Recording - stupid question!

Riaan-Combrink · 2009-01-24T19:40:30+00:00

I'm actually still shaking (from relief :-[). Just heard, for the first time ever, four minutes of music I recorded myself on my laptop! I now have the dilemna that I've scanned the 254 page Reaper user guide, and I'm confronted with a really silly issue. This is way before I even come to adding effects, balancing tracks, etc. For this to make any sense, I should probably start at the beginning. Got hold of a silly little USB/RCA connector goody. I will still get a proper interface, but couldn't pass up buying something that claimed to record for just R 150,00. 8) Its a Behringer UCA200: http://www.free-instrumentals.com/behringeruca200.html So, in theory perfect for someone who already has a mixer. Everything into the mixer as per normal, and the mixer linked to the USB device via RCA cables. Read a lot of stuff on the net last night, and it appears almost no one could get this thing to work with anything. I did, Sherlock Holmes style, however find the correct ASIO driver. Sped through to Bothners first thing this morning, and bought good quality gold-tipped RCAs (Proel Die-hard). Got home,and connected up. Installed ASIO-driver, and Reaper recognised it first time. ? Created three tracks, armed and recorded exactly the way I would play live - one channel for backtrack, one vox and one guitar - exactly levelled and mixed as I would do live, and allplayed in at once. Lo and behold. Playback was cool. No stutters, sounds like a CD (well IMHO ?). Very happy. Now the problem: I wanted to add a track with some crunch guitar. Added the track, armed and pressed record. Realised I can't hear anything (ie the three tracks I already recorded) so as to know when to play on the 4th track. Thing is, with my mixer I use the "Tape" inputs and outputs to link to UCA via RCA cables. In order to get a record-signal when recording, I have to leave the "tape to main" button on the mixer in the up position. If I don't, there's no signal visible on Reaper. To listen to what I've recorded, I have to activate/push in the "tape to main" button to get playback. While that button is pushed in, there's no signal to reaper -playback only. When I thus want to add the fourth track (ie my first real multi-tracking as the other three were done at once), I have to release the "tape to main" button, which means I can't hear anything! I have a headphone jack on my mixer (but use a headphone with a PC type jack at the moment - will get an adaptor soon). Question is, will I then hear the playback through this headphone on the mixer even if tape to main is not active? The newer version (UCA202) has a headphone jack on the USB device - which sort of makes sense to me. Point of this long post is I cannot plug a headphone into the mixer at the moment (lack of adaptor), and I'm dying to know: will I hear the other tracks in playback whilst I record the fourth track in record mode?? If this contains way too little information to make sense of it, please advise!!!! My momentum has dipped now, and needs to be restored!!! ?

Riaan-Combrink

Alan Ratcliffe wrote Check the input levels on the virtual mixer belonging to your interface (or the Windows version). Inputs might be turned down there. Some other program may have changed level settings.

Hi, Alan. The one I did find when checking my audio devices, was that the USB device was not set as my default RECORDING device. The laptop's microphone was. So I've changed that, but the problem still persists. From a diagnostics perspective it bugs me that I got full high recording levels when I used the tape I/Os to record. The Behringer is a very basic device, so when I check it in device manager, it only shows me that it's working properly, and gives me driver details. There's no virtual volume settings for it, and also not on the actual hardware device.

All the Vista OS volume settings are also on full.

Stranger and strangerer ...

AlanRatcliffe

Hmm. You were recording a full mix before - are you doing the same now? Or just a single track?

When you record in Reaper you should be able to see the track levels on the track meter as you record - are they normal or low?

Riaan-Combrink

Alan Ratcliffe wrote Hmm. You were recording a full mix before - are you doing the same now? Or just a single track?

My first successful attempt was three tracks recorded at once on the fly. Guitar, vox and bactrack all through the mixer at once as if playing live. The subsequent attempts were single track, trying to add, eg, a solo or extra guitar track to what was already recorded.

Alan Ratcliffe wrote When you record in Reaper you should be able to see the track levels on the track meter as you record - are they normal or low?

Negligible. Just a little ripple at the bottom of the level display. Whereas with the first attempt using tape they were jumping up there!

FatBoy

Reaper looks fine Riaan, so it is probably some sort of hardware / connection issue, which I won't be able to help with...

Heath

maybe the aux signal isn't hot enough to record the signal , use the aux for output and use the tape send to record .

AlanRatcliffe

From what I can see Riaan, the output of the sub is at 28dBu max (which all the outputs on the mixer seem to be) - which is plenty output and the same as the aux output. That doesn't mean you are pushing the same signal level from the sub output though - aux sends often have gain on them (there's usually a detent - where the send pot "clicks" - and above that you are boosting the signal (and boosting is never a good idea on a Behringer anyway), while the sub bus has lots of headroom to handle many tracks all mixed together.

Try this: Play a CD through the system and connect it via the sends (at unity gain - 0dB) and then via the sub (also set to 0dB) and compare the signal levels. If they both work the same at these settings, everything is correct and you'll have to either use the aux sends with lots of gain or boost the input via software.

Gearhead

One more suggestion: run a cable directly from the aux send to the aux return. You should be able to compare the signal levels and exclude the mixer as the cause of the issue.

Riaan-Combrink

Gearhead wrote One more suggestion: run a cable directly from the aux send to the aux return. You should be able to compare the signal levels and exclude the mixer as the cause of the issue.

Gearhead, sorry for my ignorance. What do you mean? Connect a jack to jack cable from the send to the return? How do I compare the signal? :-[

I'm in deep waters here ...

Riaan-Combrink

Alan Ratcliffe wrote Try this: Play a CD through the system and connect it via the sends (at unity gain - 0dB) and then via the sub (also set to 0dB) and compare the signal levels. If they both work the same at these settings, everything is correct and you'll have to either use the aux sends with lots of gain or boost the input via software.

Alan, now I'm freaked out! Did the above, and got a nice strong playback signal (I guess thats what you meant) when my sends were connected to the aux returns. Ie turned up only the mains fader and sounded clear.

Then connected the cables that were in the sends into the sub outs at the back of the mixer (leaving the others in the returns). Changed source to "sub" and pushed up subs fader. Heard nothing! Pushed up mains fader, and heard perfect playback! I must have something else connected wrong then?

AlanRatcliffe

Don't worry about the mains for now, you need to check the signal going to Reaper. Check and make sure that you are getting the same level from the two different signal paths....

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