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Trying to make a Mixed CD

I am trying to figure out how to create a good quality mixed CD to promote with. Could someone please walk me through recording the set with my computer? Can I just plug something into something? Any help is appreciated.

DJ Groove
Electric Union
Thurs. noon - 2:30pm (PST)
KDVS 90.3 FM
www.kdvs.org

Hooking up to your computer

Well...first off...do you have a PC or Mac ? If you have a Mac then it is out of my realm of knowledge....but if you have a PC I hope this will help you out. First off...you need a program that will record from your soundcard, in other words, anything that is coming out of your soundcard will be recorded. If you don' t have that then that is the first thing that you need to pick up a program that will do such a task. Second...you have to run your mixer to your computer. From the mixer it should come from the master out on the back of your mixer to the line in on the back of your computer...there should be three spots that you can plug into. I supposse you would like to know what kind of cable you can do that with...well you need a cable that has stereo jacks (red and black/or white) and the other end needs to be a headphone size jack...or ministereo jack...I think that is what it's called. Once you do this...you should be all set to go. Hopefully this will help you, if you have any other questions or something is different then what I have said then let me know and I will see what I can do for you. Either reply to this or PM me.

l8r
Bear

Thank you

Thanks, now I just have one other problem. My tables are downstairs and my computer is upstairs... Hmm.... I wonder if they have super duper extension cords for that kinda stuff...

Anyway, thanks for getting me started. This has been something I have wanted to do for a while but never gotten around to.

Yeap, Bear4569 Is Right, For The Recording Software I Suggest Total Recorder. Now The Cable You Need Has To Have RCA On One End (The Red And Black/White One) And On The Other End A 1/8 Inch Jack That Will Connect On Your Sound Cards Input. The RCA Will Go To Your Mixer Or Amp. After You Have Recorded Your Set You Can Use Sound Forge To Chop It Up To Tracks. And Remember When You Burn It On CD To Have The Option 'Track-At-Once' Enabled To Eliminate The Gap Between The Tracks.

Cheers

Re: Thank you

quote:

Originally posted by The_Groove Thanks, now I just have one other problem. My tables are downstairs and my computer is upstairs... Hmm.... I wonder if they have super duper extension cords for that kinda stuff... Anyway, thanks for getting me started. This has been something I have wanted to do for a while but never gotten around to.

move your computer upstairs. you might be able to get a super long extension cord, but you'd probably have to patch them together.

this will result in quality degradation.

you want the shortest possible route from your mixer to your computer.

I as wodnering how long everones cables are for doing this, my PC is like 5 feet away from my mixer and I dunno if there are cables long enough?

Thanks!

I appreciate the responses I have been getting. You are getting me all amped to do this. If only I were not at work. I guess I'll have to move my comp downstairs and record away. I'm assuming if I mess up a mix, I start the whole thing over? Kinda new to the demo thing.

I had the same problem, and this is the solution...

TTS > MiniDisc
Minidisc > PC

no loss of quality

try to find one MD to record directly from your amp and then move to your pc to write the set from the MD... you just have to hear the set again.

If you want full record/editing/burning features, I suggest you find Wavelab and Samplitude. They allow you to record, edit (normalize, trim, paste, ...) and make the recording ready for burning on cd (set track indexes, and do the actual burning). Soundforge is good too, but it lacks a disk-at-once preparation feature (you can't make a constant mix-cd with indexes, you'll have to use another prog/plugin for that).

I should say that editing should be kept on a strict minimum, like trimming the start and end of the recording (so you don't have 5 seconds of silence at the beginning of the cd for example). Try not to use editing to cover up for mistakes, as this is mainly considered cheating

As for the recording itself, I explained it some time ago, do a search and you'll find it. But as a reminder I'll tell you this : to have the optimum recording level, watch the meters of the prog you're using (again those progs I suggested have very accurate meters, with Wavelab having the best meters imo). The loudest signals should come as close to 0 dB as possible, without reaching that mark (so let's say, max level -0.1 dB). Don't go over 0dB in the digital domain, as this means clipping, and digital clipping is very bad.

quote:

Originally posted by Dj_Andrew_K I had the same problem, and this is the solution... TTS > MiniDisc Minidisc > PC no loss of quality

Wrong, I'm afraid. MDs do not actually record at CD quality, but somewhere close to. It's like the equivalent of a 320kbps MP3 or something (but not).

Recording to MD requires that you send the signal:
- over an analog cable into the MD. Quality loss 1.
- through the MD's analog-digital converter. Quality loss 2.
- encoded into MD compression format (I can't remember what the format is called, but I know it does it). Quality loss 3.
- MD is played back through an analog cable into the computer. Quality loss 4.
- Through the soundcard's analog-digital converter. Quality loss 5.

Compare this to recording straight to the computer. The signal travels:
- over an analog cable into the computer. Quality loss 1.
- through the soundcard's analog-digital converter. Quality loss 2.

5 vs 2. You do the math.

well I ain't good at maths...
The only thing I know is that the quality is still almost perfect to burn it to CD

DJTJ, that's true - in theory.

In the real world, I'll bet you ANYTHING that you won't be able to tell the difference between those two recordings.

quote:

Originally posted by skywarp DJTJ, that's true - in theory. In the real world, I'll bet you ANYTHING that you won't be able to tell the difference between those two recordings.

exactly... this is what I am trying to say.
btw this was a nice theory

This may not be the best solution if you're after a super-high quality mix, but if you have a computer that you wouldn't consider top of the line, this may be your best bet.

You can make a pretty decent recording using Winamp and Shoutcast from Nullsoft. If you download the server software from the shoutcast website, you can setup your own computer as a server (ie: use localhost:8080 as the server address). Then, download the DJ software from shoutcast, and setup winamp to stream to the server you specify through the line in jack on your soundcard. Then all you need to do is fire the 2 things up and run a cable from your mixer out into your soundcard's line in jack and you've got a decent recording setup. You'll need the Radium Codec... that allows you to stream at 128/44 or even 192/44.

It sounds confusing but once you see what I am talking about and get the software you will realize it's really easy to get working. I recommend it for people who don't have a ballsy machine. I have a AMD K6-2 400 with 256MB RAM and I know an 80 minute CD quality wave recording will bring my system to it's knees, so if I record to 192 it's a decent compromise and my system can handle it.

Leme know if you have problems.

quote:

Originally posted by Technaut I as wodnering how long everones cables are for doing this, my PC is like 5 feet away from my mixer and I dunno if there are cables long enough?

It's not a huge problem to have really long cables. Most good mixers will come with XLR outputs. These are the 1/2" three pronged male plug on the back of your mixer. XLR is what you have to use in clubs because of the distance the cables that are run. The degradation of the signal over XLR cable is much much less than an RCA cable of the same length. Of course, if you are a quality freak, like me, every cable would be a gold plated titanium plug! Of course, as many people have said, I'd bet a buck to the person who could actually hear the difference between going through a couple sound cards, encoding/unencoding, normal costing quality wires etc.

quote:

Originally posted by shompton This may not be the best solution if you're after a super-high quality mix, but if you have a computer that you wouldn't consider top of the line, this may be your best bet. You can make a pretty decent recording using Winamp and Shoutcast from Nullsoft. If you download the server software from the shoutcast website, you can setup your own computer as a server (ie: use localhost:8080 as the server address). Then, download the DJ software from shoutcast, and setup winamp to stream to the server you specify through the line in jack on your soundcard. Then all you need to do is fire the 2 things up and run a cable from your mixer out into your soundcard's line in jack and you've got a decent recording setup. You'll need the Radium Codec... that allows you to stream at 128/44 or even 192/44. It sounds confusing but once you see what I am talking about and get the software you will realize it's really easy to get working. I recommend it for people who don't have a ballsy machine. I have a AMD K6-2 400 with 256MB RAM and I know an 80 minute CD quality wave recording will bring my system to it's knees, so if I record to 192 it's a decent compromise and my system can handle it. Leme know if you have problems.

Instead of the shoutcast dsp you can use the oddcast dsp (http://www.oddsock.org/tools/). It needs a shoutcast server (so basically the only difference with shompton's method is the dsp plugin. What's the difference? Oddcast uses the LAME encoder (which is known as one of the best). So you don't need to search the Radium rip from the Fraunhoffer codec. Oddcast can encode up to 320 kbps. And it has Ogg Vorbis encoding too...

quote:

Originally posted by Dj Flesch It's not a huge problem to have really long cables. Most good mixers will come with XLR outputs. These are the 1/2" three pronged male plug on the back of your mixer. XLR is what you have to use in clubs because of the distance the cables that are run. The degradation of the signal over XLR cable is much much less than an RCA cable of the same length. Of course, if you are a quality freak, like me, every cable would be a gold plated titanium plug! Of course, as many people have said, I'd bet a buck to the person who could actually hear the difference between going through a couple sound cards, encoding/unencoding, normal costing quality wires etc.

I only have a Vestax PMC-170A mixer and it's not a club effort!, no XLR outpus on mine just the standard Master Output and Record out. Each output has a left and right (Red and White) and all the cables I have are like 2 feet long.

So you reckon any decent audio store would be able to knock me up a set of decent lenghted Cables, so I can stop wasting all my Minidiscs??

ps - I used to bother about good quality cables for my Car's soundsystem but no-one notices so why bother! :d

Technaut

Same deal

I also have that mixer (Vestax 170A). So I'm just gonna grab a cable with a 1/8 jack and some RCA ends. Plug the RCA into the record out and the jack into my PC. This sounds good, yes?

Yup

quote:

Originally posted by Dj Flesch It's not a huge problem to have really long cables. Most good mixers will come with XLR outputs. These are the 1/2" three pronged male plug on the back of your mixer. XLR is what you have to use in clubs because of the distance the cables that are run. The degradation of the signal over XLR cable is much much less than an RCA cable of the same length. Of course, if you are a quality freak, like me, every cable would be a gold plated titanium plug! Of course, as many people have said, I'd bet a buck to the person who could actually hear the difference between going through a couple sound cards, encoding/unencoding, normal costing quality wires etc.

This would be nice, but I have yet to see a soundcard with balanced XLR inputs. If you were to use XLR-RCA cables, then by definition this is not balanced so you would lose any benefit from having the balanced output from the mixer.

Re: Same deal

quote:

Originally posted by The_Groove I also have that mixer (Vestax 170A). So I'm just gonna grab a cable with a 1/8 jack and some RCA ends. Plug the RCA into the record out and the jack into my PC. This sounds good, yes?

yeah thats what I want to do but I need to get myself a extra long lead !!

quote:

Originally posted by DJTJ This would be nice, but I have yet to see a soundcard with balanced XLR inputs. If you were to use XLR-RCA cables, then by definition this is not balanced so you would lose any benefit from having the balanced output from the mixer.

Hmmyeah, but it's pretty easy to find soundcards with TRS inputs.
As for soundcards with XLR inputs, they do exist (for example Aardvark, Sekd, Hoontech, ...) but those are rather expensive. But then again they are not really meant for regular home use

I'm not sure where I saw it, but I'm pretty sure somewhere in this forum, there was an extention for a soundblaster live that had XLR inputs etc. But anyway, my point is that clubs use XLR because they have to run the cables 30 or more feet. My setup is from my mixer with a gold plated RCA to 1/8" stereo jack. The cord is 6" long and runs into my soundcard (soundblaster extigy) and from my soundcard through another 6" USB cable. Not that much loss at all will be because of the usb cable, but this setup allows me to have a little over 12" between my mixer rec outs and my computer box. If you need more length than that you can always get another RCA cable and get a pair of female to female connectors so that you can extend it that way. (because I doubt anyone is going to buy the exitgy just to get a little extra length ). This will also bring the quality down a slight bit, but I doubt that you'll be able to notice it--especially if you get gold connectors. I have a 12" gold plated rca to rca cable going from my mixer to my reciever and that coupled with the female to female jacks to couple it to the rca to 1/8" stereo jack should work just fine for a cost of maybe $25-$50 depending on if you get gold plated or not.

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