help...recording and stuff.

[pyoo323]

Hi guys.

Okay, so here's my dilemma. I want to be able to record my playing now nicely, with a real set up and everything. I'm going to have to save some cash up for it, but I figure my budget will be around 500-700 dollars. Can you guys give me everything I need? How it works and stuff?

So one of the first things I'll need is to probably install electronics into my acoustic. I play a Taylor 314, and I need to get some electrics installed. what do you guys recommend? I want to be able to run it through pedals, like the line dl4, so what should I get to install?

Also, i want to record to my PC, which is my laptop. How do I go about doing this? I've read things on mixers and such and such, but I have no idea what the hell a mixer does, besides the fact that it has a lot of knobs to make it look confusing.

thank you in advance, I really appreciate it. Sorry if the questions sound real dumb.

[mangold]

alright, are you gonna be recording multiple tracks simultaneously? if not then just get a converter from 1/4 to 1/8 and run your guitar directly into your cpu (through any pedals u like). that gives perfect sound quality. if you want multiple tracks youll need somethin like an mbox which will mix down your multiple tracks into one. download audacity for software, its the best, and i would suggest a fishman matrix for the pickup on your guitar. the pickup is like 100 and the installation is prolly similar. good luck!

[thejoe]

dont install a pickup
just get a good condenser mic
then a good mic preamp
and a cood sound card
and cool edit pro

acoustic pickups are more for live shows, not recording

[pyoo323]

But I need a pickup in order to run my guitar through pedals don't I?

How hard is it to install a fishman matrix yourself?

[pyoo323]

Oh yea, exactly WHAT is a multitrack?

let me give a little idea of what i want to do. say i want to record howie day's "ghost". He uses a lot of effects during that song, and loops and stuff like that. how would I go about recording that?

[thejoe]

But I need a pickup in order to run my guitar through pedals don't I?

How hard is it to install a fishman matrix yourself?

nope, all you need is a high impedece signal.. which you can get from electric guitars, or putting a mic through a di, or im pretty sure that pic preamps send out high imp signals, but i dont have one, so you would want to check into it

so you would mic your acoustic, send the mic signal to the pre, send the pre's signal to your effects chain, then to your mixer... or just use the effects loop on your mixer
im really not sure what to do here, i dont use this kind of setup, as i never use effects on my acoustic

you would be doing somthing similar to what howie does with his vocals, except micing a guitar instead of his voice, since youre a fan of his, i will assume youre firmiliar with his setup, so i wont go into that , but its pretty much what i wrote above

ive never installed a pickup myself, so i cant answer that, sorry

i think what you mean for multitrack is some sort of digital recorder, sometimes called multitracks
but a multitrack recording is just a recording with many different tracks recorded on top of each other, which can be done with a lot of computer programs

any other questions just ask