hollaatroy
Beatmaker
ill o.g.
First off, apologies to Fade for posting this 2 forums. My bad!
Attempting to setup a basic home "studio" (overstated). Bought an E-MU 0404 PCI Card (http://www.zzounds.com/item--EMU8803), without knowing what I was doing. Further complicated things by purchasing an AKG Perception 100 Mic (http://www.zzounds.com/item--AKGPERCEPTION100) with XLR connections (only learned what XLR was after I bought the mic). And I figured I better talk to someone before going out and blindly buying some monitor speakers. So currently I'm stuck with a mic that doesn't connect to my sound card. Went to tweakheadz.com for advice, but as basic as he could break it down, it still was too advance for my knowledge. Anyway, did a Google search and found a cable called an "XLR to 1/4" adapter" (http://www.samedaymusic.com/browse--2367). I'm assuming that the 2 red/white inputs on the analog side of the EMU 0404 are the 1/4" jacks (correct me if wrong). Then that would mean I could get this XLR to 1/4" adapter and connect the AKG mic to the EMU 0404, right? If true, this leads me to a dumb question: Why would there be 2 of the 1/4" inputs? They say LEFT and RIGHT which is obvious. Does this mean my mic would only record on 1 channel (either the left or the right) and not in full stereo? Tweakheadz went into trying to explain balanced vs. unbalanced, and I'm guessing that has something to do with the 2 inputs. He also lost me on the pre-amp topic. Would I need a pre-amp for this AKG mic? What the hell is a pre-amp? Moving along, now I'm needing to get monitors. Did some research and I'm considering the Alesis M1 Active 520 2-Way Near Field Monitors (75 watts) (http://www.zzounds.com/item--ALEM1ACTIVE520). Again, I'm guessing that the monitors would plug into the 2 output 1/4" jacks on the EMU 0404. I called Alesis and they confirmed that the speakers do not come with 1/4" to 1/4" cable (very cheap of them). If all my assumptions are correct, this would complete my setup. I'm also not big into using adapter cables (like the XLR to 1/4" for example), so I was thinking of getting the Delta 1010 LT (http://www.zzounds.com/item--MDOD1010LT), which has the XLR's, the 1/4", the Midi, and all sorts of other shit. I read the reviews and they all said that pre-amp sounds like shit, which I'm assuming would make my mic sound like shit (I'm still not up to speed on this pre-amp shit). Would it be worth investing in something like the M-BOX Pro 2 (http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Digidesign-Mbox-2-Pro-Factory-Bundle?sku=241802) if the sound is better? I this shit was long, but I need help bad, and don't want to make another bad purchase. Any advice at this point would be very helpful. Good lookin' out Illmuzik fam.
Attempting to setup a basic home "studio" (overstated). Bought an E-MU 0404 PCI Card (http://www.zzounds.com/item--EMU8803), without knowing what I was doing. Further complicated things by purchasing an AKG Perception 100 Mic (http://www.zzounds.com/item--AKGPERCEPTION100) with XLR connections (only learned what XLR was after I bought the mic). And I figured I better talk to someone before going out and blindly buying some monitor speakers. So currently I'm stuck with a mic that doesn't connect to my sound card. Went to tweakheadz.com for advice, but as basic as he could break it down, it still was too advance for my knowledge. Anyway, did a Google search and found a cable called an "XLR to 1/4" adapter" (http://www.samedaymusic.com/browse--2367). I'm assuming that the 2 red/white inputs on the analog side of the EMU 0404 are the 1/4" jacks (correct me if wrong). Then that would mean I could get this XLR to 1/4" adapter and connect the AKG mic to the EMU 0404, right? If true, this leads me to a dumb question: Why would there be 2 of the 1/4" inputs? They say LEFT and RIGHT which is obvious. Does this mean my mic would only record on 1 channel (either the left or the right) and not in full stereo? Tweakheadz went into trying to explain balanced vs. unbalanced, and I'm guessing that has something to do with the 2 inputs. He also lost me on the pre-amp topic. Would I need a pre-amp for this AKG mic? What the hell is a pre-amp? Moving along, now I'm needing to get monitors. Did some research and I'm considering the Alesis M1 Active 520 2-Way Near Field Monitors (75 watts) (http://www.zzounds.com/item--ALEM1ACTIVE520). Again, I'm guessing that the monitors would plug into the 2 output 1/4" jacks on the EMU 0404. I called Alesis and they confirmed that the speakers do not come with 1/4" to 1/4" cable (very cheap of them). If all my assumptions are correct, this would complete my setup. I'm also not big into using adapter cables (like the XLR to 1/4" for example), so I was thinking of getting the Delta 1010 LT (http://www.zzounds.com/item--MDOD1010LT), which has the XLR's, the 1/4", the Midi, and all sorts of other shit. I read the reviews and they all said that pre-amp sounds like shit, which I'm assuming would make my mic sound like shit (I'm still not up to speed on this pre-amp shit). Would it be worth investing in something like the M-BOX Pro 2 (http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Digidesign-Mbox-2-Pro-Factory-Bundle?sku=241802) if the sound is better? I this shit was long, but I need help bad, and don't want to make another bad purchase. Any advice at this point would be very helpful. Good lookin' out Illmuzik fam.
