, if I plug my guitar and mic into my acoustic amp (fender acoustasonic jnr), and then plug my amp into the line-in on my PC sound card, will I get the needed pre-amplification for the mic through the amp. I know I can probably try this out for a qucik answer - just haven't got the cords yet.

Also, the reason why I'm stepping up to the sm57 is because i started out doing some practice recording with my PC mic, which sounds fine, except that I get a lot of background noise in too. Will the sm57 give me significantly better results? (i think i can still return it if not :-)

........Also, the reason why I'm stepping up to the sm57 is because i started out doing some practice recording with my PC mic, which sounds fine, except that I get a lot of background noise in too......

A lot of this background noise is probably the result of your soundcard. Especially if its a soundchip built onto your motherboard: ie RealTek 97. A proper soundcard like the M-Audio 24/96 will go a long way.

Hej Morot

Jag köpte min UB802 mixer för 475 kr hos Förstärkardoktorn http://www.forstarkardoktorn.com/
samt en Behringer XM8500 mikrofon (en Shure SM 58 kopia) för 275 kr.
Det är nog det mest prisvärda i stan just nu.
Läs om dem här http://www.behringer.com/02_products/index.cfm?lang=ENG
(XENYX 802 mixern är så ny att den inte kommit ut i butikerna.)
Både mixern och micken låter utmärkt och är lätta använda.
Jag köpte det billigaste mikstativet JAM har= Rockstand RS20710B för 325 kr
Men jag tror att http://www.kjell.com säljer samma stativ (produktnr 24-520) för 299 kr

Jag använder både mixern och mikrofonen när när jag gör inspelningar på PC med hjälp av gratisprogrammen http://www.kreatives.org/kristal/ och http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ .
(det funkar bra även med de enkla ljudkort jag har i min PC)
Mixern har jag också använt när > 3st gitarrspelare (akustiskt med inbyggda mickar) jammat tillsammans och velat ansluta oss mot en förstärkare.

Om du vill veta mer sÃ¥ mejla pÃ¥ [email protected]

Kalle

Jag har funderat ett tag på att köpa en mik och en enkel mixer men vet inte riktigt vilken butik som har bäst priser. Har köpt gitarr och smågrejjer på Jam men antar att det borde finnas andra bra butiker i stan. Om jag t ex. vill ha en XENYX 802 och en SM57 (+stativ med bom) var ska jag kolla då?

Hi Kachman

"if I plug my guitar and mic into my acoustic amp (fender acoustasonic jnr), and then plug my amp into the line-in on my PC sound card, will I get the needed pre-amplification for the mic through the amp. I know I can probably try this out for a qucik answer - just haven't got the cords yet."

If the amp has an mic input (as an acoustic amp normally has) and a line/aux output and if you connect the amp´s line/aux output to the line input of the soundcard it will probably work.

I got the Behringer UB802 mixer last night. Tried a quick recording, and it makes my guitar louder, but it's a little scratchy. Not any scratchier than it was plugged in directly, but I was hoping that would go away in addition to the added volume and EQs.

The mic works fine though, I still need to play around with it some more in general. I've tried using the "FX out" and the "main out" to my PC, but there seems to be no real difference. Is there supposed to be any? or maybe thats for sending the signal along with effects? except there seems to be no effects on the mixer so thats a little confusing.

Hi Kachman
If you have headphones, connect them to the headphone jack on the mixer.
Connect the guitar to Line 3 or 5 (jack left channel)on the mixer.
Crank up the gain on guitar to max and set channel level to midpoint = 0dB.
Increase main mix level until the 0 dB LED blips when you play hard on the guitar.
Increase headphone gain until you can hear the guitar with a good level.
Can you then hear (in the headphones) the schratchy sounds from the guitar ?

Use Main mix outputs to connect the mixer to soundcard line input.
But hold down the main mix level and DON´T let the 0 dB LED blip when recording, you will then overdrive the line input of the linecard.

If you send a 0 dBu (0,775 V) output level (from the mixer) into the line input of a typical PC soundcard this level could be close to the clipping level of the soundcards inputs A/D converters.
This is due to the fact that semiprofessional equipment as the UB802 mixer has a reference line level of 4 dBu (approx 1V) while a home recording equipment as a PC soundcard has a reference line level of - 10 dBV (approx 0,3 V).

That "scratchiness" is digital distortion. You're going to have a hard time getting rid of it without a DI. The reason being that, although the guitar has a preamp, it does not boost the output to line level. It is still an instrument level output. The distortion is caused because the instrument level being fed to the soundcard is clipping. This has to do with an impedance mismatch. Basically there is too much power coming from the guitar output and it is causing the distortion on the card before you are even able to get a decent level.( what I should have said is that the power from the guitar is low and due to having to increase the gain in order to get a decent level, the line is clipping) If your mixer has an instrument level input this will help. A low priced DI box will do the trick as well. On the other hand, there is a lot more that can be done with a decent sound card. Upgrading that will improve the overall sound of your recordings. Better clarity, more headroom, lower noisefloor. It's a minor investment that will take your recording from ok to sweet. The Line6 tone port is a pretty decent looking and from what I understand a nice sounding unit. All the emulations are based on the POD xt. If you've heard the POD xt, it sounds great. The toneport comes with Cubase LE. Another decent tool.

I dont fully agree with hueseph.
I have performed recordings with my preamped acoustic guitar into a line port of the UB802 mixer and the mixers main mixer out into the line input of my cheapo soundblaster soundcard.
And I have not had any problems with digital distorsion as long as I hold the output level from the mixer at about the -20 dB(u) level LED.

And I have used Kristal as recording SW, as I like it better than Audacity for multitracking recordings.
And with the ASIO4ALL driver I have no problems with latency ( track to track delay).

But I agree that the "scratchiness" could be digital distortion and that its due to a too high level from the mixer.
Thats why I recommended a test to check that its not the guitar,its preamp or the mixer that is causing the "scratchiness" .

Maybe so but were you to plug into a DI and decent sound card, I promise you, you will wonder how you ever lived with just a soundblaster card. This is speaking from experience. I own both a soundblaster and a Delta 44. I have a UB502 which sits on my desk doing nothing. That's not to say that it's entirely useless but the sound from my tube pre into the Delta 44 is miles ahead of the soundblaster card. Try even mentioning the "Creative" cards at a recording forum and you will get nothing but flak. You pointed out the main point though. You have to keep your levels reletively low in order for you to keep from any sort of distortion at the soundcard level. With the Delta card I can pretty well keep everything at unity gain. Hell, I can even push the tube on my preamp pretty hard and still get away without any clipping. I'm not saying that this is the best way to go. I've spent time behind a 64 channel Solid State Logic desk and had the painstaking task of calibrating a 24 track Otari tape machine. As brief a time as it may have been(2years), it opened my ears I guess you could say, as to the potential of what audio can be. Sounblaster is the dregs of audio. I'm sorry. You owe it to yourself to invest in a decent soundcard. If a good demo is what you want, you are not going to get it from a soundblaster card.

Yes , I know that a Soundblaster card or other normal PC soundcards is not good for quality sound recordings, but I can do recordings with it without any (for me) hearable digital distorsion and too high noise level.

To make the life of my soundcard and mixer a little bit better, I have built a Line Level Attenuator box that reduces the high (professional +4 dBu) output line level from UB802 mixer to the lower (home equipment -10 dBV ) input line level of my soundcards.

But when my playing and singing ability reaches a level that needs better recording performance I will buy a more professional type of soundcard as the M-Audio Delta 44.

hueseph

I'm wondering if you have any experience with the M-Audio Audiophile 2496? Is this a decent card for guitar hobbyist that just wants to do some basic recording? For recording an acoustic guitar I have the Audio Technica AT2041SP mikes on order. But for my electric I was thinking of getting the Behringer MIC100 Tube Ultragain DI. Any thoughts. I want to keep this to a low budget as it is a hobby.
Just trying to keep myself amused, no dreams of stardom.

I'm thinkiing of buying a new laptop with my tax return (if i get any)..... so I'm not going to upgrade the soundcard on my old PC now. Do you guys know of any brands and models of laptops that come stocked with stuff thats compatible with music recording - soundcard, good size RAM and hard disk, I/O ports, etc. I also hear that mac is a a better operating system than windows when it comes to software for this type of stuff.... any ideas/experiences/opinions? thanks.