recording digitally...best way?

[thescientist13]

So I am interested in setting up a home recording studio in my house, albeit on a small scale level. Nothing too fancy, but I would like to be able to demo songs and record them live on a computer and mix them, yada, yada, yada. To make this sucessful, I assume I must allow for three things so I can record the person playing in the jam room from a seperate adjacent room; the control studio:

a) monitor playback, by way of amp or natural acoustics, for the musician in the jam room (so they can hear their own track as they play)
b) direct signal from the musician to the computer (to record the track)
c) and the audio playback from the computer (or recorder) to the producer and musician (so they can both hear the song while the track is being recorded)

Assuming I have an understanding of the basics above, what is the best way of accomplishing step C? I want the jam room to have playback of both the track being recorded (through an amp) and the song its being recorded to (through speaker or headphone.) Can you have input and output at the same time on a computer (or do you need more soundcards?) Or do I need to get a digitial recorder to record the songs and then just output the finished product (track by track) to the computer for more mixing and mastering?

Any help and ideas would be greatly appreciated! Thanks, sorry its such a long explanation/question!

[midikid]

I think you need something like the Focusrite Saffire which has multiple outs. This allows you to send your various signals where you want.

[thescientist13]

basically, how do you get playback and record at the same time on a computer?

[greasy]

Originally posted by thescientist13
basically, how do you get playback and record at the same time on a computer?

Audacity has this option, so I assume pretty much every non-free piece of recording software has a similar option.

[iaresee]

Originally posted by thescientist13
basically, how do you get playback and record at the same time on a computer?
It's a function of three things: the hardware (your sound card/interface has to support full duplex I/O), the drivers (you have to have low latency drivers -- on Windows that's ASIO2 usually, not sure what it'd be on Mac), and the software (the software has to support full duplex I/O).

The software is easy: Cubase, Sonar, Digital Performer, what ever floats your boat there. There are lots of options for all kinds of budgets.

The hardware is no longer hard (it used to be tricky to get it all working). Just set your budget and point -- for any price range there's a ton of options these days for full duplex, high quality I/O boxes.

Your best bet? Find a local store that specializes in recording (in Toronto we have Saved By Technology (http://www.savedbytechnology.com)) and go chat them up. They'll set you up within your budget with something you know will work with your computer.

[thescientist13]

whats full duplex? would it just be easier to get a digital recorder for syncing tracks and then just output them to the computer track by track for mixing and mastering?

[burning]

There are all kinds of inexpensive USB or Firewire interfaces. If you're just overdubbing, the $20 Behringer UCA202 works really well...it plays back and also has a monitor output. Left and Right are isolated too so you can BS 2 tracks. You can also chain them I found....I hooked 6 up to my computer and with 0 software/driver setup was able to use each one as an input device in Audition (long live Cool Edit Pro) and multi-track with it.
Link: http://www.behringer.com/UCA202/index.cfm?lang=ENG

It helps to get a direct box, a good mic, and a small analog mixer too.

If you have skipping issues on playback/record try defragging and adjusting the record/playback buffers.

[Moo]

full duplex means sending and receiving or recording and playing at the same time.

A phone is full duplex.
A walkie talkie is half duplex, which is a ridiculous term linguistically.

would it just be easier to get a digital recorder for syncing tracks and then just output them to the computer track by track for mixing and mastering?
I don't really see the difference.

You can get zero latency output by just routing the microphone input to the output. In windows the mic output is muted by default, so you just unmute it and hook up a pair of headphones. Doing this in a DAW program is probably just as simple.

Cubase et al have a big deal called ASIO which is more for playing virtual instruments via MIDI than anything else.

[guitarose]

Originally posted by midikid
I think you need something like the Focusrite Saffire which has multiple outs. This allows you to send your various signals where you want.

+1...I have this, the LE version...I havent had the opportunity to utilise this yet, but I know it can do this. It has it's own monitoring software that makes it all very simple to do.