podcasting mixer [Archive] - Revision3 Forums

kjaf

01-30-2009, 11:47 PM

Hey guys, I am interested in starting a podcast with 4 of my friends and I already have the mics and they are all xlr input type mics. Well I am not to smart on mixers, and I bought one that I wouldn't be able to use on my computer, so I have a question did a little searching and came across this bad boy http://www.cheapbandgear.com/XENYX_1202FX_p/1202fx.htm

and I was wondering would this do what I want it to do. Basically will I be able to use 4 xlr mics, and will it let me record to my pc? Would really appreciate it if anyone knows. Thanks in advance

gta_bmx

01-31-2009, 01:12 AM

Yeah it looks like it should work, great price. You may need to buy $10 or so worth of cables at Radio Hut to run the output of the mixer to your sound card. Audacity is an open-source program you can use to record.

Good luck on the upcoming podcast. What's it going to be about? I understand if you want to keep that info. under wraps though.

gta_bmx

01-31-2009, 01:33 AM

http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/UCA202.aspx

You may need something like this to connect it to the PC, or might be able to go straight into the sound card.

kjaf

01-31-2009, 02:11 AM

thanks alot, yea my podcast is not to original just going to be a roundtable discussion with some of my friends about video games. I use to work at Gamestop and we use to spend like so much time just sitting around talking about different crap and i thought that the world should hear our converstations because they are informative but at the same time pretty funny.

tokenuser

01-31-2009, 04:37 AM

You are on the right track, but the 1202 will need an interface into the computer via a soundcard (or a line in port).

A better option is to spend a little extra and go for the 1204FX. It has USB output, and plugs straight into the computer as a digital interface (no line out as analogue).

I do not have one myself, but seriously looked at them awhile back for a friend. It is an external mixer, but I seem to recall that each input could be read discretely on the PC ... but I might be mixing this one up with another model.

Quick look at the manual (online at the Behringer site (http://www.behringerdownload.de/XENYX_GRP2/XENYX1204FX_ENG_Rev_A.pdf) see page 4) confirms this ... USB is 4 separate channels at 48kMHz.

This will give you a lot more post edit control options to boost a quiet guest/host/mic, or zero out the mic completely.

I want to say it works in Audacity directly, so you can edit the 4 channels in there.

[quote]

gta_bmx

01-31-2009, 05:34 PM

thanks alot, yea my podcast is not too original just going to be a roundtable discussion with some of my friends about video games. I used to work at Gamestop and we used to spend like so much time just sitting around talking about different crap and i thought that the world should hear our conversations because they are informative but at the same time pretty funny.

Sounds neat. Are you guys gonna drink copius amounts of that social lubricant we call beer whilst pod casting? More fun that way. Are y'all gonna focus on a particular platform like the PC or Xbox 360 or Wii or will you be platform independent? Most games are available on most of the systems, so I guess it doesn't matter.

Do you need headphones for everyone? So there won't be any feedback/echo? Because if the speakers are turned on, the mics might pick up the speaker sound and record it again and again. I've never pod casted but one of my friends wants to start one about horror/sci-fi films. I imagine there will be some tweaking and tuning experiments before you guys nail the settings down. And the Behringer has some effects built in to the mixer, so it'll be cool to use some of those in between segments to indicate the start of a new segment.

kjaf

01-31-2009, 06:31 PM

I am not sure if you guys know about that Dazzle video capture card device, I was wondering if i could just substitute that in for http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/UCA202.aspx it has the audio input things and plugs into the usb port on my laptop, ussually its used for video but it looks like I might be able to use it with the mixer to but not sure.

gta_bmx

01-31-2009, 07:49 PM

Isn't that Dazzle device just analog though? RCA/S-video I/O. And also you may have to mess with their Pinnacle software interface and have to make that work with Audacity. But I guess having the Dazzle capture device would allow you to do a video podcast if you wanted to go that route.

That 1204FX like Token said may sound better because it's outputting digital through its USB port instead of analog outputs, but it may not be much of a difference to even matter or worry about. It'd be hard to get an absolutely perfect audio recording anyway, and most people are listening through crappy $7 PC speakers anyway.

http://www.samedaymusic.com/product--BEHPODCASTUSB

This $100 package may be a good route to go with. It comes with the USB interface, plus the mixer (looks somewhat simpler than the 1202 though but should work), and a headphone and a mic. So the price is right, and you'd have some gear leftover for spares.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-01-2009, 05:00 PM

Funny isn't it - after years of getting ripped apart by pro musicians, Behringer finds a ready audience among podcasters and others who've never been near a recording studio. The pros must be chewing on their XLR cables.

Anyway, I'll suggest an alternative:
http://www.alesis.com/multimix8firewire

It's a firewire interface, respectable performance all around, and every channel is routable to the PC separately.

gta_bmx

02-05-2009, 12:18 AM

I bought a pair of SingStar karoake mics for $9 used at EB games today, so my wife can get her karoake fix. They seem to be made pretty well. Just for kicks I plugged one into a USB port on my PC to see if it would work, and it works. The PC recognizes them as USB mics. I downloaded Audacity and within a minute I was recording my voice, and it sounds pretty good actually. I just would need an mp3 encoder, and then I could record a podcast, if I wanted to. It would be a super low budget set-up.

kjaf

02-09-2009, 11:20 PM

sorry for my stupidity but why would you need an output with the mixer, dont you just need to input it to your computer. Sorry like I said I am not experienced with mixers at all

gta_bmx

02-09-2009, 11:48 PM

If it has a USB or Firewire interface for the PC, you're set. Input, output -- that's basically semantics.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-10-2009, 12:02 AM

sorry for my stupidity but why would you need an output with the mixer, dont you just need to input it to your computer. Sorry like I said I am not experienced with mixers at all

Built-in audio on computers is frequently inferior.
An external soundcard is usually a better bet, in terms of fidelity of digital-analog / analog-digital conversion, isolation from interference, etc.

The mixer I linked to passes through each channel strip as separate audio to your PC / recording software. This means you can record all channels simultaneously, then play with them later.

If you had an analog mixer with a stereo mix going to the computer's built-in soundcard, not only would you get lower quality of that stereo mix, you wouldn't be able to do anything with the way it happened to be mixed later.

tokenuser

02-10-2009, 04:15 AM

If you had an analog mixer with a stereo mix going to the computer's built-in soundcard, not only would you get lower quality of that stereo mix, you wouldn't be able to do anything with the way it happened to be mixed later.Thats why I suggested the Behringer 1204FX ... discrete channels you can manipulate on the computer using Audacity or Cakewalk or whatever.

Advantage of the Behringer over the Alesis is that the computer recognises the 1204FX as an external USB sound card device - while the Alesis being firewire needs to be controlled by software on the the computer. Its a minor distinction, but it gives the Behringer a little more flexibility ... and not all computers have firewire/IEE1294.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-10-2009, 11:54 AM

Thats why I suggested the Behringer 1204FX ... discrete channels you can manipulate on the computer using Audacity or Cakewalk or whatever.

Advantage of the Behringer over the Alesis is that the computer recognises the 1204FX as an external USB sound card device - while the Alesis being firewire needs to be controlled by software on the the computer. Its a minor distinction, but it gives the Behringer a little more flexibility ... and not all computers have firewire/IEE1294.

It's not really an advantage in any way. The Xenyx effectively outputs a stereo mix to the PC through USB. All you've effectively done is to tack on is a cheap-but-better-than-onboard-ADC into the mix as opposed to a regular mixer hooked directly up to a PC.

The Alesis outputs discrete channels to the computer via Firewire. If you have four mikes, you'll definitely end up wanting to play with audio separately later on.

Firewire also has more stable audio performance under load, and most computers come with firewire - almost all laptops do (Unless you're Apple) at least, and you can cheaply add one to desktops. So what if you need additional software? If you're RECORDING you are going to be using software which should be aware of this.

Do you have any experience of recording at all, or are you just plucking this stuff from thin air or the 'wisdom' of Google?

tokenuser

02-10-2009, 02:32 PM

It's not really an advantage in any way. The Xenyx effectively outputs a stereo mix to the PC through USB. All you've effectively done is to tack on is a cheap-but-better-than-onboard-ADC into the mix as opposed to a regular mixer hooked directly up to a PC.

The Alesis outputs discrete channels to the computer via Firewire. If you have four mikes, you'll definitely end up wanting to play with audio separately later on.

Firewire also has more stable audio performance under load, and most computers come with firewire - almost all laptops do (Unless you're Apple) at least, and you can cheaply add one to desktops. So what if you need additional software? If you're RECORDING you are going to be using software which should be aware of this.

Do you have any experience of recording at all, or are you just plucking this stuff from thin air or the 'wisdom' of Google?Professional recording experience? None, but I have used the Behringer 1204FX (see my first post on the subject ... Iwas helping a friend with the research they were doing on the mixers). It outputs 4 discrete channels, not a stereo mix over USB - which would be little better than plugging into the "line in" on a computer sound card.

You make a good point about the need for software when using a firewire connected mixer ... that was half assed logic on my part and incorrect. Its the same deal with the USB connected devices - except that the USB devices appear as sound cards, which might give a little more flexibility in software choice later.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-10-2009, 06:36 PM

I have used the Behringer 1204FX (see my first post on the subject ... Iwas helping a friend with the research they were doing on the mixers). It outputs 4 discrete channels, not a stereo mix over USB - which would be little better than plugging into the "line in" on a computer sound card

The 1204FX doesn't ship with the UCA200?

You make a good point about the need for software when using a firewire connected mixer ... that was half assed logic on my part and incorrect. Its the same deal with the USB connected devices - except that the USB devices appear as sound cards, which might give a little more flexibility in software choice later.In what way? Firewire audio interfaces work with Core Audio / Vista Audio / WDM in functionally identical terms to the user as USB interfaces.

tokenuser

02-10-2009, 08:00 PM

The 1204FX doesn't ship with the UCA200?No, the UCA200 comes with the 1204FX. People wire up the outputs differently depending on their needs, but the end result is 4 discrete mono channels over USB to the software on the PC.

I looked at this over 12 months ago, but once Pete got the settings as he wanted them it worked well.

In what way? Firewire audio interfaces work with Core Audio / Vista Audio / WDM in functionally identical terms to the user as USB interfaces.We were using an XP machine at the time. Firewire audio drivers were flaky at best and prone to crashing (lockups). The USB solution just "worked" out of the box better.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-10-2009, 09:37 PM

I think you might be being confused. The UCA200 is a 2 in / 2 out interface, hence my line of posting.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-15-2009, 11:43 AM

gta_bmx

02-15-2009, 03:28 PM

So to recap after the uninformed inaccuracies above...

If you want 'pre-mixed' audio only on your computer, i.e. the aggregation of the 4 mic inputs into a stereo signal that you can't change beyond some limited audio manipulation thereafter, then tokenuser's suggestion of a regular mixer + a USB audio interface would do fine.

However, if you want the ability to record all four mics (and more) separately to the PC as well as the above stereo mix so that you can play with levels, timing, etc later on individual tracks, get the mixer I pointed you to.

I've noticed on some pod casts I listen to that sometimes one person is very loud and others are quiet. Would you need to record all 4 mics separately to the PC to equalize the volume out? Or could you do that to the pre-mixed (4 into 1) audio in Audacity? Probably not.

I think the OP is just looking to get started, so the cheaper alternatives would probably get him started, but you know how gear is. Once you get started, you quickly outgrow your gear and slap it on eBay and then start opening your wallet for better gear.

ArmpitOfDeath

02-16-2009, 01:16 PM

Exactly. And commodity audio gear like low-end mixers depreciate as much as PC stuff does - so it's a good idea to get a baseline idea of what you're going to do and buy for that.

Obviously if you have 4 mikes hooked up to a mixer, it's possible (in fact, a must) to soundcheck so that everyone sounds about the same. But as you said, it's not possible to change this mix afterwards. Recording each channel separately allows you to do whatever you like to it - even e.g. blank out offending words used inappropriately for a specific person, without having to cut out that entire section for everyone.

kjaf

02-18-2009, 04:48 AM

well i got the first mixer that I posted and also got that thing to hook it to my computer, and so far everyone is working as intended. Only problem I am facing at the moment is I am getting an echo sound when talking. I have moved rooms twice but still face the same issue, any ideas on how to remove the echo and what could be causing the problem.

Thanks for all the help guys.