Boy do I need your help.  Ive been doing this since Cakewalk was first released all the way up to X2.  And I still have no idea what I am doing.

My issue is basically that my audio recordings of my finished projects sound terrible.  The sound is not near as crisp and clean as when I am creating the project in Sonar, and I am almost certain its either because of my equipment or the way I have things setup.

Here is what I have:

Windows XP PC with 4GB Ram
Mackie 1202VLZPro Mixer
Excho Mia sound card.
SonarX2
Roland XV-88


I think my issue is and has always been using a mixer.  Its just too much for me and I am certain I just never have things plugged in the right way and routed and adjusted correctly etc.


99.9% of my works are instrumental.  I use my Roland XV-88 and a few virtual instruments - usually Real Guitar and Dimension.  I also often use drum loops.

Im wondering how I can simplify - any way for me to make my music without the mixer and just go direct to the Mia card?

Or is there a much simpler mixer I should use in place of the Mackie?

Keep in mind I am mostly recording midi tracks to audio, virtual instruments to audio, and then exporting all 3 audio tracks to an Mp3 or .wav.

The end result never sounds near as good. Always sounds muffled, the mix is way off from what I hear while recording it also. Sort of this phaser kind of sound...



www.myjefe.com

I use a Mackie 1604 in my setup and though I don't have any experience with your particular model, I can't imagine the mixer is really at fault. Do the individual tracks that you record to audio sound as you expect them to when you compare them to the original Midi? If not, then there is something in the way the signal is getting to your DAW that is causing the issue. If they do, then you are likely realizing that simply exporting the tracks to a WAV or MP3 is not real mixing. Any time signals are combined, the character of both signals is changed.

Once you've converted your Midi tracks to audio, you need to mix each track so that the sum sounds the way you expect it to. That also means using compression and EQ when needed. I am by no means an expert, and it has taken me years to get my mixes to where I can at least be comfortable letting others listen to them.

As for the phasey sound, if you only hear that in MP3 versions, try upping the bitrate for the MP3 converter you are using. You shouldn't hear compression artifacts like that at higher bitrates (192 +).

Regards,
Dan

Oh, also, it might help us if you can describe how everything is connected...

Regards,
Dan

Sounds like you are doing something wonky in the mixdown. You're saying it sounds okay when recording/mixing but the final product is screwed up?

Are you trying to mixdown through the mixer (ie: sending your mix through the board and recording the resulting stereo)? I used to try to do that with Nuendo and it definitely caused very bad results. You need to use the Export function in Sonar and make sure you understand what everything in the Export dialog box means.

Seriously what you are hearing in your mix should be what your end results sound like if you are setting up your export/mixdown properly. A little more detail on how you are doing this and letting us know exactly when the sound starts to deteriorate in the process would help. 

If I'm way off base my apologies but the reason I mentioned the mixdown through mixer thing is because of the phasing sound you mentioned. That's what used to happen to me when I tried going through my mixer. I did actually manage to get it under control eventually to get it sounding more normal but it was the COMPLETELY wrong way to approach things and when I just started using the internal mixdown feature in Nuendo everything was all good. 

Cheers.

Dan thank you Sir!! By the way..I LOVE your work!

Okay one thing I'll say after taking a look at the Mia (I was envisioning the Gina which has a couple multi ins) you should really think about getting a more versatile interface. If you are just doing a couple tracks at a time you could get away with spending around $150 and get something decent quality. If you are willing to spend around $250-300 you could get a FastrackPro (M-Audio) or a Scarlett 18i6 (Focusrite... which I own and it's great). Then you'll have some multi ins (XLR with mic pres/phantom power, instrument in and line in) as well as MIDI i/o. With the Scarlett you'd have a bunch of extra analog ins as well as SPDIF and optical connections too. Without something like that I think you are stuck using a mixer with the MIA. Just makes things a lot easier when you can plug straight into the interface.

Just a thought. 

Hey Beepster, I got the impression that he is mixing by exporting the tracks to WAV/MP3. I don't think he is exporting via playback through the mixer. That's just acting like a patchbay, I think.

I could be wrong though, which is why I asked how everything is connected.

Regards,
Dan

Yeah, I was taking a really wild guess there. Pretty much because I did it before with similar results and... well my brain's not 100% there today. I was also gonna mention the export settings more like dithering and what not but couldn't really tell how he was doing stuff from his OP.

Again... I am totally spaced today and quite possibly talking out my bum.

;-)

Basically here's what I do:

Write the tune using a combo of drum loops, virtual instruments, and midi from my XV-88.

Once the tune is complete, I mute any audio tracks and playback the rest thru the mixer to the MIA and record those midi tracks to audio.

Then I get rid of all tracks in the project except for the audio tracks.  I set my levels etc, do any processing, and then export to an mp3 or wav or both.

The end result never sounds clear and crisp as it does when I just play it back thru Sonar.

I do not use a mixer at all. 

My interface is a Focusrite Saffire and has preamps built in so I run everything direct to it.

The entire process here in INSIDE the box.

I have mastering software and everything works and sounds good

You might want to get a new interface and ditch the mixer.... listen to my tunes to see the results I get with this setup