Starting Out

[zuzek]

Yo lads,

Been lurking around here since November last year but decided I want to actively participate and learn from other people, deem talking is the best way. I've been reading loads, but it still leaves me with some questions before I start with actually buying stuff. So if you're willing to give a shit about a noob starting out, read on please!

Basically, I always loved listening to music, until I discovered what it's like to actually write myself. Not that I'm a prodigy, I just love doing it. So, being the retard I am, I went out and bought a Line6 Toneport GX. The thing's absolute trash when I don't use it with GearBox (which to my ears sounds like donkeypoop) itself and it has no mic pre. Suffice to say I'm looking for a replacement, but I haven't really found a 'best option' with just reading away.

I'm a student so on a tight budget, I have my own amp (Mesa DC-5) which I eventually want to record off as well (Double SM-57 so would need at least 2 inputs). Thing is I can't turn that thing up so loud without scaring my neighbours into oblivion and beyond (uni dorms), so I mainly want to focus on software at first. Revalver MKIII is being released soon, and it sounds as convincing as any tube amp I've ever played on, so I'm going for that.

So what would be an ideal interface for me to start on for the coming years? I need at least 2 mic pre's and the option to do DI-recording with high quality sound. I've read about SP/DIF; MIDI and all that, but I don't see the use of that when I would just record guitar and perhaps vocals, nothing more. Or am I wrong here? Also, I would prefer an interface to a soundcard as the latter doesn't give me the ability to record elsewhere. FireWire or USB? I would need to buy a FireWire PCI card but that's not an issue as they're dirt cheap. FW seems to be faster somewhat, but then again not that many PC's/Laptops have a FW input. Are there reasons FW is better that I've missed?

I'm not aiming to equal the production on my favorite albums cause I know that's not possible, but I want good clarity and quality for around 300 euro's with an absolute max budget of 350-400. Thanks for your time!

 

[Metaltastic]

Hey man, great first post, definitely got your situation across well, and welcome! FW is generally considered better because it's a more constant high-speed in that it's a stream of data, whereas USB 2.0 may claim to have transfer speeds just as high, but sends data in packets, which can cause bottlenecks. That being said, for a 2 in/2 out interface, USB is perfectly fine, and though they mostly tend to be pretty similar, I've heard that the EMU 0404 is the best bang for the buck.

Good luck, and again, welcome!

Oh, and since Gearbox uses the same modeling engine as the Podxt, there are definitely good tones to be coaxed out of it, it just takes some tweaking. But try out the Line 6 Treadplate model through the Treadplate 4x12 cab with a tube screamer stomp model (knobs from left to right - 10%, 50%, 35%), and I think that'll start you off pretty well.

 

[Ouroboros]

Look into getting a firewire based external hard drive to record on. Or at least, a separate partition to record onto, anything away from sharing the same partition as the operating system. There are a lot of USB based external HDD, but since the USB bus acts like a bottleneck, you will lose required bandwidth if you had a printer or anything else in your USB bus.

 

[zuzek]

Thank you for your replies and the welcome! I see that FW is somewhat better but USB is just easier to use everywhere (will buy a laptop in some time + will use it at friends/parents places) so I'll go for USB at the moment. I haven't come across the EMU 0404 USB while looking for interfaces but I'll definately check that out as it seems to have a lot of quality features for it's price. Things I was looking at were M-Audio Audiophile USB and Presonus Firebox; but the M-Audio seems to pale in comparison to the EMU; and the Presonus is quite expensive for what it offers (and I've read a lot about shitty customer service). I'll try to read up some more on the EMU, but thanks for your suggestion, looks like it's the winner so far!

Will definately be recording on a seperate partition but lashing out dough on an external hdd seems a bit over the top when my budget is this limited. Guess a USB interface will still be just fine if I just have a mouse and keyboard plugged into the USB bus. Cheers for the advice.