I'm fairly new to all this so bear with me! What I understand you are
recommending is -
Here is what I'm recommending:
http://www.faqs.org/faqs/AudioFAQ/pro-audio-faq/
This is the best beginners resource I know of for audio and represents
the distilled opinions and technical expertise of many working and
retired professional persons who have actually made $million$ records
for many years and have also written defining standards for government
and industry including contributions to AES/EBU.
I didn't intend to recommend anything specific really. I just posted
in response to someone who suggested you needed super fast hard drives
to do simple production audio on a pc. The system I described is
almost 10 years old and would be considered obsolete, although you can
see it is still perfectly acceptable for simple work. Any modern built
pc will easily do what you want. That was my only point.
Software:
SAW for hard drive recording
The current version of SAW (now called SawStudio) is $2500. I'd look
at Cool Edit or Mackie Tracktion as more affordable for multitrack
work. I use WaveLab for 2 track stuff. I use these because I know the
keystrokes and have used them for almost 10 years not because they are
superior. The defacto software for pro audio in studios is ProTools.
($500 - $50,000). Most of the packages I see now are absurdly
complicated and over featured. I don't imagine most users will use 30%
of the capability they are paying for. I understand there are free or
almost free multi track apps as well that work fine for basic
recording and playback.
Hardware:
MB - P90 with scsi hd sockets (not really understanding the importance
of scsi)
HD - >= ATA100 7200rpm
forget I said anything about that old stuff.
SC - LynxOne / M-Audio Audiofile with VST Support (vst is some kind of
inbuilt envelop generator / synth?)
I still think both of these are viable cards. The LynxOne is probably
to outdated for most people. Yes, VST is the a Steinburg specification
and is necessary for "softsynth" use. As you suggested, a built in,
computer generated synth. Various companies, notably Native
Instruments, but many others, make software replications of classic
synthesizers as well as modern innovations. It really is a brave new
world. Make sure your card is VST compliant and has usable drivers
available.
Ok time for the idiot questions!
Firstly, I was under the (mis)conception that connection would go from
the desk into a normal USB / Fwire connection.
Why would you need a USB / fwire port on the sound card? Why do you
advise avoiding this route?
That's what many vendors are pushing these days. Your soundcard
choices are USB, Firewire and PCI. I say PCI is the most stable and
the cheapest. The other options are dependent on specific combinations
of chipset, mainboard etc. Poor production quality and sloppy, cheap
design mean it's a clusterfuck and a crapshoot at best. That being
said I also have a Tascam US-244 with spdif i/o and two shitty preamps
with midi and USB interface. I think it was $300 and it's worked
flawlessly for 3 years in a mobile laptop situation. You can't really
use the "microphone" or soundcard input that comes as part of your
mainboard. You need dedicated parts for this.
1)Basic "acoustic" recording is done like this:
microphone -> preamp -> Digital Audio Converter (DAC -this is part of
your "soundcard"- there's a zillion types) ->pc using dedicated audio
software. If you want to sing/rap or add real guitar etc. this is how
you have to do it. Yes, the preamp was historically part of the desk
for both playback and recording. This has changed. It can now be all
on a computer chip inside your soundcard or a separate dedicated
preamp with no desk (mixing) features.
My playback is out through the soundcard via analog cables to a pair
of Mackie "powered" speakers. The amplifiers and speakers are
integrated in the speaker box. I think there are clones now that are
fine in the same price range. ($1000usd). Speakers/amps i.e. output
reproduction is a religious issue involving the room design and
treatment, speakers, multiple amps, cabling etc. While it all sounds
like a dark art with insurmountable technical problems, the idea here
is to make music that sounds close to sounding the same on any system
you play it back on. Car stereo, boombox, radio station, movie theater
etc. When your mixes "translate well" you have done your job
correctly. Most people can't do this effectively using headphones.
2)Basic "electronic" recording. This is where all the sounds are
generated by a computer using software: i.e. "softsynths". Very cool,
this is where you need buttloads of cpu, mem etc. Steinberg is the
king of this in my amateur opinion. I use a 64 key Oxygen midi/usb
keyboard for input as this also has controllers on board. About $130.
I just use the midi connection. A professional keyboard or piano
player would laugh at it but it works fine for me. You can also use
outboard midi gear: samplers, keyboards, drum machines etc. This is
considered "old school" and will probably disappear before long as all
the amazing old gear is now being modeled inside the computer. With
the advancing march of hegemony and the distortion effect of
aggressive compression coupled with lossy bitrate reduction no one
with know or care before long anyway.
According to your setup the desk plugs directly into an analog audio
port on the sound card? Is whis via an optical connection or a standard
1/4 jack?
The "desk" in my case is a tiny preamp/mixer which feeds analog signal
to the soundcard via microphone cable with XLR connectors. The DAC is
done by the soundcard. That's one option. I hear Berringer makes a 4
channel entry level mixer that fits in your hand for less than $75 and
doesn't suck completely. On the other hand my current system has a
pair of dedicated outboard preamps feeding a standalone DAC which
feeds the digital stream into the PCI soundcard via cable with XLR
connectors. Just for perspective, without the microphones or the
soundcard/pc/software this front end is roughly $4000. You can spend
lot's more or lot's less. Most soundcards have both analog and digital
inputs. Sometimes you can use both or only one at a time, depending on
the capabilities of the cards.
I presume you are using monitors powered by the desk - so there is a
full duplex connection between the desk and the sound card over this
connection?
yes, you should be able to record and playback at the same time.
Almost all the cards do this now.
Would there be an advantage in using a more passive desk and hooking
speakers to a seperate external amplifier, direct from the sound card
on an optical connection?
Not an optical connection. That's an old system for digital transfer.
You would just use an audio connection; microphone cable using XLR
connectors.
There are some "digital speakers" and the DA takes place on a chip
inside the speaker box where the amp is also stuffed. The've mostly
just moved the components around. I see this as a gimmick to sell
things as "the next big thing" as the parts to all this are built at
such a low price point that they can't really be of acceptable
quality. Optical is mostly phased out I believe. spdif is considered a
consumer standard with professional being AES/EBU on XLR connectors.
(like a mic cable- three conductor)
Check out the FAQ on that site at the top. All this is covered I
think. Best of luck.
