Digital Music Recording Desks
 

Anyone record on a digital desk that has a VGA monitor output to copy/paste/edit the music you've done on a graphical interface?

I know about the Roland vs2480 which looks incredible (not sure about effects on board) but is very expensive over here.

Any help is most appreciated.

try a mackie d8

Thanks, checking it now.

You don't have a link to it do you? I can only see mixers.

The Roland MV8000 is a better price but is way too Hip Hop - I need something to handle guitars with drums and effects on board.

good to know...

Don't bother with that.

Get a respectable computer with some extra ram and an audio firewire interface.

Get either Ableton Live, or ProTools LE.

Then just get the plugins (or Reason) that are specific to your needs. If you are need good acoustic sampled drums, look at DFH, or BFD. For guitars, maybe Guitar Rig might be useful.

This type of setup is way more friendly and powerful than something like the 2480. Just download the demo of Ableton Live and you'll see how easy it is use.

Thanks for that info. I am a bit weary of working my music on a PC aswell - spend way too long on a PC as it is! But I am checking it out, thanks.

I know... I have the same problem. It sucks staring at a monitor all day.....

However, the computer is the right tool for recording/editing. The interface (e.g., Ableton) is going to be 100x times flexible, productive and more powerful than a 2480.

I have just done this and I can see how, after some studying, I might get some good drums going. I need to understand how I will record my guitars or vocals into my computer.

The reason I am clueless in this respect is that I am currently using an analogue Tascam 4 track which is about 16 years old so it's going to be a totally different experience. :1orglaugh

It's actually pretty straight forward. Just get a microphone (e.g., Shure SM57) and a firewire interface (which is essentially a preamp and a digital to analog converter). So just plug you microphone into the firewire interface, adjust the preamp level and record.

Here are a few firewire interfaces:

http://www.rme-audio.com/english/firewire/ff400.htm

http://www.motu.com/products/motuaudio

http://www.m-audio.com/index.php?do=...bileinterfaces

Thanks for that :)

I have briefly seen Garage Band in action and like that but am not a Mac user myself.

Do you think ProTools for example would do just as good of a job in terms of guitar recording and onboard drums/effects?

I am a little confused. Ableton Live, or ProTools LE will get the job done. Live might be easier to learn, because it's interface is so intuitive. ProTools might have a larger learning curve, or it might just make sense to you.

The audio quality for recording guitars is going to be limited by your preamp, d2a converters, and microphone. After it's recorded, you can use plug-ins (i.e. effects) and shape the sound of the recorded audio. This allows you to add reverb, eq, delay, compression, etc... Most programs offer some basic plug-ins, but you'll normally want to get higer end versions of the plugins to meet your needs. This is a good alternative. The 'factory' include a hand full of pretty good plug-ins.

What do you mean by "onboard drums"? Do you mean using midi to write drum patterns? You can use midi to trigger samples to create a drum part.I use DFH, but EZdrummer is excellent for getting real quality drum parts with minimal effort.

Download the demo of Addictive drums from http://www.xlnaudio.com/ and use it in the Ableton Live demo. You'll get a good idea of how things work. I don't think Addictive drums are as good as EZdrummer, but nevertheless, you'll an idea of how midi and quality acoustic drum parts are created.

I use a Neve board w/ Apogee converters .
M-Audio is shit IMO.
Use the RME Hammerfall or a High End MOTU idf you Cant afford the Apogee's.

what kind of music you guys doing? lol i bought a cheap tascam 4 track a few months ago and i haven't touched it for a while hehe

Great info thanks.

I have been checking out this: http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_u...xPro-main.html which looks like a good option. I wondered what you think of it.

I completely agree. M-audio is horrid. The preamps suck, the converts suck and the drivers are shady. I would suggest RME or Metric Halo, over MOTU. I had the 896 and the converters were shit. I don't know about the new stuff. Maybe it's improved. The apogee ensemble looks pretty nice too.

I don't know about that. I never heard of it.

M-audio and PTLE is a great place to start on a budget. But it's known for having shady drivers and lackluster preamps. The PT 003 rack, or 003 factory would be a much better alternative. (Also, to use PT you can only use M-audio interfaces, or 003, 003 factory. You can't use MOTU, or RME, etc... This is kinda the problem with the PTLE and M-powered PT).

Something like this might also be useful. It could be used in PT or Live.

http://www.native-instruments.com/in...=guitarrig2_us

I just got the software edition. It's pretty cool. I am amazed how amp modeling has evolved in the last 5 years.

That looks damn good too. I wonder if I got this: http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_u...xPro-main.html I could use Guitar Rig 2 together with it? This way I could combine the usefulness of both (and get drums).

Not sure if they are compatible like that?

The software version should be fine, but using the GR2 pedal with the PTLE, I am not sure if that will work. PTLE works with only the 003, 003 factory and M-powered PT works only with specific M-audio interfaces.

A important difference between that M-audio black-box and GR2, is that with GR2, you record the 'raw' (i.e., direct guitar sound), then you select which amp/effects/distortion/etc... you want. So after you've recorded, you can change the amp modeling setting, increase the distortion level, etc... It's amazingly flexible. After you record, you can change the amp/microphone to sound totally different. I don't think the Black Box works that way. You record the audio after it's been processed. But, I am not sure.
Also, GR2 is a bit of cpu piggy. But, that's fine with me. After you've tweaked your sound you can always 'freeze' the track to free up cpu usage.

Thanks for the info Karl. I'm going to order some of the things you mentioned here.

Any tips on what drums effects to use if I went the ProTools M-powered route?