f*** the assignable outs for recording...

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By chupacabra Mon Mar 20, 2006 10:32 pm
Capshun wrote:ive been doing 1 track at a time forawhile, i want to start doing 4 at a time


don't you have the 828?... why not 6 at a time then?
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By ryssen Mon Mar 20, 2006 10:42 pm
sleepersriddle wrote:i wish i knew more about the digital gain staging in the 1k...

do you think that tracking out in realtime gets around your problem because the 'volume' dial is applying one additional digital volume boost to the master signal- before the signal is dithered down to 16 bits? or does the volume dial control an analog amplification stage after the d/a conversion?

if the latter, then really you're no better off whether resampling or not.


I´ve really no idea on the internal handling of digital audio in the MPC. In my studio I always mix analog and track down to two tracks.
My point with the post was just shed some light on the fact that it´s not always better to keep it digital and inside the box if you haven´t got tight control of the levels. A resampling to a lower amplitude will have a negative effect on objective sound quality, some might like a lower bitrate sound, but the original poster seems to cut as many quality losing steps as possible.
The moral of the story is (and that applies wether you go through the D/A of the analog outputs, the digital outs or resample): Make sure your levels are as hot as possible when passing into or through the digital domain, preferably by adjusting the program and / or sample levels. When in your DAW you can always lower the volume of a specific track without problem, if you have to crank something up like 10 dB or more you´ll lose some quality.
So if some tiny shaker is really low in your MPC mix, raise the samples level to 100 before you track it to your DAW in case you want to do a sudden, loud and powerful shaker break while mixing.
Even though I don´t track digital I imagine that a S/PDIF connection between the MPC and a PC gives greater control and monitor possibilites than the guessing game of internal resampling.
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By ryssen Mon Mar 20, 2006 11:01 pm
sleepersriddle wrote:do you think that tracking out in realtime gets around your problem because the 'volume' dial is applying one additional digital volume boost to the master signal- before the signal is dithered down to 16 bits? or does the volume dial control an analog amplification stage after the d/a conversion?


Now I see the point of what you´re saying! And your second theory scares me, it´s hard being precise when you can´t see whats hiding beneath the hood of the machine. One could guess, or hope that the first theory is the one in effect. One could guess that it works with a greater internal bit depth to a give headroom for effects and filters, but that would be used only by the "add on" amplitude, or what?
The more I think about it it seems like it dosen´t matter. One can think one is doing the right way but one is fooled none the less.
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By bassics Mon Mar 20, 2006 11:17 pm
I have tried all different ways and found teh best is to run a soft sampler program on my PC[battery]...then once I've finished my beat on the MPC I copy the folder via USB over to my PC, then assign teh samples from this folder to corressponding cells in battery..I then record the MIDI information only in from the MPC [you can also drop stuff in on teh fly too which is great for fills and stuff...I can setup a whole song in about 5-10mins [kicks,snares,hats,percussion,bass,samples,synths,etc]which is faster than recording the audio out from teh MPC and leaves me with a fully editable song right up until teh very end, so if I change my mind about a snare or something I don't have to redo it...using something like Battery allows me to constantly change layers,ADSR,run plug ins etc etc etc...it is a lil more complex than I've listed but once you understand how it works its highly unlikely you would go back to the tedious relm of recording audio again..
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By Mike-P Mon Mar 20, 2006 11:52 pm
[quote="Hypes"]yeah I was doin that when I first got my 1k - its a tedious process however.


I sync with and record into nuendo 1 track at a time now - through the reg stereo outs.

I do not use the assignable outs because my interface only records 2 ins at once anyways.

Could you not pan hard left/right and record 2 tracks out of the Stereo Outs (if your samples are mono) into Nuendo (then convert the WAV file back to MONO L/R)? I want to try doing this with Cubase but wanted to see if anyone has tried it.

By sleepersriddle Tue Mar 21, 2006 1:43 am
ryssen wrote:
sleepersriddle wrote:do you think that tracking out in realtime gets around your problem because the 'volume' dial is applying one additional digital volume boost to the master signal- before the signal is dithered down to 16 bits? or does the volume dial control an analog amplification stage after the d/a conversion?


Now I see the point of what you´re saying! And your second theory scares me, it´s hard being precise when you can´t see whats hiding beneath the hood of the machine. One could guess, or hope that the first theory is the one in effect. One could guess that it works with a greater internal bit depth to a give headroom for effects and filters, but that would be used only by the "add on" amplitude, or what?
The more I think about it it seems like it dosen´t matter. One can think one is doing the right way but one is fooled none the less.


Indeed :). I started getting on that paranoid type of thought-train after reading Bob Katz's articles about digital mixing::

http://www.digido.com/portal/pmodule_id ... age_id=18/

On the other hand, at the end of the day it just makes me vow to rely on my ears more than anything else; if it sounds fine it is fine otherwise not. Because if I let myself I will spend way to much time worrying about if i'm getting the most out of my bits ;)

By orjanbeats Tue Mar 21, 2006 9:11 am
orjanbeats wrote:
sleepersriddle wrote:
ryssen wrote:Maybe it´s just me being stupid, but I just can´t get the internal resampling to give a balanced level, it´s either rather low or to strong, causing digital artefacts. I´m switching the master level in "Other" mode but it never comes out good sounding.

If you care about sound quality and like me can´t get a resampled file that is reasonably loud but not too loud, don´t think the resample function give better result quality wise. A sound recorded digital in 16 bit but with it´s peaks far below a 0 dB level don´t use all the bits and thereby sounds as it has been recorded at a lower bitrate. So if your sounds peak low on the meters after you imported them in your DAW it´s a bad idea quality wise to resample internally, and normalize isn´t the solution to the wasted bits, the signal to noise ratio and resolution remains the same even though the file gets louder.


i wish i knew more about the digital gain staging in the 1k...

do you think that tracking out in realtime gets around your problem because the 'volume' dial is applying one additional digital volume boost to the master signal- before the signal is dithered down to 16 bits? or does the volume dial control an analog amplification stage after the d/a conversion?

if the latter, then really you're no better off whether resampling or not.


What?! I didn't quote this.
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By ryssen Tue Mar 21, 2006 10:49 am
sleepersriddle wrote:Indeed :). I started getting on that paranoid type of thought-train after reading Bob Katz's articles about digital mixing::

http://www.digido.com/portal/pmodule_id ... age_id=18/

On the other hand, at the end of the day it just makes me vow to rely on my ears more than anything else; if it sounds fine it is fine otherwise not. Because if I let myself I will spend way to much time worrying about if i'm getting the most out of my bits ;)


Yes, sometimes one really have to let go of that little german scientist inside of you and go for what your ears tell you, or adapt to the amount of time you have to spend on mixing.
But isn´t there a very easy solution to keep the digital flow out of a machine like the MPC 1000 in a somewhat pure and non crunched way? If the main volume at it´s max position didn´t introduced any amplification but left off the signal in a digital form at the max output (a -2dB peak on an internal sample would be -2dB if it hasn´t been modified along the way, if the internal headroom would be higher the output would give the exact level of the dithered signal).
I´ve lived in some sort of delusion that proaudio equipment work like that, a full effect of the potentiometer leaves a level line output if you kept the internal signals straight, but now I see that that one probably adds some amplification after a certain point on the main volume, probably added just to make it "user friendly". It´s like **** iTunes, so flexible and easy to use but real crap if you want to keep your stuff in check.
What the world needs is some good old russian standardization.
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By Hypes Tue Mar 21, 2006 1:24 pm
Mike-P wrote:
Hypes wrote:yeah I was doin that when I first got my 1k - its a tedious process however.


I sync with and record into nuendo 1 track at a time now - through the reg stereo outs.

I do not use the assignable outs because my interface only records 2 ins at once anyways.

Could you not pan hard left/right and record 2 tracks out of the Stereo Outs (if your samples are mono) into Nuendo (then convert the WAV file back to MONO L/R)? I want to try doing this with Cubase but wanted to see if anyone has tried it.


Yeah mayne u can do that - I just dont

I dont think its anything new tho.
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By RundFyrkant Tue Mar 21, 2006 2:44 pm
sparq wrote:although digital is good..... i like the analog world of recording. that's why i'm trying to recreate it as much as possible. i just like the warmth of the sound.

yeah me to...
that's one of the main reason i wanted to get back to working with hardware.
now i actually sample tapenoise and use in the MPC.. i guess i got to much of the clinic computersound. to bad i sold the most of my old studio to get the Pulsar II card and a new computer.
.. one day in the future KorgMs20's,808's and micromoog's gonna grow from DNAmanipulated bushes and then i'll have the whole backyard full of them :wink:
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By Antonym Tue Mar 21, 2006 3:03 pm
now i actually sample tapenoise and use in the MPC.. i guess i got to much of the clinic computersound


check out my post in production tech about sampling silence. i do the same kind of thing. it's a really powerful technique.

By Chisel Tue Mar 21, 2006 9:01 pm
I used to record one track at a time from all my outboard gear into my computer. Then, I got a Behringer ADA8000 which I connected via lightpipe into my Creamware Pulsar II and I haven't gone back since. As soon as I started mixing everything using the Creamware mixer, I noticed an improvement in sound over using other DAWs. I just bought a second ADA8000 (the Pulsar II has two ADAT ins/outs) so I'll have 16 ADAT + 2 SPDIF + 2 analog = 20 channels! Now, I've been seriously considering taking the DAW out of the picture completely and arranging the entire song in the MPC. This way, I can record straight from the Creamware mixer into Soundforge as two channels and be finished. I only really need the DAW when I'm adding vocals or VST synths/effects. If I stick to my outboard gear and Creamware synths/effects, I don't need it. This would give me a better workflow since it's one less program to worry about. :D

Peace \/
Chisel
http://www.soundclick.com/chisel316

By japspecvr6 Fri Mar 24, 2006 7:09 am
Hypes wrote:
Mike-P wrote:
Hypes wrote:yeah I was doin that when I first got my 1k - its a tedious process however.


I sync with and record into nuendo 1 track at a time now - through the reg stereo outs.

I do not use the assignable outs because my interface only records 2 ins at once anyways.

Could you not pan hard left/right and record 2 tracks out of the Stereo Outs (if your samples are mono) into Nuendo (then convert the WAV file back to MONO L/R)? I want to try doing this with Cubase but wanted to see if anyone has tried it.
hey i have an motu ultra lite and i want to lock up the mpc with nuendo how do i do that.

Yeah mayne u can do that - I just dont

I dont think its anything new tho.

By orjanbeats Fri Mar 24, 2006 1:05 pm
somebody said that it was better to record 2 and 2 tracks analog, rather than internally resampling 2 and 2 tracks. does this count for mixing the beat in the mpc1000 as well; is it better (sound quality-wise) to record the whole song analog through the main outs, instead of resampling the whole song and transfer it via usb?
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By Balls Fri Mar 24, 2006 3:10 pm
orjanbeats wrote:somebody said that it was better to record 2 and 2 tracks analog, rather than internally resampling 2 and 2 tracks. does this count for mixing the beat in the mpc1000 as well; is it better (sound quality-wise) to record the whole song analog through the main outs, instead of resampling the whole song and transfer it via usb?


Yes it is.

Resampling causes loss of audio quality no doubt.

Akai should make a digital resampling-feature.. That could REALLY be useful.. And easy to implent aswell.
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