Record each track in stereo

[The Colonel]

I now have a Rode NT4 stereo mic. If I wanted to record my guitar first, and then the vocals, should I (when selecting the proper input source for the DAW), choose "stereo" instead of "mono" in each instance?

My gut says yes, since you want to apply the same f/x and e.q. to the left/right sound produced by the stereo mic, but I don't know what recording two stereo tracks means for final mixdown (i.e. can you still pan the guitar and voice to different positions)?

(I have Sonar Home Studio 7)

[RRuskin]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

I now have a Rode NT4 stereo mic. If I wanted to record my guitar first, and then the vocals, should I (when selecting the proper input source for the DAW), choose "stereo" instead of "mono" in each instance?

My gut says yes, since you want to apply the same f/x and e.q. to the left/right sound produced by the stereo mic, but I don't know what recording two stereo tracks means for final mixdown (i.e. can you still pan the guitar and voice to different positions)?

(I have Sonar Home Studio 7)

Stereo guitar - It makes sense to do this unless the track is going to be very dense. You lose or end up having to throw away much of the stereo to get it to "sit" well in the mix.

Lead vocal - No. The human voice is not a stereo source.

Background vocals - Yes if recording more than one voice at a time. No if you are overdubbing one singer at a time.

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by RRuskin

Stereo guitar - It makes sense to do this unless the track is going to be very dense. You lose or end up having to throw away much of the stereo to get it to "sit" well in the mix.

Lead vocal - No. The human voice is not a stereo source.

Background vocals - Yes if recording more than one voice at a time. No if you are overdubbing one singer at a time.

So even if my NT4 has two mics, and two chords running from it to my interface, I should choose the mono option when selecting the track in DAW?

[RRuskin]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

I now have a Rode NT4 stereo mic. If I wanted to record my guitar first, and then the vocals, should I (when selecting the proper input source for the DAW), choose "stereo" instead of "mono" in each instance?

My gut says yes, since you want to apply the same f/x and e.q. to the left/right sound produced by the stereo mic, but I don't know what recording two stereo tracks means for final mixdown (i.e. can you still pan the guitar and voice to different positions)?

(I have Sonar Home Studio 7)

Originally Posted by The Colonel

So even if my NT4 has two mics, and two chords running from it to my interface, I should choose the mono option when selecting the track in DAW?

When recording mono, I'd use one side of the stereo mic to one mono track of the DAW.

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by RRuskin

When recording mono, I'd use one side of the stereo mic to one mono track of the DAW.

Then I need to find out if one side of the Rode NT4 sounds better for vocals than the MXL990 I have.

[KevWind]

Actually for the guitar I think I would consider recording into two mono tracks. If for no other reason than have a wider range of options when It came time to mix , Or try it both ways.
While it's true that sometimes or even most of the time you might want to apply the same processing to both Left and Right, there might be times when you actually want to apply different settings on the same effect for each track or even a different flavor of effect for each track in order to accentuate a particular desired effect. This is in fact done sometimes by professional mix engineers.

For example the advantage of two mono tracks you can acocmplish the "same effects" on both tracks by just sending the output of the left and right mono tracks to bus and input that to a Stereo Aux track and do one instance of whatever effect/s. Or you can place effects on the individual tracks and tweak one side slightly different from the other and then bus them to an Aux track that might also have an effect on it.
(For example) if you have an EQ that can work on multiple bands say a 4 band, then you eq the two sides slightly differently, then send them to the Aux with a single reverb on it. this can for example accentuate the width of stereo field.

But by all means experiment and decide what works best for you.

As for the vocal I would still consider two mono tracks and then you can decide if you want to just pan them into the center and or just use one track and go from there eq ,reverb ect. or again play around with say a slight delay on one track or different delays on the two sides instead of reverb
Cheers.

[RRuskin]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

Then I need to find out if one side of the Rode NT4 sounds better for vocals than the MXL990 I have.

I was assuming the stereo mic was all you had but yes, see which one sounds best and take it from there.

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by RRuskin

I was assuming the stereo mic was all you had but yes, see which one sounds best and take it from there.

It may be the best mic, after all. If you go to my earlier (pre NT4) post in Show and Tell (Something in the Way She Moves), you can hear how the MXL990 sounds.