Mpc x mic preamp specs?

Yeh I did record a few sketch tracks on the mpc x and vocals sounded pretty good, I'm using a TLM 102 through my new Apollo twin duo and vocals seem somewhat smoother on first impressions. still early days so when I next lay down something I might try switching between the two and comparing the difference.

So I was reading this and as a new X owner I have been meaning to record vocals to test it. Inspired by this I laid down aquick vocal track. It could definitely use some good compression (I'm no guru in sound engineering, or singer for that matter) to remove peaks but I figured it would give you an idea. I also used the built-in mic pres to record the guitars.

Again, nothing pro and I really had no lyrics (lol) so no high expectations please. As always, headphones recommended.

https://soundcloud.com/guille-chumpitaz/demo1

Lyricalgenius81 wrote:Yeh I did record a few sketch tracks on the mpc x and vocals sounded pretty good, I'm using a TLM 102 through my new Apollo twin duo and vocals seem somewhat smoother on first impressions. still early days so when I next lay down something I might try switching between the two and comparing the difference.

A comparison would be awesome! Looking forward to hear that - I only hear great things about the apollo line

ghost.transmitter wrote:

dmacto wrote:Good to hear, but how good? What do you usually use to record? In the Uk the price difference between the Live and X is £900 . Would the quality be over and above the Mackie Mixer?

There are no detailed reports on the quality of the pre-amps of the X so far. They are probably decent enough to record without any significant noise or other artefacts being introduced. But the pre-amps in the Mackie will probably of the same quality, at least not that different that you'd notice much. Personally, I wouldn't go for the Mackie/Live combo because I think that adding a (more or less) budget mixer in the chain won't make an improvement on the sound. I would suggest to look for another pre-amp in that case, but if you want something above semi-pro quality you have to be prepared to spend quite a few hundred extra.

I've put my pre-amp (UA Twinfinity 710) in between my X and TLM-103 because I like the sound of the pre-amp (solid-state to tube and everything in between). I expect the X to record as quiet as possible and leave the colouring of the sound to the Twinfinity. If the X would disappoint in that, if it's noisy for instance, then I'll stick to recording my vocals in my DAW.
Things like room treatment (or Reflexion filter, I use an SE RF Pro) and pop filter are of course equally important.

Thanks alot man. I don't have enough money to get a Pro quality interface/preamp to go with the Live, so i guess that if both options will produce similar results, I might aswell just get a Live as the Mackie is free for me.

I notice that you say that you "expect" the X to record a certain way. I'm assuming then that you haven't tried to connect a Mic directly to the X and record?

dmacto wrote:Thanks alot man. I don't have enough money to get a Pro quality interface/preamp to go with the Live, so i guess that if both options will produce similar results, I might aswell just get a Live as the Mackie is free for me.

I notice that you say that you "expect" the X to record a certain way. I'm assuming then that you haven't tried to connect a Mic directly to the X and record?

Indeed, I haven't tried it yet. My main mic is out of the house for recording duties elsewhere and I want to focus on getting to know the X better first. So I haven't planned any vocal sessions anytime soon, unfortunately.

If you don't need all the extra controls the X gives you, you might as well go for the Live. Maybe you could check beforehand if the Mackie is quiet enough just to be sure.

Guilleonline wrote:So I was reading this and as a new X owner I have been meaning to record vocals to test it. Inspired by this I laid down aquick vocal track. It could definitely use some good compression (I'm no guru in sound engineering, or singer for that matter) to remove peaks but I figured it would give you an idea. I also used the built-in mic pres to record the guitars.

Again, nothing pro and I really had no lyrics (lol) so no high expectations please. As always, headphones recommended.

https://soundcloud.com/guille-chumpitaz/demo1

Really appreciate you taking the time to lay something down, though it seems that the track isint up anymore? Didn't get a chance to have a listen.

Sorry this question is not for the X but do you have any suggestions about a preamp for my MPC Live?We had a gig recently with my band and the feedback from our singer plugged into Live was insane..Also i’m considering a Zoom H6 or H4n Pro recording/Preamp solution which could be very handy..Please share your thoughts

oh sorry about that, I changed it to private but thought the shared link would still be active. I just change it if you want to try again.

dmacto wrote:

Guilleonline wrote:So I was reading this and as a new X owner I have been meaning to record vocals to test it. Inspired by this I laid down aquick vocal track. It could definitely use some good compression (I'm no guru in sound engineering, or singer for that matter) to remove peaks but I figured it would give you an idea. I also used the built-in mic pres to record the guitars.

Again, nothing pro and I really had no lyrics (lol) so no high expectations please. As always, headphones recommended.

https://soundcloud.com/guille-chumpitaz/demo1

Really appreciate you taking the time to lay something down, though it seems that the track isint up anymore? Didn't get a chance to have a listen.

Yorgos Arabatzis wrote:Sorry this question is not for the X but do you have any suggestions about a preamp for my MPC Live?We had a gig recently with my band and the feedback from our singer plugged into Live was insane..

This is much likely more a routing issue than anything else, a different pre-amp will probably not solve anything. Can you describe how everything is hooked up? If the vocals are going to the Live and the Live is going to the FoH and wedges on stage then you have to be very careful with the volume on the monitors. Especially if you already have the vocal "dry" on the monitors as well. Playing with in-ears would probably solve at least most of the feedback issues (because there is little or no sound needed from the wedges on stage).
And of course some mics are a bit more prone to give feedback. I use a Telefunken M80, best mic I have ever had on stage and well worth the investment. That and proper mic technique might make an improvement as well.

F**king love the M80. Wish I could buy the wood version of it.

ghost.transmitter wrote:

Yorgos Arabatzis wrote:Sorry this question is not for the X but do you have any suggestions about a preamp for my MPC Live?We had a gig recently with my band and the feedback from our singer plugged into Live was insane..

This is much likely more a routing issue than anything else, a different pre-amp will probably not solve anything. Can you describe how everything is hooked up? If the vocals are going to the Live and the Live is going to the FoH and wedges on stage then you have to be very careful with the volume on the monitors. Especially if you already have the vocal "dry" on the monitors as well. Playing with in-ears would probably solve at least most of the feedback issues (because there is little or no sound needed from the wedges on stage).
And of course some mics are a bit more prone to give feedback. I use a Telefunken M80, best mic I have ever had on stage and well worth the investment. That and proper mic technique might make an improvement as well.

I think the mic in the gig was a classic SM58 and we wanted to hook it up in my Live because some passages in our tracks had a live performance delay line sent to our singer..I had to crank the mic level knob in Live all the way to the max so i can have enough juice...
In our rehearsals in my studio volumes where normal so we didn’t had any problems but on stage because of the insanely fat monitors (singer couldn’t placed elsewhere) the feedback was nuts and the audio engineer guy had to hook the singer into PA console to control her..He also said to me “save your self and buy a preamp to solve this issue...”

ghost.transmitter wrote:

Yorgos Arabatzis wrote:Sorry this question is not for the X but do you have any suggestions about a preamp for my MPC Live?We had a gig recently with my band and the feedback from our singer plugged into Live was insane..

This is much likely more a routing issue than anything else, a different pre-amp will probably not solve anything. Can you describe how everything is hooked up? If the vocals are going to the Live and the Live is going to the FoH and wedges on stage then you have to be very careful with the volume on the monitors. Especially if you already have the vocal "dry" on the monitors as well. Playing with in-ears would probably solve at least most of the feedback issues (because there is little or no sound needed from the wedges on stage).
And of course some mics are a bit more prone to give feedback. I use a Telefunken M80, best mic I have ever had on stage and well worth the investment. That and proper mic technique might make an improvement as well.

I think the Live is line level only. You wouldn't need a fancy pre, just a small simple mixer, even a 1-2 input piece. The mixer will bring the SM58 up to line level in the Live for easy tracking and live use, plus you'll more than likely get an eq and maybe an aux send for effects in the little mixer. Easy fix.

Another wonderful idea that came in mind is that i could get me a Zoom H4n Pro (+cloudlifter CL-1 if i need some extra boosting) and at the same time can record our Live performances!is this going to work?Battery powered & USB bus powered is a big plus so i wouldn’t lose the mobility of things..What do you think about the new Mackie Onyx Producer 2x2?

Gnome Tone wrote:I think the Live is line level only. You wouldn't need a fancy pre, just a small simple mixer, even a 1-2 input piece. The mixer will bring the SM58 up to line level in the Live for easy tracking and live use, plus you'll more than likely get an eq and maybe an aux send for effects in the little mixer. Easy fix.

Yorgos Arabatzis wrote:some passages in our tracks had a live performance delay line sent to our singer..

Not sure that I understand correctly how you set it up; you send something FROM the Live TO your singer? Or are you taking the mic directly into the Live so you can put some delay effects on it, so just using it as a FX unit?
If it's the 2nd, then indeed it would be wise to invest in pre-amp, just to get to line level for the Live. But in my experience, running mics into instruments in a live environment is always a bit tricky. I've used my Nord Modular and mic for vocoding purposes, but it was always very susceptable to feedback. In the future I'll probably won't do the vocoder live anymore, too much hassle.
At first I used a Behringer MIC-200 as a pre-amp, but that failed sometimes during rehearsals so I won't recommend that. After that I plugged the mic into my Mackie mixer (that I already brought with me for the synths) and used the alternative outs to bring it back into the Nord (so just using that as a pre-amp). So yeah, a (cheap) mixer might be better than just a pre-amp, you'd get a bit more control.

I don't really understand why you'd want a solution battery powered? For most venues, if they have a PA, they have power. The Zoom is not an option I would take, just get your signal from the FoH and some mics in the room and record to some medium.

Yorgos Arabatzis wrote:Another wonderful idea that came in mind is that i could get me a Zoom H4n Pro (+cloudlifter CL-1 if i need some extra boosting) and at the same time can record our Live performances!is this going to work?Battery powered & USB bus powered is a big plus so i wouldn’t lose the mobility of things..What do you think about the new Mackie Onyx Producer 2x2?

Gnome Tone wrote:I think the Live is line level only. You wouldn't need a fancy pre, just a small simple mixer, even a 1-2 input piece. The mixer will bring the SM58 up to line level in the Live for easy tracking and live use, plus you'll more than likely get an eq and maybe an aux send for effects in the little mixer. Easy fix.

I have a Tascam DR44WL mobile recorder and its mics are superb quality, it also has a line out and sometimes I connect it directly to the Live to practice sampling my vocals and mixing in standalone. You can also connect another mic to it and use its preamp. For field recording and sampling into the Live, its like a swiss army knife.