Home recording: What difference will a new soundcard make?
September 25, 2004 9:14 PM Subscribe
Home Recording: my current setup is a Mackie 1402 board direct into an Audigy Platinum card. I was thinking about getting a higher-quality card--this was recommended--though truthfully, I'm not sure what noticeable differences to expect. Also, what is the advantage to having a breakout box if I've already got a decent mixing board?
We have a really small Mackie DPX-6 with an M-Audio Audiophile 24-96 card and no breakout box, and it works really well. The card you want is definitely a step up from ours, but anything is better than Audigy because the connectors aren't so great.
More professional set-ups would use the breakout box, but we get on fine without it. As far as the card itself, we've noticed a brighter sound, definitely -- it was well worth buying. I don't know what you're recording, but if it's just you, you may not need the breakout because of course you're only recording a track at a time. That's how we find it easiest to do it. Feel free to visit the url in my profile and download whatever you want; everything there was recorded as I've described.
Also, if you don't already subscribe, Tape Op's free and it's by far the best source out there for home recording information. They did a great interview with The Shins' James Mercer a few months ago, and it turns out that his set-up for a lot of what's on Oh Inverted World is much like what we've got (he even used CoolEdit). So, you can get some fairly decent sound this way.
posted by melissa may at 9:50 PM on September 25, 2004
More professional set-ups would use the breakout box, but we get on fine without it. As far as the card itself, we've noticed a brighter sound, definitely -- it was well worth buying. I don't know what you're recording, but if it's just you, you may not need the breakout because of course you're only recording a track at a time. That's how we find it easiest to do it. Feel free to visit the url in my profile and download whatever you want; everything there was recorded as I've described.
Also, if you don't already subscribe, Tape Op's free and it's by far the best source out there for home recording information. They did a great interview with The Shins' James Mercer a few months ago, and it turns out that his set-up for a lot of what's on Oh Inverted World is much like what we've got (he even used CoolEdit). So, you can get some fairly decent sound this way.
posted by melissa may at 9:50 PM on September 25, 2004
Typo -- it's a Macki DFX-6. Anyway, good luck.
posted by melissa may at 9:53 PM on September 25, 2004
posted by melissa may at 9:53 PM on September 25, 2004
The breakout box on the Delta-66 *does not* contain the converters - you'd need to go right up to the Delta 1010 for that. The 66 has the converters onboard (so the bo box doesn't shield you from audio noise) - it merely makes plugging and replugging stuff easier...
posted by benzo8 at 1:11 AM on September 26, 2004
posted by benzo8 at 1:11 AM on September 26, 2004
Response by poster: The breakout box on the Delta-66 *does not* contain the converters -
Do you mean the ability to convert analog -> digital?
posted by dhoyt at 8:13 AM on September 26, 2004
Do you mean the ability to convert analog -> digital?
posted by dhoyt at 8:13 AM on September 26, 2004
Since it is somewhat related, could I ask readers of this thread to comment on mobile firewire audio interfaces? I need something for my laptop to capture audio from my mixer and was thinking of the M-AUDIO - Firewire Audiophile but would consider other options if suggested.
posted by gen at 4:07 PM on September 26, 2004
posted by gen at 4:07 PM on September 26, 2004
This thread is closed to new comments.
A breakout box is always good -- it'll allow you to use balanced inputs and outputs. Otherwise, you might have balanced I/Os from your mixing board, but you'd still be sending unbalanced to your card.
posted by Jairus at 9:33 PM on September 25, 2004