I need your advice

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by Dreadfulnaught

Have not used it in years. Teac 3440, passive 4 channel mixer, Shure SM 57 and 58 mikes laying in a drawer for years, a DigiTech compressor limiter, some old rack mounted graphic equalizer, old Acoustic Research speakers I used to mix through, using a high end Fisher home stereo. Patch bay that looks like a refugee from the phone company ( and the kids ask, "What's a patch bay?") Enough stands and cables to equip Kool and The Gang. Probably all unserviceable now. Forgot my much maligned acoustically dead booth made of hollow doors and hanging carpet samples, and some old rack mounted digital delay unit, excellent for the Sun Records echo effect, also had reverb.
I want to go for portability and ease of use. Been watching Garageband tutorials, and while the tasteless techno music some people came up with sounds like 1970s porn movie soundtracks, it looks like it may do what I need.

"Acoustic Research speakers" ?? would they be AR 3 A's ? if so and they are in good shape, with a good relatively clean power amp they would IMO make great monitors.
If I recall correctly they are acoustic suspension in design and a pretty flat response.

[buzzardwhiskey]

Unless the computer route turns you on, consider an all-in-one board (recording, mixing, mastering) such the Tascam DP-24.

[KevWind]

ooopppss double post

[MikeBmusic]

Originally Posted by Dreadfulnaught

Anyway, there seems to be little love for USB mics here. Do they really sound that bad? Someone who uses one please chime in.

The biggest problem with USB mics is that you are limited to using one mic to record. Except with some finagling with a Mac, you cannot get a computer DAW to recognize two USB audio interfaces (there may be one DAW exception to that).
A USB mic does not let you plug a line-in or instrument DI into it, either. Depending on the model, it may not provide zero latency monitoring, either.
These are all features that you will get from the most basic audio interface

[Doug Young]

Using what you have makes sense, and the Mac Air is a nice (and totally silent) base. GarageBand is nice because it's reasonably capable, and if you decide to upgrade later, you can open GarageBand projects in Logic. Or you can take your GarageBand projects to a full studio that has Logic and have them mix.

You could get a pair of Apogee iMics and have a pretty simple, self-contained system, just the Mac and mics, but for more flexibility, something like the Apogee Duet (or Quartet, if you want to be able to record more channels at once) would be a portable option that's designed to work with your Mac. You could start with your existing mics, and upgrade to some condensor's later if you feel the need.

[Dreadfulnaught]

Originally Posted by KevWind

"Acoustic Research speakers" ?? would they be AR 3 A's ? if so and they are in good shape, with a good relatively clean power amp they would IMO make great monitors.
If I recall correctly they are acoustic suspension in design and a pretty flat response.

I think I had one AR3a and one AR5. Gave them away long ago. Yep they were chosen for the reasons you mention. It made sense to monitor and mix down on something people would actually be using to listen to it. And being a shoestring studio one set of speakers served as both monitors and mixdown speakers.
I also had a cheap huge proto boom box type of thing hanging from the ceiling, used to check the mix on those craptastic speakers but used it for nothing else.
My ears are so ancient now I will probably need my son to mix. Back then with only four tracks and building the song like a layer cake, I had to make mixing decisions as I went along, but now it can be done the way it was done in a real studio, mix it all down at the end.

[ChuckS]

Originally Posted by Dreadfulnaught

......... I play Open Mic nights just for fun, and the setup should be portable enough to take there if I want to. We also have some older musicians in this area who have never been recorded, so I'd like to do that before Father Time hits the stop button on them.

Depending on how portable you need this recording setup to, you might want to consider something like the Zoom H4n or H6 recoders. They have internal mics and can also accept external mics or line input levels. They record to SD cards or can be used as an interface to a computer/DAW. Their internal preamps may not be as quiet as many external preamps and their noise floor may be higher than many interfaces, however you may not notice it and they are very good for the money.

Also, I sent you a PM

[DupleMeter]

As has been said, it's not that all USB mics sound bad (some are very usable). It's just that it's an all or nothing proposition. The mic is the converter/interface, there's no room to expand.

An Apogee duet (or similar interface) would be a better option because it allows you to use whatever mics you have and add others as you can/want.

[Dreadfulnaught]

Late breaking news, I obtained a Blue Yeti mic today. With the MacBook Air and Garage Band looks like I have the basis for a functional yet portable home studio.


Now the tough part will be learning to use it!