benoit wrote:
Tele_player is right in that you don't have to dedicate the computer to audio. That said, it is good to do so if you can afford to.
A trick I used was to get 2 of the EXACT same hard drive and installed a removable hard drive rack in the HD slot. Installed OS/applications on one HD for general use, and OS/applications for dedicated music on the other. Swap as desired.
The usual hangup is the BIOS settings, but with the exact same model HD, it's transparent.
dartanion wrote:There is a great online seminar pertaining to using your guitar with a Mac on Apple's website. You have to register on the site to see it, but I have been watching it while working on some documentation and I have learned a lot that I think I'll trying out soon. I had no idea that GarageBand came with virtual amps built in and supports all 3rd party amp plug-ins. This is great as then when I'm up at the wee hours, I won't wake my wife while laying down some ideas.
Thanks, I didn't know about this.
I'm currently building a tube preamp based on one half of an Alembic F2-B (basically a dual showman preamp) to boost the guitar and add a little tube goodness to the signal before running into the sims in Garage Band.
Thanks again for all input. I am leaning more towards the Boss Mirco or 864 for my needs.. I want easy. I have access to better recording equipment & people that know what they are doing once I have a decent product. I hope to record a cd to sell at gigs without cover tunes someday.
I have a pretty elaborate home studio that I never use. I have a home-brew PC with three 500GB hard drives. One boots into Vista x64 for everyday use. The other drive has XP x64 for music only. That drive has Sonar 6, plus a bunch of other plugins and stuff and has been optimized for PC recording. The 3rd drive is for backups of both of the other drives.
I use a Presonus FireStudio as my interface with a Presonus DigiMax FS digitally slaved to it. That gives me 16 preamps plus a plethora of other ins and outs. I also have a couple of other outboard mic pres, compressors, etc.
For most of my guitar recording, I'm using a Palmer speaker sim. I've had pretty good luck getting it to sound almost exactly like my cabinets. I A/B'd it by recording 2 tracks simultaneously--one with a mic and one with the Palmer. The only difference after I tweaked it in is the Palmer track did not have the percussiveness of the real speaker. But it is more than adequate.
I own something like 14 amps and 8 or 9 guitars and use them interchangeably.
It's a shame to have all this cool gear and never use it for lack of time!
I read a lot of good things about the PreSonus FirePod and the FireStudio is the new version of that. Can you attest to all the glowing reviews? Any gotchas to look out for? I'll be using mine on my Macs though. I also picked up a condenser Mic package (Vocal and Instrument mics for a great price).
I think the FS is a fine product. The convertors are sightly better than the chips used in other units in the same price range. The mic pres are clean and clear. It is nice and speedy through the FireWire interface and has a nice software mixer that comes in handy sometimes.
I liked it enough to pony up for a DigiMax, which is essentially an extension of the FS.
