Thinking about upgrading V-Studio 100

V Studio 100 itself is supposed to be decent, but I've never had one myself.  I can't see the Octacapture being any better than the VS-100, but I could be wrong.  I personally would never consider that as an upgrade.

MOTU and RME have excellent converters, hardware and drivers.  I own 2 MOTU Ultralites.  RME is actually a step up from MOTU, IMO.

I don't know anything about Mbox pro and can't recommend it one way or the other.

AT


As Beagle sez, there isn't much difference between cake pres/converters.  There wasn't much between the Vs100 and 700, anyway.  The fader is cool, tho.  And portablity.  But it is good stuff.

If you are looking to spend money to upgrade your sound the best bets (in order) are room treatment, mics, preamps, effects and then convertors.  But the difference isn't going to be as dramatic as the right mic, or a new preamp.  The rode is good, but there is better.  A nice transfomer based preamp can add body to any recording. 

If you don't need more inputs getting a mic and preamp combo would do more for your sound quality than replacing perfectly acceptable convertors.

I have very little understanding of room treatment but I do have a friend who can help me with that.  He told me it would be better to point my speakers going the long way as opposed to the walls that are closer together.

I will also do more research on preamps and mics.   I will gather some cash within the next 21 days and at least upgrade the mic

and then within the next 45 days have a nicer preamp.  Thanks AT for the insight. 

Studio,

yea, just clap your hands in your "room"  and listen to how it sounds.  The reverb, however short, any echoes, flutter or not, and any eq bumps will all imprinted upon anything you mic.  It will also be present during mixing, so that any room eq problems "fixed"  during mixing will be doubled.  So if the room has a hump at a certain frequency, you will eq that out twice (once for the recording, the next during mixing).  When you play the recording back on another system in a differnet room, that frequency will be attenuated.  Same for missing frequencies in your room.

If you've ever moved furniture out of a room you've got a good idea of how to fix this problem.  Fire your monitors down the long side of the room since bass signals are long (organ stops give you a good idea of just how long they are - 32' comes from a pipe 32 feet long).  The long side gives your bass more room to expand before it hits a wall and the parts of the sound that aren't absorbed bounce back into the room.

You can spend as much money as you want room treatment, but w/o going hog the best thing to do is put stuff in it that absorbs some and relfects some back so the room doesn't sound dead or empty.  A couch or bed absorbs - esp. low frequencies.  A bookshelf absorbs (the books) and also refelects back sound from the wood.  Wood is good.  Wood gives a nice warm sound to the room.  Wood floors reflect nicely and you can dampen that with rugs as needed.  Some traps in the corner help even out the bass.  A quilt hung behind a player absorbs the reflections from the back wall and the 1st reflections from the front wall which otherwise would have bounced off the back wall.  It is quite cheap to get an acceptable room tone w/o breaking the bank, as long as the room ain't too small or big.  There are tons of threads in the techniques forum about this.  There are plenty of sites, too.

One thing I will add is take your time adding equipment.  The more you understand the limitations of your stuff and the room, the better decisions you can make on spending money wisely.  If money is no concern, just send your surplus to me.  Buy the most expensive equipment you can afford of a piece - it will last (this applies if you are in for the long term).  I've got a yamaha montitoring system from c. 1980.  Still works like a champ, although the last time it was in shop the tech just shook his head and said he couldn't guarentee something wouldn't blow when I got home.  I couldn't replace it for less than $2000 today.  Good buy.  On the other side of the ledger, I bought an Art MP tube preamp for $50 since I needed another preamp for my old interface.  A starved plate design Beagle warns about.  The preamp was fine - just like the interface preamp.  The "tube" effect was less useful, since cranking it up (it is in the output section, I think) got all fizzy.  It sits in a box for live use if needed, now (it does sound good on bass for a fluffy sound).  It worked for me then, but wasn't a good investment, esp. considering my lack of fund back then.

Looking at your gear I would suggest you look at a new mic first.  Different mics have different strengths. Differnet flavors or sound.  For many instruments a stereo set of small diameter condensors is the trick (both of them or just mono).  And you can get a good drum sound just using those (if the room is good!).  A large diameter condesor (like the rode you have) is generally used on vox and solo stuff.  A ribbon mic can substitute, if you want a "vintage sound."  Less highs, more lows and just right for certain things.  Having a mic locker if you are doing a lot of acoustic recording, even a lower budget locker, will speed up your learning curve on what mic works best, but what technique works - mic distance, angle, placement.  One good mic is better (the Bock 195 comes to mind as a great all arounder) but you can get a lot of good milage out of a couple of decent mics.

Finally, mic preamps.  The best thing about a good preamp (other than bragging rights) is the flexiblity in placement they give you.  Most interface preamps top out at 55-60 dB of gain.  But they get ... iffy at the top gain.  And easily overloaded if the performer hits a louder note.  Something like the ISA One or Warm Audio (both around $400) give 80 db of gain.  Which means you can back off the instrument to find the right place for the mic, getting a nice blend of the instrument and the air around it in the room (that magic word again!).  And they won't crap out when the singer hits that louder note or phrase that is right in the middle of his range.  Once you start mixing, the air helps separate the instrument in the soundfield from everything else.  Suddenly your mix falls into place easy w/o as much work and still sounds better.  This is all rather sublte, but real and cumulative.  5% here, 10% there but suddenly your song sounds like a professional recording, not a bunch of sounds w/ a mic randomly thrown in front of stuff.  Good tools help that process and will help get you there quicker.

have fun and choose wisely.  You'll find a lot of good help on this site, and that everyone has an opinion.  Most are valid.  Take what you can and develop your own opinions about what works for you.

@

Ps - I don't know why the forum software is using the "quote" style on this post.

I would certainly recommend upgrading the Behringer Ultragain.  it's not horrible, but it's not great, either.

Okay.  I have done a little research on mics and I must say I do like the Rode Nt1a;  having said that, I have decided to upgrade to the Rode NTK ($500+ new--  about $350 used) since I am familiar with Rode.  It is about twice as much (new) as the Nt1a, but it has been compared to mics that are twice as much. It supposedly handles male vocals quite well to give that nice rich tone.  And you can also switch patterns to omni or bi-directional. So I will be moving furniture and equipment in the studio this weekend and hopefully I will have the mic.  Then I will be working on the mic pre.  Just putting it out there, the Warm WA12 is something I've been doing a little research on and that looks to be an decent upgrade from what I have.

I've never used the WARM preamp.  But the Rode NTK is very good. 

Reflection filters help keep first reflections from the front wall out of the mic, which is good.  If you hang a quilt (or duvet in SOS speak) behind you that stops a lot of the 1st reflections from the back wall (behind you) from entering the most sensitive area of the mic.  It also will attenuate the 2nd order reflections from the back wall, too.

All this helps get the "room" out of the captured signal, so you can add your own reverb during mixing.  The only thing to be careful of is drying out the signal too much w/o getting rid of the bad parts of your room's tone.  If you back the mic too far into the reflection filter it can sound unnatural and muffled rather than clean.

Thanks for the info.  I have just started moving everything out of my studio to place the speakers toward the long wall.  I shall be finished tonight or tomorrow morning...

It is a long process unless you win the lotto - even then w/ a kid in school you might want to go slow ;-)

If you are doing acoustic stuff a mic is probably the best investment you can make, along w/ basic room stuff.  Pointing the speakers down the length of the room is a good one - as well as some furniture to absorb and reflect the sound.  An IC interface preamp is surprisingly good - not as flexible as a high gain, discrete preamp but certainly good enough in most circumstances.  Of course, as you go along in home recording you'll always think one more piece of hardware will fix whatever problem you are having.

But to put that in perspective I was trying to talk myself out of buying a tube mic for use here at home.  I took my modded Otava LDC to the studio and checked it out w/ my main singer against a Wunder 47 clone.  Sure, there was a difference between the two mics.  Some high end and low and the tube essence for the wunder.  I'd pick the wunder everytime for vox, I think.  But was there $5000+ difference?  Not for home use.  Not even the $1000 it would take to pick up a midrange tube.

But if you interested, B&H photo has the mxl Genesis tube mic for sale for -$500.  Good buy, tho I haven't used it.  The reviews were good, tho, and a great price on a $1000 mic.

@

I've been a VS100 user for years, so I wanted to pass on a couple tips.

As others have mentioned (or hinted at), the VS100 is not your weak link, so upgrading that isn't the way to go at this point (unless of course you need a lot more inputs). Adding quality pre-amps and mics is money better spent, as you have figured out :)

You need to fully understand the VS-100 and how the inputs work to get the most out of it.

• Don't confuse converters with pre-amps. There are 6 converters on a VS-100 (1-6), but there are only 2 preamps (input 1/2).
• Input 1 & 2 are Pre-amps. Don't plug an external pre-amp into these inputs. These inputs will have a different "color" than any other pre-amps you own/buy which is not a bad thing.
• Channel 3 & 4 are +4 inputs (pro level). This is the best place to plug in a pro level external mic pre(s). If your mic pre has selectable output levels, make sure you choose +4. Remember to use TRS (balanced) lines between the mic pre and the VS-100 if you can.
• Channel 5 & 6 are -10 inputs (consumer level). Anything hooked up to these channels should be something with an output of -10. This is the weakest link of the VS-100 having just RCA inputs.
• Channel 7 & 8 are digital inputs. If you have external gear with SPDIF out you could hook it up here. I hook up my POD X3 Live to this input, saving channels 1 - 6 for other things.

 

Thanks for the info.  I have another question for you codamedia.   I have a Yamaha MOX6 workstation.  I tried to record using the 3 and 4 inputs from the MOX6, but I can't seem to get a proper level when I record.  I'm going direct into the VS-100 from the MOX6 and when I record, can't get the levels higher than -20 db, so, when I playback the recording, I can barely hear the sound from the recording...During recording, the monitored sound is loud but the recording is low.  Do you have any thoughts on what the problem is?  Could it be the settings in the VS-100 or something else?