i trying to set up a small recourding studio.i have a gnx3 peavy and roland anp peavy mic dr-3 drum machine. could i hook up a mixer and do i need better speakers? what brand would work.thank you.
i trying to set up a small recourding studio.i have a gnx3 peavy and roland anp peavy mic dr-3 drum machine. could i hook up a mixer and do i need better speakers? what brand would work.thank you.
If you plan to use the drum machine for drums, then you probably wouldnt need a mixer because you have no drum mics to use at the same time. Im not sure what the mic preamp on the GNX3 is like but you could get away with vocals through that. If it isn't that good, you could invest in a DI box or Mic Preamp for vocals. I dont know what your amps are like but for the best sound reproduction \"stuido monitors\" usually reproduce the sound pefectly with flat EQ resonses. G3456 might be able to help you out on good brands to use. Also what program do you intend to use for recording?
If you are in fact setting up a studio, you probably want some full-range speakers - do your homework, but I personally don't recommend the low-end M-Audios that have been advertised \"free upgrade to 5.1\" lately. But really anything will work, even your home stereo.
From the sound of your soundcard, you might be better off getting either an audio interface (to function as both an input mixer and the soundcard - check out PreSonus and Edirol) or a hardware recorder if you're not going to computer way. Of course you won't get the 192kb sampling rate cheaply without a computer. I like Korg XD series recorders, they're budget-friendly and reliable, but max 24/96.
If you do want a hardware mixer without a recorder, I personally like Carvins, although I hear Behringer products have improved lately and their mixers are pretty cheap too.
But keep in mind that GNX series are designed with an built-in mixer, so you might be able to get away just using your 3. Your mic can go into the XLR in, and your drum machine can go into CD-in. Alternately, your drum machine can go into XLR-in (via DI). Any S/PDIF capable sound unit will be able to record it into Cakewalk, or your can feed the analog signal to your current soundcard.
All that said, let me ask an important question: are you planning to record a bunch of things in one take (drums, vox, guitar, bass, synths, etc) or one thing at a time in many takes? Furthermore, are you planning on future expansion of your studio and its capacities?
Is it a computer based studio you wanted to set up?
in any instance one of the first things you will need you need is a good set of near-field powered monitors - I use alesis prolinear 820DSP's and they reproduce my mixes flawlessly with plenty of power. If you try recording with a power amp/speaker setup, it tends to color your sound and you don't end up with a very good product. Most any of the alesis products are a good investment and worth looking into IMO
I use a Mbox plugged into my laptop, and soon a couple of powered beheringer truths for monitoring. You can plug anything you want into that to record with excelent quality(for the price). I record 24bit /44.1. Be sure you have a least a GIG of ram and a P4 if you use a laptop instead of a desktop PC. So far I havent crashed once, with Cakewalk I used to drop out all the time. a really simple and stable setup so far. I will post a new tune soon that I am working so you can be the judge. Different stuff for different needs but this fits my home studio needs and its also portable so I can record wherever. I use a behringer condencer mic for recording. its my first experience with this new setup but I am really enjoying learning ProTools and with my GNX and DR-3 the possiblitys at this point seem endless :P
i was looking at the phonic mu 1002 mixer it 150.00 canadian but will it work with gnx3.i well hook it up to my pc later ,but will get better sond card later.
Tweak's site does take a bit getting used to, but there's a lot of useful information... it's just the ads confuse everything. The MU-1002 looks like it'll work fine for GNX, just plug into inputs 1/2 or a pair of stereo (i can't find the specs so i don't know exactly what it has). How are you planning to run the signal from the mixer?
If you are using the PC for most of your recording you need to be careful of the really small mixers like 4-6ch. many of these at $100 and below are more likely to produce noise. The Behr UB series and Phonics are good but get something with at least 8ch's that have better filters. It depends on proximity and other things too, but start with a good mixer if you get one. Monitors? There's a whole post on Monitors and user evaluations. My Sugg for home recording are the Behringer 2031A's. I also like the Alesis MK series. You want 8\" drivers or better. Lower ones are harder to resolve without a decent sub. hth
I have a Mackie DFX6 and it is great :!:
very low noise levels and for the price it even has a built in effects. I use my plugins for effects in recording usually but when I pugged in a acoustic at practise I remember I used the onboard delay and it sounded ...hmmm whats the word? oh yea GREAT! :P
I thought it was way noisey for recording untill I swapped out my
Cheep a$$ cables :evil: for some decent ones. problem over :oops: so make sure whatever you get don't skimp on the all the cables.
Comments
If you plan to use the drum machine for drums, then you probably wouldnt need a mixer because you have no drum mics to use at the same time. Im not sure what the mic preamp on the GNX3 is like but you could get away with vocals through that. If it isn't that good, you could invest in a DI box or Mic Preamp for vocals. I dont know what your amps are like but for the best sound reproduction \"stuido monitors\" usually reproduce the sound pefectly with flat EQ resonses. G3456 might be able to help you out on good brands to use. Also what program do you intend to use for recording?
From the sound of your soundcard, you might be better off getting either an audio interface (to function as both an input mixer and the soundcard - check out PreSonus and Edirol) or a hardware recorder if you're not going to computer way. Of course you won't get the 192kb sampling rate cheaply without a computer. I like Korg XD series recorders, they're budget-friendly and reliable, but max 24/96.
If you do want a hardware mixer without a recorder, I personally like Carvins, although I hear Behringer products have improved lately and their mixers are pretty cheap too.
But keep in mind that GNX series are designed with an built-in mixer, so you might be able to get away just using your 3. Your mic can go into the XLR in, and your drum machine can go into CD-in. Alternately, your drum machine can go into XLR-in (via DI). Any S/PDIF capable sound unit will be able to record it into Cakewalk, or your can feed the analog signal to your current soundcard.
All that said, let me ask an important question: are you planning to record a bunch of things in one take (drums, vox, guitar, bass, synths, etc) or one thing at a time in many takes? Furthermore, are you planning on future expansion of your studio and its capacities?
- Ilia
Is it a computer based studio you wanted to set up?
in any instance one of the first things you will need you need is a good set of near-field powered monitors - I use alesis prolinear 820DSP's and they reproduce my mixes flawlessly with plenty of power. If you try recording with a power amp/speaker setup, it tends to color your sound and you don't end up with a very good product. Most any of the alesis products are a good investment and worth looking into IMO
Why wouldn't it?
www.tweakheadz.com but it very confusing about what to get and all that.
- Ilia
G3456
very low noise levels and for the price it even has a built in effects. I use my plugins for effects in recording usually but when I pugged in a acoustic at practise I remember I used the onboard delay and it sounded ...hmmm whats the word? oh yea GREAT! :P
I thought it was way noisey for recording untill I swapped out my
Cheep a$$ cables :evil: for some decent ones. problem over :oops: so make sure whatever you get don't skimp on the all the cables.
just my 2 cents
thanks i,m lookig in to the phonic mu1002 or the mu 1202.