Recording Sound

[chilli]

Hey Sphinx, good advice, I generally do a clean install of XP every 6 months or so anyway, is a bit of a compulsion and it takes me about an hour and a half for an nlited OS and most of the programs I use... I also use the most important tips from one of those XP for audio sites, similar to the one you linked to.. I'm generally happy with the actual performance of the laptop, especially considering its nearly two years old now, its just the hardware issues that are really screwing me around, but looks almost definitely like a wiring issue for most of these probs... for example, I when the computer is running off AC power, I get these ripples across my secondary LCD monitor, and as soon as I switch to battery it becomes clear... someone switches a light off and the Ozonic interface is no longer detected by the system... I think the TriggerFinger may be an IRQ issue because it happens when the PC is running off battery.

It seems I've kind of inadvertently hijacked your thread Shiva, sorry... anyway where are you?

[bean me]

hi sphinx

do you work only with the protools soundcard or use an additional one like onboard / soundblaster or the like ?

meaning what soundcard u go through when postmixing ?

hope u can enlighten me on that one, thanks b4 !

bean

[Coschi]

IB, try powering everything from a powerboard with a filter, should remove this crap

does your audio interface not have a usb option? the tascam i used had usb and firewire - forget firewire

bean, when i worked with protools (the rig we hire) it's m-powered (all m-audio gear) i can't remember what exactly it was but it was a usb interface, 19" rackmount unit with 8x balanced ins, and via adat lightpipe connected to another 8in/8out balanced audio interface.. sorry can't remember the name of the things. we recorded all audio tracks with this setup and then moved the tracks to the laptop and mixed there. with the laptop i had a tascam us-122 which really is pretty average, but it did everything i needed it to.

if you really want to know the m-audio gear (which was excellent) give Pink Noise Audio in Collingwood (melbourne) a call, in fact i suggest anyone wanting to hire a recording rig go trough these guys. just ask them what is in their protools rig. good prices, very flexible people

[chilli]

"...try powering everything from a powerboard with a filter"

Is that a surge protector? I wondered if one of those might work, but they were pretty expensive just to experiment.

The Ozonic does only have firewire, I bought it as a portable powered interface/MIDI controller, but I didn't realize firewire could only deliver be power over a 6-pin connection, and my laptop only has 4-pin. Other than that, its been pretty good, and I thought firewire was generally better than USB2.0 anyway.

[Coschi]

Not surge protection (this is an overcurrent switch)

Filtering just uses a low pass-filter inline with the power source so it lets through your 50hz (power) but cuts out all other high frequency shite that can mess with switchmode power supplies (all computer stuff uses switchmode power supplies pretty much) - you know when your neighbour uses their drill and you see it on your tv ? low-pass filter will fix this

http://www.eyo.com.au/prod_Y-PB3_proddesc_...Protection.html

should do the trick

BUT i could be wrong! sounds like noisy power to me though..

The Ozonic does only have firewire, I bought it as a portable powered interface/MIDI controller, but I didn't realize firewire could only deliver be power over a 6-pin connection, and my laptop only has 4-pin.

Well... if you are a little crafty you can work with this:

Get a 6-pin firewire cable, this is the pin description:

• Pin 1: Voltage Positive
  
• Pin 2: Voltage Ground
  
• Pin 3: TPB-
  
• Pin 4: TPB+
  
• Pin 5: TPA-
  
• Pin 6: TPA+
  

 

TPx are twisted pair cables (need this for noise cancellation), same signal on + and - but they are inverted, Voltage Ground is the referrenc, Voltage Positive is the aux power supply (what you want to power the Ozonic - cool unit by the way!)

Now, on the laptop end of the cable you want to get the connector to be a four-way:

1. Pin 1: TPB-
   
2. Pin 2: TPB+
   
3. Pin 3: TPA-
   
4. Pin 4: TPA+
   

and the shell is Voltage Ground

You want to pull out Voltage Positive and Voltage Ground and connect them to the power pins on a USB connector:

1. Pin 1: Voltage Positive (+12V)
   
2. Pin 4: Voltage Ground
   

 

Like this:

Really they probably make something already that does just that

[ThunderIdeal]

cubase.

[chilli]

Cubase might be overkill for what Shiva wants to do.

[ThunderIdeal]

it wasn't directed at shiva, i was just shouting the goodness of cubase for all to hear.

it behaves weirdly sometimes, and there is a ton of stuff to learn, but it's great.

[chilli]

Yep, Cubase is a great program, I use it for final arrangement and mixing usually... version 4 looks awesome.

[ThunderIdeal]

i've heard something about it having lots of bugs at the moment. i'm not sure if there's any reason i'd need it, nuendo is already overdone for me ie surround sound.... that is, unless they've taken a step back and improved more basic functions. you can never improve basic functions enough, i say.

[chilli]

I just reckon the interface looks a lot nicer... they should have the bugs ironed out by the time AIR or someone cracks it

[ThunderIdeal]

you know what i think would really benefit cubase? finding an image somewhere that you can cut into bits and glue all over your keyboard, which shows the shortcut values of the keys. i've seen one but for proper size they wanted money.

there is too much mouse required the way i've been doing it (without my midi keyboard plugged in), constantly resizing things and changing the zoom and stuff like that.

[chilli]

Well, the custom made keyboards are pretty pricey, but you can get a stick on set from here for about $20... considering the shortcuts I need to remember for about five other regularly used programs though, I think something like that would end up being a distraction. Guess it depends how your brain works though (mine doesn't).

Edited May 27, 2007 by IllegalBrain

[ThunderIdeal]

well, i think you can get some brain-starter for about twenty bucks too.

i only really want shortcuts for cubase, so i have no problem doing it, but i don't have a credit card. what other programs are you regularly using, ableton and such?

custom keyboard would be alright so long as it's not just an ordinary keyboard that's labelled differently.

[Coschi]

have you ever really given logic a proper shot?

[ThunderIdeal]

is that directed at me?

i used it breifly before cubase, it was easier. it seemed like a good program.

[Coschi]

whoever's listening.. er reading

i used cubase for years, before sx days, was good and certainly did the job but logic is smoooooth, really fucking smooth, smooth operation, huge ability to customize the console (design your own mixer/down/loops/sends/subs etc..) i just loved it

AND no shit, i can't explain why, but if you import the same files into both cubase and logic and bounce, logic sounds better, but who knows what to attribute that to

i just think that if people spent a little more time and really got to know logic inside out they'll never want anythign else

[ThunderIdeal]

i'll take that into consideration and give it more of a go some day.

it's weird isn't it? i swear cubase does weird stuff, like playing the same thing differently on different ocassions, even when the vst's aren't registering any cpu lag.

[No_One]

whoever's listening.. er reading

I am!

[chilli]

Thunder those things I linked to are basically things that you stick on your own keyboard... I seem to remember custom keyboards for Cubase being available, but I might just be mixing it up with the colorful and expensive Logic ones. Yeah, I use Ableton Live, Reason and Cubase mostly.

The trouble with Logic is it was discontinued for the PC at version 5 back in 2002... a long time in computer audio land. If you're using a PC it can't compare to Cubase SX 3. The latest mac incarnation of Logic is version 7, and it looks awesome... but I can't really justify buying a Mac until my little Inspiron pikes.

[No_One]

Hey Brain - save me looking into it - what is it that makes Macs better for creative endeavours?

When I bought a nerd-box to run CAD the dude said Macs were the go then and from what I'm picking up apparently Macs are better than PC's for Music-Production aswell?

[chilli]

Well traditionally the advantage of Mac over PC is stability... the endless possible configurations and various manufacturers involved with non-Mac rigs can lead to a number of stability issues... these problems are compounded by the relative bugginess of Windows (if you are using it) when compared to Apple's OS (currently OSX). Over the last few years, Intel and AMD CPU power started to leave Apple's CPU's choking on their dust, but that all changed last year when Intel and Apple struck a deal, and now all new Macs utilize Intel dual core CPU's.

So why would anyone use a PC? Well there's price... you might pay almost twice as much as a nice PC for a similarly spec'd Mac, although prices are coming down. Also, Macs are compatible with far fewer programs than PC's, especially as regards professional business software and games... in fact, most modern games will not run natively on a Mac. To solve this, one solution is Apple's Boot Camp, which lets you dual boot Windows and OSX on your Mac, thus giving you the best of both worlds. One more problem is that Macs are far less configurable than PC's, which makes it a lot more expensive when it comes to upgrading... this is the price you pay for stability though.

[komodo]

hey shiva

a real pro-PC point is the quantity of not only software but pirate software its there for mac too but nowhere near the scale of windows.

but yes windows is a dirty whore where osx is true love.

i've seen the macbooks running a fair bit and while they are cute and zippy theyre not really workhorses (ie. a bit kitsch on the hardware side for pro audio or 3d). you do however get a 6-pin firewire port, the 4-pin ones are *not reliable* for critical audio (eg. don't even touch the cable during a dj set!). macbook pro might be better but then you're back in old school mac money. the quad core mac pros look excellent, so shiny and beefy, but again you pay a premium for all that sexy engineering.

my advice would be if youve got cash to splash a mac pro would be great, if you're on a budget, build an AMD pc, or a pc laptop with custom fruit (i went for a toshiba A6 a year ago, gave it a high end HD, fast RAM, and it was still cheaper than the macbook)

maybe in another 6 months apple will get even better and cheaper, who knows, their switch to intel architecture is still new.

anyone tried out an Echo Indigo DJ PCMCIA card? looks tempting... so portable...

Edited June 4, 2007 by komodo

[chilli]

anyone tried out an Echo Indigo DJ PCMCIA card? looks tempting... so portable...

I nearly got one of these when I first set up my PC for audio a couple of years back, but I didn't know about external audio interfaces then. In hindsight, they seem kind of crap given the very limited I/O and average specs... no XLR/phantom power/1/4" jacks. After all, you can get a USB powered MIDI keyboard/controller/audio interface that will fit in a bag with your laptop for pretty cheap these days... I just don't know when the extra convenience of a PCMCIA card would come in handy for me, the only time I even need portability is when I'm traveling.

Just curiously, how would you use such a card? I mean, how would its portability fit into your setup/system of use?