Mac Recording

The built in mic on your mac isn't designed to record bass. It's purely intended for use as a messaging tool (voice). I would fully expect it to distort horribly if recording bass.

If you want to record on your Mac, either use the line in socket, or get an audio interface like an M Audio Mobile Pre USB or similar.

Take a line out or DI from your amp, and record in Garage Band (or if you prefer, download Audacity).

...or if you want to mic your rig, get a decent mic and connect it to the line in or an Audio interface.
 
It is not made to withstand the the high decibels/SPL's being generated. Therefore, the soundwaves get clipped when they get converted by the mic. The resulting clips are distortion, akin to a guitar amp. To record with a mic, you'll need a quality microphone such as a Shure Beta, and a means to convert the signals from the mic into your computer. Specifically an interface such as the one mentioned.
 
I gotta question guys.
If you were going to buy a computer specifically to record with,nothing else,what would you choose & why.
I'm just starting to scratch the surface of recording with my windows XP PC with Audacity.For those that have used both Mac's & PC's,with Garage Band &/or Audacity,please help me decide. :)
 
Greg said:
I gotta question guys.
If you were going to buy a computer specifically to record with,nothing else,what would you choose & why.
I'm just starting to scratch the surface of recording with my windows XP PC with Audacity.For those that have used both Mac's & PC's,with Garage Band &/or Audacity,please help me decide. :)
Click to expand...

I'd build myself a PC, install on it with Audacity and use an M Audio Mobile Pre USB.

Seriously - Ubuntu Linux with Audacity works excellently!

I'm not anti-Windows...actually, I'm a Microsoft instructor, as well as Cisco and A+ PC Hardware.

...If you want an out-of-the-box- solution, Macs are great - the included Garage band software is very good, but I still advise getting a decent audio interface.

Regarding Audacity Vs Garage Band - the benefit of Garage Band is that you get a whole bunch of drum loops etc included that can make it a bit of fun. Audacity will let you record pretty much just what you can put into it (it does an excellent job of that though). I've got a couple of Macs, and a few PCs and have tried it on most of them.

I think Audacity is a little easier to use effectively, and I reckon the recordings I've made with it are a little better quality than those made on any of my Garage Band Macs (with the same audio interface).

;)
 
Ok well my set up is good enough for me, i have my mac (garage band) and my Line 6 Tone Port UX1, the coolest thing about this is that it comes with a modeling software which i think is incredible, i have the choice (this is just generic tones, you can go far more in-depth then this) of Ampeg Fliptop,Eden, Ampeg SVT, the legendary bass cabs, a bunch of cabinets, and then every effect you could imagine, and you can dial in each effect to how you like it
 
Mac is the shit for home recording, or any serious recording really.

We once lost 4 hours worth of drum mix because XP crashed during the session. Not fun...
 
paperbag1213 said:
Ok well my set up is good enough for me, i have my mac (garage band) and my Line 6 Tone Port UX1, the coolest thing about this is that it comes with a modeling software which i think is incredible, i have the choice (this is just generic tones, you can go far more in-depth then this) of Ampeg Fliptop,Eden, Ampeg SVT, the legendary bass cabs, a bunch of cabinets, and then every effect you could imagine, and you can dial in each effect to how you like it
Click to expand...

I've got a Line 6 Toneport UX2 and I can highly recommend it for home recording. The Gearbox plugin is indeed awesome, almost worth the money on it's own. Seriously do check it out!
 
Having got a dedicated PC based DAW (digital audio workstation), they can be a right bloody pernickity bugger to work BUT I don't think that is exclusively a PC thing. I know of a couple of Mac users who have had similar problems.

One thing's for sure - definitely get an audio interface...makes life way easier actually getting signals into the computer. Quite often you can get software bundled for free with them so that's often worth bearing in mind if you're on a budget.
 
Greg said:
I gotta question guys.
If you were going to buy a computer specifically to record with,nothing else,what would you choose & why.
I'm just starting to scratch the surface of recording with my windows XP PC with Audacity.For those that have used both Mac's & PC's,with Garage Band &/or Audacity,please help me decide. :)
Click to expand...

I have a 10-month old 17" MacBook Pro HD laptop and it's the shizzle. I can't say enough good things about it. Not once has it ever done anything that I haven't asked it to do and it has done everything that i have asked it to do... no hang-ups... no freezes... no lost files... no eff-ups whatsoever; and I'm on it for 2 to 5 hours every day. They're designed for musicians and graphic designers.

I got mine refurbished and highly recommend checking out the refurbished Macs on their website. You can save a boatload of money.

I used to be scared of Macs because I was so used to using Windows-based PC's... I figured it would take a long time to get used to using the Mac OS. It took me a day and a half. Now that I've had it for so long and learned all the shortcuts and ins and outs I can cruise. They just make sense.

(And no I don't work for Apple)
 
I got the Line 6 tone port and it works incredibly, I've had it for awhile, just never installed it on my mac
 
I think that home recording systems are more based on personal preference. Most of the quality comes from your audio interface so as long as thats decent the sound you'll get will be pretty good.

I can understand why people will say macs are better, due to the whole load of programs and the extra ram they have for more complex post production processing. And if your doing it professionally i'd go full industry standard tbh.

Audacity is great for just recording, for more complex things you really need a sequencer. I'd only go with PC over mac due to software piracy being easier on a PC, and thus its cheaper to 'test' what you want and then allows you to buy it later, where a mac will end up costing quite a bit and in some cases the software costs the price of the computer...only to find out you might not like that particular program.
 
Callum said:
I'd only go with PC over mac due to software piracy being easier on a PC, and thus its cheaper to 'test' what you want and then allows you to buy it later, where a mac will end up costing quite a bit and in some cases the software costs the price of the computer...only to find out you might not like that particular program.
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That doesn't justify software piracy :lol:

There are loads of programs that have a legitimate trial version of their software freely available that allows you to try it out on a time limit before you buy it - (for both PC and Mac).

;)

....whilst I have Windows PCs and Macs, I'd really like to see more development of software for Linux. Some of the distributions like Ubuntu are really great ;)
 
Been a Mac and pro tools man for some time now. If I was to do it all again I would still choose a mac and maybe try Logic instead of Pro Tools. But when a system works well you dont really go looking around for a change.
How many things do you need to record at once? Are you doing solo or band work recording?
Cheers
Dale
 
Im in the middle of recording an album using a mac. Due to the studio not being quite finished (still need the interface and studio monitors) we're recording in quite a weird (and budget way).

Despite this, the results are excellent. Mac is a mac pro (2.8 ghz 8core / 2 GB RAM) running the full version of logic eight. Drums are recorded into a tascam 24 track recorder and exported onto the mac via USB. Everything else is recoded directly into the mac using the line in (going through a boss digital recorder as preamp).

Despite the absence of a good interface (im looking at the RME fireface 800) and studio monitors I'm still happy to be recording the album this way.

The quality were getting using this cheap method i can be heard on our myspace - track called patriots gamble.

Ironically the most worst bit about the quiality is the absence of a cheap pop filter for the vox :wink:
 
Mac is, as they say, the shit for recording! I once had an XP based system crash during mixing, we lost 3 hours of mixed drums... :cry:
 
Greg said:
I gotta question guys.
If you were going to buy a computer specifically to record with,nothing else,what would you choose & why.
I'm just starting to scratch the surface of recording with my windows XP PC with Audacity.For those that have used both Mac's & PC's,with Garage Band &/or Audacity,please help me decide. :)
Click to expand...

I'd go with macs. From my own experience I've found macs to be ore stable and quicker. You can build PCs to be better but it takes a hell of a lot of knowledge. Ive recorded in many studios and again I think only one used windows. All of the engineers prefered macs for the stability and reliability.

Concerning software...if your on a budget I'd go for logic express. Its a fantastic platform to record with. If you've got more money to spend I'd go with a full logic program. If your not recording in a professional capacity logic express would be more than enough though
 
Macs all the way.

I'm currently on ProTools but going to change to Logic soon... check out the Apogee interfaces too (the 'Duet' in particular).

Lex
 
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