May 31, 2005 12:10 am i hafta admit....i spat on those who dare bring a laptop on stage....but now i i see it as a valid instrument.....
what ever it takes to make it happen man!
Laptop as rack gear??
Posted on May 30, 2005 10:53 pm
crux
Typo Szar
Member Since: Jul 04, 2002
My bandmate has a standard PC type laptop probably has a consumer laptop soundcard on it like a soundblaster or something i guess, i was wondering if i installed soundforge type software effects like Compressor/limiters reverbs and the such, could i then use the I/Os on his laptop to create an type of rack gear effects loop? For recording onto my PC. I dont know how to explain it well actually.. any ideas? has this ever been done?
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May 31, 2005 12:10 am i hafta admit....i spat on those who dare bring a laptop on stage....but now i i see it as a valid instrument.....
what ever it takes to make it happen man!
May 31, 2005 09:33 am if there's a line in, there that'll hold 2 line inputs (left and right). I just tried using the built in card on my dell 600m, it didn't work to well. n-track kept having fits with the lo-fi-ness of the card. It eventually worked, but only at 16bit (i think). Also, if you only have mic input, be prepared for crappy preamp (like mine).
So I guess it might be promising enough to try if you have a line in. I wouldn't bother if there's only a mic input. If you're really interested, then an external audio interface would do the trick. I've got a Tascam US-122 that does all the audio work quite well. I think edirol has one as well, as well as others.
May 31, 2005 09:36 am Could you do it? Sure, in theory, but also remember PC's, while being expenentially more stable than previously, murphy's law still applies...
May 31, 2005 09:59 am very good point, having a large file write in the middle of a song could interupt the whole band, while the compressor hiccups.
May 31, 2005 10:04 am Im talking more of a "recording" enviornment, sorry if that was unclear
May 31, 2005 10:28 am I'm kinda thinking, that if you want good audio out of a laptop, then you'll need a seperate audio interface. If you're going to spend 200$ on an interface to do what you need, you will probably be better to just buy the device you're looking to replace.
If you're looking to do lots more with the laptop, adding different effects, etc. then maybe the laptop route would be the ticket. Refer back to my post re: the ins and outs, I guess, and go from there.
May 31, 2005 10:57 am I think that latency would be the downfall of such a setup.
But if you want to try, give Kristal Audio a try. It's the freebie multitracking software that I use, but it also has a LiveInput mode where it acts kinda like Guitar Rig or something similar. ONly problem is that it's limited to 2 inserts per channel, which'll only get you a compressor and 1 other effect. Maybe you can use the 2 master effects also for a total of 4.
I would suggest only trying this with ASIO drivers because WDM latency is just too great to overcome.
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