Dear Lazywebs… I Need an Answer
Apr. 3rd, 2007 11:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
octothorpeThis goes out to all recording artists of any sort who may have some info on this topic:
Normally, when you record, you have a bunch of analogue mics that all get shoved into a mixer. That mixer then gets fed into a computer (usually via Firewire) for direct-to-disk recording.
With the advent of USB mics, a physical mixer is no longer necessary, and I can record directly to the disk via USB. What happens when I want to record several people using several USB mics? Does the OS or mixing software differentiate between all the mics? Is it a limitation that I can only have 1 USB mic (that would suck)? Do they make physical mixers that have USB ins?
Ideally, I'd like to record the mics as separate tracks, then bounce them to a stereo mix, but I suppose I can go ghetto and just deal with a single pre-mixed vocal track. This just makes editing more difficult.
* Mind you, this is for podcasting, so latency isn't *super* critical, although I may just give it up, and go XLR if I have to. Why can't everything be low latency isochronous Firewire?!?!
Normally, when you record, you have a bunch of analogue mics that all get shoved into a mixer. That mixer then gets fed into a computer (usually via Firewire) for direct-to-disk recording.
With the advent of USB mics, a physical mixer is no longer necessary, and I can record directly to the disk via USB. What happens when I want to record several people using several USB mics? Does the OS or mixing software differentiate between all the mics? Is it a limitation that I can only have 1 USB mic (that would suck)? Do they make physical mixers that have USB ins?
Ideally, I'd like to record the mics as separate tracks, then bounce them to a stereo mix, but I suppose I can go ghetto and just deal with a single pre-mixed vocal track. This just makes editing more difficult.
* Mind you, this is for podcasting, so latency isn't *super* critical, although I may just give it up, and go XLR if I have to. Why can't everything be low latency isochronous Firewire?!?!
What software are you recording with?
Date: 2007-04-03 08:13 pm (UTC)I know both Garage Band and Audacity can handle this.
I have a device that takes analog inputs XLR for mics and Phono for guitars and connects via usb to my computer.
If you are on a mac a trip to the "creative Bar" or "genius bar" could help with this.
Re: What software are you recording with?
Date: 2007-04-03 08:20 pm (UTC)The more research I did, the more I think I will go with something like an Alesis io|14. It can send 24/192 audio in each channel, and it's got 4 XLR/analogue ins. I can always use my Snowball as a 5th mic, should I need it (I'll be using 8-Balls for the analogue mics). The io|14 is also pretty inexpensive, all things considered.