Firewire. Question

DriLL · Post by **DriLL** » Sun Oct 07, 2007 12:51 am

Hello i just got my new M Audio FireWire 410 sound card.. but i don't have firewire "connectors" in my computer. So i was wondering if i bought a firewire pci card for my pc so i can plug in my soundcard... will it make a lot of difference in final sound, if I buy very good or very cheep firewire pci card. Or is it just a connection between pc and sound card , and don't change nothing.
?

Post by **John Sayers** » Sun Oct 07, 2007 6:10 pm

That's the way to go - a firewire card is a firewire card - your sound card will sound fine.

cheers
john

DriLL · Post by **DriLL** » Sun Oct 07, 2007 10:58 pm

Thanks man. I've bought it. But problems are here. :S
I install all drivers and stuff, than i connect my sound card (M Audio firewire 410) to the pc and all that, but problem is. that when i plug in my (Rode NT1000) mic, the sound is only on one side. In front of sound card i have 2 connectors for microphone, if I choose left one, sound is only in the left, and the samo on the right. How can i have sound on my booth sides when i record.
Next problem is that i have 5.1 suround speakers and the cables came from sub woofer. There's 3 cables ( front, rear, center and woofer)
How to put them in my sound card? I'm realy confused, beacuse when i plug them in, i don't here any sound in the right speaker.
+ when i want to record i press Mic/Line button and it's no sound.
I can here myself trough microphone only when (mic/line) is off.
please help.. i just got the gear and, nothing works fine.
I'm an amateur and it's my first time doing studio.. so can you guys help me.
here's teh photo of my sound card:

Lord Tim · Post by **Lord Tim** » Sun Oct 07, 2007 11:05 pm

Yeah, as John said, there'll be no difference in sound whatsoever between different FW cards.

BUT - some soundcard drivers are very picky about which chipset is used on the firewire card. 90% of the time you should be fine, but it's generally recommended to get a FW card with a Texas Instruments chipset just in case you happen to fall into that last 10%.

This isn't your problem with what you're hearing, though.

What you need to do is pull up your software mixer for the 410 (sometimes called Cue Mix on a lot of cards?). You can set the panning for each channel to center so you'll be able to hear it in both speakers.

Depending on which software you're using too, if you have low enough latency, you can mute your monitoring entirely and listen through your recording software and that'll fix it too, but that can be a bit of a headache making sure your machine is up to the task - I don't recommend doing this until you're more comfortable with recording.

Definitely check your manual out for the monitor mix / software mixer / cue mix or whatever it's called - that'll do the trick.

As far as setting up for 5.1, that I'm not entirely sure about - sorry!

DriLL · Post by **DriLL** » Sun Oct 07, 2007 11:21 pm

Thanks man.. i'm going to check this up..
If anybody else knows how to fix this speaker,and mic problem, please help me. I hope that previous answer will work..

But in which "holes" I must put the three of cables from my 5.1 speakers.
Describe me whit the photo that i post early ..
Does it matter in wich "hole" i put microphone (mic/line)

Lord Tim · Post by **Lord Tim** » Mon Oct 08, 2007 12:14 am

Again, I can't help with the speaker problem, but for the mics - any hole will do with the front panel MIC connectors.

You use the software mixer to control how you hear it (by default it will sound either left or right, depending which hole you plug it in, but with the software mixer you can pan it to the center).

DriLL · Post by **DriLL** » Mon Oct 08, 2007 12:43 am

man, i try everything, but when i say something un the microphone, only the left volume is bouncing in the mixer.
Look if you see something what i should change, tell me.

but why is microphone working only when (Mic/Line) button is off, when i push it mic is dead.

Lord Tim · Post by **Lord Tim** » Mon Oct 08, 2007 1:59 am

No offence intended here, but I have to ask, but did you get a manual with the sound card? That would be a LOT more help than my guesses here.

Having said that, I would say try setting channel's pan control to the center position. (I'm guessing the round dial at the top of each channel is a pan control and not a level trim?) I would say that would fix it.

But I would really recommend going over the manual - that would give you EXACT instructions on how to do what you want I would say.

Good luck!

DriLL · Post by **DriLL** » Mon Oct 08, 2007 3:20 am

No, it is a level trim. But i soled the problem by making it mono., and it works.
The manual

I've got 3 pages of how to install the driver, and the manual on the drivers CD has not much info. And about 5.1 speakler problem.. i figure that out to. It's a special "jack" that puts all 3 of them into 1 jack , wich you put in sound card.
thanks anyway.
I will post in this topic, if I'll have some other problems about my first studio.

Post by **gullfo** » Tue Oct 09, 2007 12:57 am

generally speaking, a single mono microphone is a monophonic source. so it would only show on one channel or the other in a to channel system (my M-Audio Omnistudio works the same way) so you set the source to mono in the mix application (for me its Sonar 7 Producer) and then the signal is routed across the stereo buss (and now i can pan it etc...) if you want hardware output to span both monitors, then you have to set it like you did on the hardware control panel.

Lord Tim · Post by **Lord Tim** » Tue Oct 09, 2007 3:57 am

Ah, you got SONAR 7? Awesome!

How are you finding it? I haven't got my upgrade yet - still on 6.2.1 here.

Post by **gullfo** » Tue Oct 09, 2007 10:03 am

my desk is down at the moment

piled into my 4200cu ft control room...

i've gone through the manual though and it looks like some great stuff (finally) like side chaining - with some additional routing capabilities. the audio-to-midi as part of the correction plugin, lots of new midi edit stuff, some new effects and synths, and supposedly better performance with 64bit OSes and Vista.

Lord Tim · Post by **Lord Tim** » Tue Oct 09, 2007 1:10 pm

Yeah, looks really great! The sidechaining thing was a huge annoyance with lots of workarounds if you wanted to do it in the past. I'm told the audio to MIDI is still a little dodgy though.

I'm keen as anything to get my copy. The new MIDI tools look amazing on paper, as do the new mastering plugins.

DriLL · Post by **DriLL** » Wed Oct 10, 2007 6:39 am

So there's nothing wrong if i just put it on mono like you said, so that my voice is recorded on both sides? I do that in Cubase SX (put mono for recording)..
So is "monophonic" good or bad thing? or it's in my case the same thing, as i would had stereo?
If I sound "rookie" please don't judge me, i am still learning and so far this forum helped me a lot.

Lord Tim · Post by **Lord Tim** » Wed Oct 10, 2007 2:13 pm

Like Glenn said, a mic is a mono thing (usually) and so is your voice, so mono tracks are the way to go for this.