RE: Newbie having problems....
2005/08/23 10:57:55
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fanlee,
The GT manual shows a guitar being plugged into a mic input on a sound card (not sure if the manual actually says its a mic input). Mic inputs have a built-in preamp (not a very good one). You could buy some sort of DI (Direct In) box. It will have a preamp and boost the input signal to line-level. I use an amp modeller, and that acts as a preamp. You could also buy a mixer (the Yamaha MG series is very good) and plug into that. It will act as a preamp.
If you're trying to record your amp, you could buy a mic (an SM57 is the favorite for micing amps), a premap for the mic, and record that way.
You can try the phone output on the amp. It's probably line-level, or slightly hotter. If you can adjust the level, then turn it all the way down, and then slowly up until you get a good level.
One more thing, the 2496 card has an adjustable input level. I think by default it's set to "consumer", which is -10db line-level. You can adjust it to "pro", which is +4db. Whatever device you use, try to find out the signal level and adjust the card accordingly (you make the adjustement on the Hardware tab of the 2496 control panel). My gear is routed through a Yamaha mixer, and I use the AUX bus on the mixer to send to my 2496 card. The AUX is +4db, so I have the card set to pro level.