How to make stereo

Is the button for stereo set to MONO? or are you recording to one side of a track? (L or R?) May need a bit more info on that one, I record everything on one track and run into my PC as a mono signal, then I pan as I think works. There is a button over (in console view) to switch between stereo and mono mixes...I'm using MC Pro, I think it's the same for others.

the plug in buzzing - I'd try reducing the output gain on it, you may be getting D/O's if it's too hot. (D/O = digital overs)

hope that helps!

No How,
It looks like wickerman's pretty much got you covered.
Don't forget you have several gain stages, and places to monitor them.
The guitar itself, your ART pre-amp, PatchMix, and the effect. PatchMix is where you have final control of your input signal, and you may find yourself playing with the sliders in that quite a bit.
Effects with a lot of gain, such as FreeAmp2, and possibly the tube plug-in you are using can give you that D/O that wickerman mentioned. You can dial the effect down, or reduce the input level. You will get different results, depending on what you do, so experiment.
Sometimes you need to find a balance by adjusting all of your gain stages a bit. Just keep an eye on all of your meters.

That's pretty much what I do Terry,
I have the L & R inputs going to seperate tracks, so each track gets a Mono signal. This way you can pan to your hearts content, and you can use the whole stereo field. If you record a Stereo track, the Pan control acts more like a fader, and doesn't move the instrument in the stereo field.
If you record either side, L or R, as Mono, it will default to the center, since the Mono signal is evenly distributed on both sides.

I am not getting it. Everything was recorded through the right channel on patch mix so all the sounds are on the right only. Is there a way to get them to the left without having to re-record the track?
It has to happen at patchmix first- is this correct?

Sorry Jamz,
That's not entirely accurate. It's not entirely inaccurate either. Depends on what you want.
There is a PatchMix screen shot in this thread:
Sonar or MC
Note the position of the Pan controls in the L & R Input strips.
Rick,
In the MC Track Pane, next to the Volume Control, is a button that looks kind of like this[>.<]. This is showing a Stereo track
Click on it, and it will turn to this [>.] This shows that the Track is now Mono. Even though the track was recorded from a Full Right input, it will now be centered, and should display as a single track, not split as a stereo track would be shown. With the Mono Icon [>.] showing, you can pan freely.

Give it some time. After a while, you'll be doing these little things without even thinking about it.
Wait 'til you start playing with fun stuff like EQ, compressors, reverb, and all the other details that really make your song come to life. The learning never ends.

Yeah, that would do it.
For now I would be inclined to visit someplace like Wal-Mart or Best Buy. They should have several inexpensive units to chose from. Just make sure it has line inputs. You don't need high wattage. Most reciever/amps sound their best in the 40-60% volume range. In time you will probably want to get some good powered monitors, but they aren't cheap.
I knew that would come back and bite us, but we solved the problem at hand.

Edit:Sitting here brainstorming, and I had an idea. Do you use your computer for gaming at all?
The E-MU is not good with games, the software doesn't access the card properly. I'm looking at my gaming speakers, and a light went on.
Get a set of powered computer speakers, stereo, don't worry about 5.1 stuff. You can use these with a stereo x 2 mono adapter with the E-MU. This should run you $30-$50.
If you want to know what setting up for games entails we can cover that.

I have been using a Sherwood stereo reviever, 200w, 100w per channel. Only paid $89.00 for it, and I've seen it for less since. Problem free, clean sound, plenty of inputs, set up for two speakers per channel so I have monitors in the mix booth and speakers in the studio.
Later
Albert

If you're going to spend $100 or more, I'd look into studio monitors instead of spending near that on a HI-FI amp or computer speakers. That equipment boosts different frequencies in order to make the consumer hear "better" sounding computer games or "better"sounding CDs.

If you can't afford more than $30, then I'd go with Bob's suggestion. If you get close to $100, then I'd start looking at the low end monitors like these:
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/MAudio-StudioPro-3-Professional-Desktop-Audio-Monitors?sku=603709
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Edirol-MA7A-Stereo-Micro-Monitors?sku=603677
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/MAudio-Studiophile-DX4-Powered-Monitors-Pair?sku=603705
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Fostex-PM0.4-Powered-Studio-Monitors?sku=600682

An alternative to buying monitors now (and some "pro" types would bash me for saying this) would be to get some decent headphones to use with your 0404, but you still would have to have a headphone amplifier (or mixer which has a built in headphone amp). Headphones are not the best thing to mix with (and thus the reason I would get flamed for saying that), but you use what you can!

If you want to go that route instead, as and we can give you some advice in that area.

No How,
You can spend your money on whatever you want, of course, but I think you may have missed the point of my post.

The Sherwood Reciever, while is a good purchase for home theater, is not the best thing to use for a home studio. for home studio you want FLAT RESPONSE studio monitors. The receiver will not give you a flat response, it augments the signal (sort of like a built in equalizer) and the response you get is not a "reference" like you should be using for mixing.

for $100 you can get some low end powered speakers which are "studio monitors" and will have flat response (or near it) and will be a much better monitor system for your home studio. The first ones I listed there, the 3" m-audios are only $100. They're the lowest of the low end monitors, but they will still be better than buying a receiver to use as a monitor because of the way they're designed.

It's the same thing for your audio card. If you use a Soundblaster card, they're great for GAMING, but they're not designed for home studio recording. They'll work, but they won't work as WELL as something that was DESIGNED to do RECORDING WORK.

YES, studio monitors come in two different types, powered and passive. Most home studios tend to use powered since the amps you need to get a good quality flat response from (as well as other parameters) typically will cost you more in the long run once you buy the amp and the passive speakers. plus, you have to deal with the room for them, power consumption, heat, and other considerations. for home studios, powered monitors are the most popular.

Personally, I like the M-audio better, but I believe they are probably both pretty good for entry level.

Hey, Al. No problem, no offense taken....

The quickest I can find an article talks only about the difference between HI FI SPEAKERS and STUDIO MONITORS, but the principle applies to the difference between HI FI amplifiers and Studio Amplifiers as well.

Can you tweak a HI FI amp to be used in the studio? Sure, but, with all due respect, I don't think you can do it just by using it in its flat state. I think you actually have to use an EQ on it and flatten it out more than it already is.

the problem is that the amps in the powered monitors and the studio amplifers are DESIGNED for a flat response. I could get very technical about this telling you how operational amplifiers and filters are used, but I don't think you need that much info. A HI FI amp is designed to make the listener's experience the "best" that it can be and are typically boosted in the bass and sometimes in the midrange.

Here's an article on the HIFI vs Studio monitors:
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/Jun02/articles/monitors.asp
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/Jul02/articles/monitors2.asp

While the author of this article's conclusion is not completely conclusive, it still points to the Dynaudios as the best response for near fields as a studio monitor. The HI FI speakers that he used in the test did rather well against some of the studio monitors, but all that tells me is that you have to be careful which monitors you get. Just like anything else. Just because you buy a LARGE DIAMETER CONDENSOR MICROPHONE, doesn't mean you'll get the best sound out of it. A Neuman (although overly priced) is going to sound better than an M-audio NOVA. Every time.

And the article does give you a LOT of info about how they determine the responsiveness of the speakers.

Here's another article. Notice that the author says that good monitors shouldn't "artificially exaggerate frequencies". http://studio-central.com/studio_monitors.htm

Here's an excellent short article, what he says in a few short paragraphs brings up volumes of info. basically, it boils down to this part of the article:

Bottom line: If your mixes sound bottom-heavy in the real world, your monitors don't have enough bottom. If your mixes are dull at home or in the car, your monitors are too bright. The monitors are adding highs to the sound which are not added in the mixdown path.

If your mixes are lacking punch, you're mixing on overly-punchy monitors (like the ones in the walls - which are no longer "flat" because they're mounted in non-factory designed enclosures). If the vocals or middle instruments sound thin in the car, there's probably a "bump" in the midrange in your studio. If the panning seems different or you're just having a hard time "seeing" your exact sound field, there's probably some reflections off the board or other gear that's blurring your monitor imaging. But there's more

http://www.johnvestman.com/studio_monitor_madness.htm

His point about amplifiers is on the money, too.

Power amplifiers, speaker cable and monitor preamplifiers are significant in accurate monitor sound. "But my power amp is flat from 20 to 20K." You have to use your ears when judging a power amp. They're all "flat", but some are dull sounding, some are harsh sounding, some are mushy sounding, some collapse the image, etc.

But then he goes on to say that he prefers HIFI amplifiers to studio amplifers, but he doesn't go into the reasons why. He does say, however, that they need to be the VERY expensive HIFI amps and not ones you buy at Circuit City.

You will find a lot of different responses to this question of using flat response amplifiers vs. HIFI amplifiers and studio monitors vs HIFI speakers. The bottom line is you don't want anything to add or not give you enough of a certain frequency range. You want it flat across all human hearning frequency levels. if you can achieve that with HIFi, then go for it! If youcan't, then you have to compensate with EQ or buy better amp/speakers.

that's my 2cents.

sorry, Al, I posted early, then went back and fixed it.

Which post did I tear someone up? I know i've done it before, but I thought I had been fairly calm lately. if you really wanted to see me yelling at someone for the stuff they post, you should have seen a couple of threads where this one person kept cussing in the forum. And he wouldn't back off. I got a little mad at him those times.

If you're talking about ibanezplayer, I'm not really mad at him. I asked him politely not to use that kind of descriptions. He didn't know before now that it bothered me, so now I've informed him and politely asked him to stop.

no biggie.

Oh, and 100W/channel - isn't wrong....just as long as they made it flat across all frequencies!

Beagster is right on this one (usually is anyway) the biggest issue is that Home stereo speakers are designed to add "color" to a mix either bass of treble, or both depending on the makers view of things, but anyway the point is that monitors are design to give a flat response, i might add not a truley great sounding response, home stereo speakers can sound way better, but the monitors sound like what is in the recording, that way you know if it needs more bass or the piano is too low or whatever. This gives the average mixer a base point or starting point hence the name "reference" monitor. Now having said that you can mix from anything as long as you take several looks at it, meaning listen on several different kinds of systems, like a car , home and portable stereo. listen for what it sounds like overall. Still the best way is to use a solid reference monitor.

This brings us to Tweak's Law, which says, whatever your monitors are good at is exactly what your mix will be bad at.]

This pretty much sums it up, and thanks for the links Beagle. This has come to be an interesting thread, and we all want to put our best foot forward.
I'm looking into monitors, but just as a possible point of interest, this is the response curve on my home stereo speakers.

These are Pioneer HPM-100's, pretty decent in their day, and long out of production.
I have listened to various mixes on car stereos, portable stereos, and other computers. Once you get a feel for how your mix translates, you get a very good idea of what is being emphasized on your own system, and you can adjust for Tweak's Law. It will be interesting to see how monitors affect things.