A Few Questions

aRcTuRuS

There are a few things im wanting to know bout some stuff so here goes...

1. Is there a way to record 7 drum tracks at once and have them available to edit in Sonar individually? Some may suggest just use a mixer and adjust it on the mixer then record, but when you come to edit them individually you cant. So far i have found a 4 track recording soundcard which is the M-Audio Delta 44. it will do 4 drums at a time, so using my mixer and its subgroups thatll be kik, snare, toms and cymbals. If anyone out there knows of any soundcards or devices that will let me edit 7-8 indivudal drum tracks after recording them then let me know. Basically what i wanna do is record them dry without any effects, then do all the EQ'ing, panning etc in the software.

2. Is there a way using Sonar or any other recording software to send a signal to an external effects loop then bring it back into the mix. Im thinking of the Behringer Ultramizer here... if i have low overall volume in the software i wanna run it through the ultramizer, so that itll increase the overall volume withou distorting. Also this would be useful with other effects devices.

3. G3456's presets... have they been created using new additions to the GNX models or have they been created only using what is available on the unit at present?

4. G3456 often talks about \"MFG's\", does this stand for manufaturers? or something cuz i havnt worked it out yet.

Can't think of the other questions at present but the drum recording was my main question. Ill post again if i think of the others. Cheers \\m/

MartinTele

\aRcTuRuS\ wrote:

There are a few things im wanting to know bout some stuff so here goes...

1. Is there a way to record 7 drum tracks at once and have them available to edit in Sonar individually? Some may suggest just use a mixer and adjust it on the mixer then record, but when you come to edit them individually you cant. So far i have found a 4 track recording soundcard which is the M-Audio Delta 44. it will do 4 drums at a time, so using my mixer and its subgroups thatll be kik, snare, toms and cymbals. If anyone out there knows of any soundcards or devices that will let me edit 7-8 indivudal drum tracks after recording them then let me know. Basically what i wanna do is record them dry without any effects, then do all the EQ'ing, panning etc in the software.

Get an 8 track card.

With a 4 channel card you can record 4 drums. Lets say kick, snare, high hat(HH) and tom1(T1). Then you would have to record another four tracks in sonar to record Over head(OH) mic left , OH right, Tom 2, tom 3 as an over dub.

With an 8 track card you have Kick, Snare, HH, T1, T2, T3. OHR, OHL

The OHL/OHR are overhead mics that give you sterio imaging of the entire drum set.

In sonar you have unlimited tracks you can record. With a 4 track card you can only record 4 tracks at a time. You can always add more overdubs. To get a good live drum sound you would have to use a mixer, record and mix the drums live in real time. Very difficult to do but the beatles did it with two tracks.

For hardware I would recommend the delta 1010lt. It's an eight track card that you can chain up to 32 tracks. I use two of them for 16 tracks of real time recording in Sonar. I have EXCELLANT results.

2. Is there a way using Sonar or any other recording software to send a signal to an external effects loop then bring it back into the mix. Im thinking of the Behringer Ultramizer here... if i have low overall volume in the software i wanna run it through the ultramizer, so that itll increase the overall volume withou distorting. Also this would be useful with other effects devices.

Yes. But why would you do that??

Sonar has something called normalise that does the same thing you are talking about. It takes the volume of a track and maximises it to the maximum volume with out distortion. No need for external devices. Sonar has so many effects it is AMASING!

If you really really REALLY... want to use external effects it's easy to do as well but not necessary. Normalise is just the same as your ultramiser.

MT

aRcTuRuS

\MartinTele\ wrote:

Get an 8 track card.

For hardware I would recommend the delta 1010lt. It's an eight track card that you can chain up to 32 tracks. I use two of them for 16 tracks of real time recording in Sonar. I have EXCELLANT results.

Looking at the pics of this there only seems to be 2 xlr inputs amongst the 50million cables it has coming out of it. What type of jacks are you using to record your drums? There is a chance i can use 1/4\"s but that would mean having to go and buy them, when id rather just use XLR. The 1010lt seems to have 2 jacks or every sort... xlr, 1/4\", midi, rca but now multiple quantities of each. If you can let me know what type you use it may be easier for me to understand.

\MartinTele\ wrote:

Yes. But why would you do that??

Sonar has something called normalise that does the same thing you are talking about. It takes the volume of a track and maximises it to the maximum volume with out distortion. No need for external devices. Sonar has so many effects it is AMASING!

Yeah that normalise can work well sometimes but applying it to the overall mix seems to be something i havnt worked out yet apart from increasing the level to above 0db. I listen to bands like Metallica and can hear that they could have done with a bit of normalizing on their earlier albums but then i listen to other bands and their album songs are loud as compared to what ive been able to do.

MikEdge

aRcTuRuS, Sonar does give you plenty of routing possibilities, it's a sort of camouflage software - it looks somehow easy and cheap, but there are many things in there.
As far as loudness goes, maybe try to look at some mastering plugins. There are several of very high quality, but they are rather expensive. iZotope Ozone (a bit complicated), Yamaha FinalMaster, IK Multimedia T-Racks and especially Waves Masters. BTW: Waves plugins are excellent, but far from cheap. I'm sure there are free plugs as well, but with the professional tools mentioned, you need be afraid, you'll get low volume at the output.
MFG really stands for manifacturer.

jer

I'm using Ozone. I find it pretty simple. A couple hour learning curve.

There are a lot of presets that get the job done I think.

MikEdge

Yeah, presets are handy. I tested Ozone and it offered much deeper editing than T-Racks. Great to hear learning curve is not long!

MartinTele

\aRcTuRuS\ wrote:

\MartinTele\ wrote:

Get an 8 track card.

For hardware I would recommend the delta 1010lt. It's an eight track card that you can chain up to 32 tracks. I use two of them for 16 tracks of real time recording in Sonar. I have EXCELLANT results.

Looking at the pics of this there only seems to be 2 xlr inputs amongst the 50million cables it has coming out of it. What type of jacks are you using to record your drums? There is a chance i can use 1/4\"s but that would mean having to go and buy them, when id rather just use XLR. The 1010lt seems to have 2 jacks or every sort... xlr, 1/4\", midi, rca but now multiple quantities of each. If you can let me know what type you use it may be easier for me to understand.

Great question. Only channel 1/2 on the card has XLRs the rest are RCAs. I bought a mxing console and a couple 8 channel snakes. The snakes are 1/4\" male to RCA female. The 1/4\" go from the record outs on each channel of my mixer to the RCAs on my cards. To hook up a mic I just hook it to my board. This eliminates digging around behind my computer hooking stuff up. The mixing board was expensive but compared to buying preamps it was the cheapest way to go.

\MartinTele\ wrote:

Yes. But why would you do that??

Sonar has something called normalise that does the same thing you are talking about. It takes the volume of a track and maximises it to the maximum volume with out distortion. No need for external devices. Sonar has so many effects it is AMASING!

Yeah that normalise can work well sometimes but applying it to the overall mix seems to be something i havnt worked out yet apart from increasing the level to above 0db. I listen to bands like Metallica and can hear that they could have done with a bit of normalizing on their earlier albums but then i listen to other bands and their album songs are loud as compared to what ive been able to do.

I was suspecting this.
This is the big mystery in recording. How do the big guys get thier stuff mastered so loud? It's first of all a secret. It's second of all expensive software and external hardware. It's third highly experianced and expensive mastering engineers. We spent 1,000 $ once to have the CD manufacturer do what they called thier professional mastering. It turned out very nice.

To save money I use sound forge and audio cleaning lab for mastering. I've tried to get my mixes loud but no luck. I can get them close but nothing like the big guys who get it perfect. I havent heard of the plugins
mentioned. They sound promising.

MT

AlbertA

The secret is Multi-band compressors and knowledge of loudness...

Here's a resource that explains sheds light on the complexity of loudness:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/sound/loud.html

aRcTuRuS

MartinTele...

Could you please run through your 1010lt, how it works, what jacks you use to record drums etc, im very interested eh.

MartinTele

Thanks Albert for the link. This should be interesting reading.

As for the 1010LT It has 8 inputs. Two are XLR, 6 are RCA. It also has 8 outputs - all RCA. There are midi in and out. There are two coax for SP/DIF. Also a coax used for card sync.

To be honest I rarely use the XLRs. The preamps on those suck. I do have a 16 track machine but typically only use 12 tracks (The inputs with the RCAs through my console) for most recordings.

I don't know why your specifically asking about drums. I record all kinds of signals with these cards.

MT

aRcTuRuS

\MartinTele\ wrote:

As for the 1010LT It has 8 inputs. Two are XLR, 6 are RCA. It also has 8 outputs - all RCA. There are midi in and out. There are two coax for SP/DIF. Also a coax used for card sync.

To be honest I rarely use the XLRs. The preamps on those suck. I do have a 16 track machine but typically only use 12 tracks (The inputs with the RCAs through my console) for most recordings.

I don't know why your specifically asking about drums. I record all kinds of signals with these cards.

MT

I was talking bout drums because they require the most tracks when recording, everything else you can just layer up, but drums need to be recorded all at once unlees you want a recording/timing nightmare. That was my main issue when deciding on which soundard to get. Is there no breakout box on the 1010lt? because thats gonne mean there are millions of cables coming out of your PCI slots which means having to reach round and unplug the cables going from the mixer everytime you wanna take it somewhere. However ill have a read of the manual and see how it will do, cheers for your help.

aRcTuRuS

Haha found a numbering mistake in the manual, it refers to XLR as #7 and the 48pin D thingy as #10 but they should be reversed. After looking into it, the Delta 1010 looks pretty wicked being in a 19\" rack mount unit with standard 8x 1/4\" inputs and outputs and s/pdif if needed, none of the extra stuff. They r quite expensive to get brand new but there seem to be a couple floating around on ebay for around the $250 mark. The only thing im worried about is the 9V AC power supply for the 19\" breakout running on NZ's 240v voltage system. Ive checked the manual but it mentions nothing of voltage operatios, if anyone has a Delta 1010 could they please let me know of which opertaing voltage it can work with. a 120/240V would suit me, i know with most Behringer products these days they have adopted this, makes it cheaper to import for me

MartinTele

Glad you looked at the 1010. A card with a break out box would probably work best for you. My first card was an 8 channel card with a break out box. It had 1/4 inch. I ended up buying 8 xlr to 1/4 inch adapters for mic cables to plug into the box. I loved the card but the company (guilemot) never made NT drivers for it. That's probably why the card was 250$ new.

MT