Dammit got the wrong mixer...Chippy..help?

[Zildjian]

yea so I bought this Alesis mixer and way to go it can only record 2 tracks at once. Stupid me good thing I can return it

so my question is what a a good multi track recorder that I should look at that records 6+ tracks at once?

or should I just get some interface?

[Seafroggys]

Presonus Firepod.

[BSU_53]

If you have a firewire port and want to stick with alesis they have 8 and 16 track firewire mixers. but they start at like 300.

[Chippy569]

oh wow.... silly! analog mixers are DESIGNED to filter down to two track (left, right).

i 2nd the motion on Presonus Firepod.

[Seafroggys]

yeah do you want a mixer or a recorder?

[Zildjian]

Im a little biased right now. I kinda want a recorder/ mixer to toy around with because im not getting my macbook for a little wile

but if the firepod is what it says il wait till i get the funds

[Chippy569]

well, you can hang on to the mixer for sure. what kind did you get?

[Zildjian]

yea but I dont know the return policy (some new local shop) so Il do it tomorrow.

Its a Alesis 8 track

I just wanna play with my new mics lol

[fishbulb]

I got a Phonic 16 input firewire mixer that, although i haven't done any real recording or multi tracking, seems really nice. I got it for $320 with shipping on eBay brand new.

I'll see if i can find a link because i think he buys them from onedaymusic.com or something and haves them ship it to whoever buys it.

http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQfgtpZ1QQfrppZ25QQsassZlouisQ5fbestQ5fseller That has all of his auctions (only two, and both are the same thing)

And if that doens't work, look here: http://cgi.ebay.com/Phonic-Helix-Board-18-FireWire-18-Channel-Mixer_W0QQitemZ250084168737QQihZ015QQcategoryZ2378 5QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Hope this helps.

[DxRocker]

Yo zildjan...

Can you link the mixer you own now? Just to make sure.
Pretty much any analog mixer can be used to do multi track recordings.
Thing is, you need the right interface...
If you have an analog mixer (like I do), then you need AD/DA converters to link it to the pc.

You need a soundcard that can handle multi track recording.

Each analog track is rooted through the respective AD/DA converter ports and linked to the pc via that special soundcard. Now, you can link each track on your mixer to a track in a program like cubase or Homestudio (from cakewalk) or some other multi track recording software.

Also, be adviced that you need quite a powerfull machine of a pc to be able to do this with good quality.
I can record as much as 16 tracks simultanously.

Obviously, recording 16 tracks at once, real-time, needs quite some processing power and memory. You can't afford the slightest "click" or "calculating time" since that will result in a loss of information, wich means a bad recording.

Generally, a good Pentium 4 with at least 512 MB of RAM (1 gig adviced though) and 30+ gigabytes of free disk space should do it.

When doing it this way, it is also adviced to only use that pc (or that windows installation) for NOTHING else then that...

Disable all networking stuff. Network hardware sends IRQ's that can interfere with your audio card, as these oftenly use the same IRQ channel, wich will result in cracks on the recording.

Also, THE ONLY software installed under windows should be the drivers of the soundcard and the sound editing program. That's it.
No games, no DirectX, etc. These things always change a bunch of settings in your registry and will give a higher priority to certain processes that are totally unimportant for recording.

That means that more cpu time will be reserved for these processes, while you don't need them at all.

So you will gain the best performance out of your machine if you use a fresh installation of windows with nothing else installed besides the audio drivers and the audio software (cubase or alike). That way, your pc will be optimised for audio recording/editing.

(yeah, I was bored, so I got detailed, wonna fight about it? :) )

[Zildjian]

haha nah I dont wanna fight you lol

Thanks for that info. But I will not be getting a PC im getting a macbook(2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 1GB memory, 80GB (probably will get a bigger one) hard drive1, Double-layer SuperDrive). Then get a copy pro tools hd from my sound recording teacher (shhhh dont tell)

The only thing Im after is semi decent home recording. The places I play out supply a mixer so when you think it would just be easier to get a interface?

[DxRocker]

Personnaly, I like the method I described better (wheter you use a mac or windows machine is not important).

I'm a bit old-school in that sense... :D
The good old analog mixer with the ad/da converters works just fine. I don't know much about hooking it up to laptops though.

Reason why I like the old-school method better is because I get to use a PCI card INSIDE the pc. With all those new things, it's always firewire and/or USB. PCI just is faster, more reliable and more stable.

But with a laptop, you'll have to get an external interface wich will work via firewire and/or USB anyway, so I'm thinking it doesn't matter that much at that point.

Although, an alternative to PCI (internal in desktops) is PCMCIA for laptops (external). This is a lot more stable and more reliable then USB and alike. Think it's more costly as well though.

You're gonna need to do your research :)

But you have your mixer allready, so assuming you cannot return it, I'm thinking it will be cheaper for you to just go for the AD/DA way.
But this all is still assuming that you can actually root every track of your mixer through the AD/DA converters, of wich I cannot be sure without knowing what type of mixer you have.

The large majority can do this though, but I have come accross some models where this is actually not possible. Rare though.

The only thing Im after is semi decent home recording.
When recording multi track on a pc, it pretty much is semi-pro allready, since you have total control over every track.

edit: let me do a little search on the internet and I'll give you a quick rundown of my own amateuristic setup

[DxRocker]

Here we are. With this stuff, I am able to record 16 tracks simultanously.

My mixer. An analog behringer I found on e-bay:

http://www.behringer.com/SL2442FX-PRO/index.cfm?lang=ENG

My soundcard. This card is able to record 8 tracks. I bought a second one and used it to extent the primary card, wich gave me 16 tracks in total.

http://www.sydec.be/Products/Details/ID/bff3368f-c161-4c9b-ab3d-779666748d56/Mixtreme+192+PCI+card/

My AD/DA converter. I have 2 off these as well, as they only carry 8 tracks each.

http://www.sydec.be/Products/Details/ID/c5c702ba-f5f0-4c18-892f-657783bb0721/iBox+8-LINE+(SS8IO-3)/

The card and the iBoxes are pretty professional though. I know they use these in a couple of small radio stations in Belgium. They are quite expensive.. But I'm one of those lucky guys who used to play in a band of wich the bassist is the number 2 man at the company that makes these :lol:

But at least now you know what kind of stuff I'm talking about...

[Zildjian]

DX you are a godsend

Il talk to my sound recording teacher about this set up as well. I like your idea alot though

[CasB]

I wouldn't recommend the behringer mixer, cause the pre-amps are known to be really crappy.

When you buy a firepod, you've got it all in one.

[Zildjian]

yea Im not sure about beringer to, im looking more along the line of mackie or roland because those are things ive used and find really easy to work with

what about workstations?

[dairyairman]

ok, so lemmee get this straight: you've got sixteen cables coming out of the behringer mixer carrying analog signals to the two AD/DA converters. each converter digitizes 8 input signals and mixes them together on the TDIF output to the TDIF input of one of the two pc sound cards. is that right?

[fishbulb]

And the AD/DA cables send the information back to the behringer mixer to send the EQ from the PC back to the mixer and out to a PA system. (pretty sure if it's what i'm thinking of)

[Chippy569]

those soundscapes are kinda nifty, eh Dx?

i agree with PCI > > > > > > firewire >>>>>>>>>>>> ... >>>>>>>>>>>>>> usb.


my dream home studio is based on this MotU 24I/O
http://www.motu.com/products/pciaudio/24IO

with a big fat analog mixer (like a Neve.... oh man)

with one of these:
http://www.hosatech.com/hosa/products/stp-200.html
running from the mixer's "Channel Insert" to the 24I/O



fully analog mixing, with fully digital multitracking. Ahh.... it's a good thing.

[Chippy569]

ok, so lemmee get this straight: you've got sixteen cables coming out of the behringer mixer carrying analog signals to the two AD/DA converters. each converter digitizes 8 input signals and mixes them together on the TDIF output to the TDIF input of one of the two pc sound cards. is that right?

yep! coming out of the "channel inserts" i assume.

[DxRocker]

ok, so lemmee get this straight: you've got sixteen cables coming out of the behringer mixer carrying analog signals to the two AD/DA converters. each converter digitizes 8 input signals and mixes them together on the TDIF output to the TDIF input of one of the two pc sound cards. is that right?

Yep, exactly.

If you go look in your sound options of windows, you will see a range of choices there. On standard pc's with only stereo sound, you'll have a left and right channel wich you can control. With these cards and the installed drivers, I see 16 channels in that option screen.

Then it is just a matter of installing a program like cubase or cakewalk (or any other multi track audio software), opening up a new 16 track file, mapping every channel of the cards to its respective track in the software - et voila. You are set.

You can go a lot further as well though... Suppose I go all out and use 16 mics for my DxMonster ( :smoke: ). I could record only drums on the 16 tracks, then add 4 other tracks to the file, push "play" and overdub bass, rythm guitar, lead guitar and vocals in those 4 new tracks. So now, I have a 20 track recording... Depending on the processing power of your machine, you can go as far as 128 tracks with most programs (not that you're gonna wonna do that though, but it's kinda cool to know you can right? :smash: )

And the AD/DA cables send the information back to the behringer mixer to send the EQ from the PC back to the mixer and out to a PA system. (pretty sure if it's what i'm thinking of)

That's the general idea, but my mixer does not support this, wich makes me a sad panda. When I bought that thing, it was primarily meant to be used as sound installation in the rehearsel room for vocals, play alongs and as PA for gigs. It's only afterwards I started getting interested in recording. So at the time I bought it, I didn't pay any attention to this stuff.

I'm gonna need to upgrade the mixer to be able to record and play without switching all the cables.

But it's ok. For the time being, due to lack of time, I only record rehearsels sometimes to see how our stuff sounds. So I only use tracks 1 to 8 to record. Tracks 9 to 16 are used to playback.

I'm looking into some courses as well for sound engineering since I don't know the first thing about it. For the time being I play around with the buttons and see what comes out of it, I experiment. Mostly I have no idea what I'm doing though, hahaha.

These things take time to learn, and time is not something wich grows of the trees these days...