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Gear / Technical Help => Ask The Tapers => Topic started by: jmz93 on June 21, 2008, 02:48:23 PM
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Ever capture world-class jazz, up close, with great gear, in the sweet spot, and have it come out as crap? Well, I did last night. Before I delete the results forever, can anybody explain what might have happened?
First, here's a 24 bit/48K flac sample, about 47 seconds:
http://www.sendspace.com/pro/dl/nq0emw
As you can hear, the quietest sounds are fine - i.e. Jake introducing the tune. However, louder sounds in the music are garbled, distorted somehow...
Looking at it in Sound Forge, the average loudness is at least -31DB and the loudest peak on the left is -10DB, well below 0DB where clipping should occur!
Equipment used was:
DPA 4061 microphones > Church Audio ST9100 preamp > Nicks silver cable with neutric connectors > Edirol R-09 line in at level 8.
The only thing I could think of is a low battery in the preamp, but I had stuck a fresh Duracell alkaline 9v in there before the show! R9 itself had freshly charged 2700MA AA's in it, which had lots of time left after the show.
So any idea what happened here?
thanks
Chris
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How did the mics work in previous tapings? If they worked fine previously I would guess it is the pre-amp, but you said the battery was fresh and that the battery was fresh in the recorder. Try them again, at home, recording something and see how they do.
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mic in or line in?
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Equipment used was:
DPA 4061 microphones > Church Audio ST9100 preamp > Nicks silver cable with neutric connectors > Edirol R-09 line in at level 8.
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I've taped much louder things with the same mics and same settings in the past. and, I was running line in.
The only thing different was the Nickspicks cable. But how would a cable introduce distortion like that? We're talking a simple 3' long 1/8" male to 1/8" male cable here... I would expect that cable failure would be dropouts or no signal on one or both channels, not weird distortion.
Anyway, goes to show you have to run tests before leaving the house - I just figured that a $30 hand-made cable wouldn't be a problem.
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and, I did plug in the cable before leaving home, varifying through earbuds that there was signal getting from mics to preamp to the recorder. But, i guess because I just hit rec/pause and heard background ambiance, I figured things were ok. If I had made a loud noise perhaps I would have caused things to go weird, like they did once I was at the venue.
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and, I did plug in the cable before leaving home, varifying through earbuds that there was signal getting from mics to preamp to the recorder. But, i guess because I just hit rec/pause and heard background ambiance, I figured things were ok. If I had made a loud noise perhaps I would have caused things to go weird, like they did once I was at the venue.
Im curious as well if you have tried again, can you crank the stereo at home with this setup and get similar results?
If not, then I wonder if there wasn't a setting that was accidently set (like mic-in over line-in).
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Ever capture world-class jazz, up close, with great gear, in the sweet spot, and have it come out as crap? Well, I did last night. Before I delete the results forever, can anybody explain what might have happened?
First, here's a 24 bit/48K flac sample, about 47 seconds:
http://www.sendspace.com/pro/dl/nq0emw
As you can hear, the quietest sounds are fine - i.e. Jake introducing the tune. However, louder sounds in the music are garbled, distorted somehow...
Looking at it in Sound Forge, the average loudness is at least -31DB and the loudest peak on the left is -10DB, well below 0DB where clipping should occur!
Equipment used was:
DPA 4061 microphones > Church Audio ST9100 preamp > Nicks silver cable with neutric connectors > Edirol R-09 line in at level 8.
The only thing I could think of is a low battery in the preamp, but I had stuck a fresh Duracell alkaline 9v in there before the show! R9 itself had freshly charged 2700MA AA's in it, which had lots of time left after the show.
So any idea what happened here?
thanks
Chris
+T for your troubles.
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Based on purely anecdotal experience, I'm guessing insufficient power to the mics due to dead batteries. Back when I used AA and especially 9v batteries, I experienced more than my share of absolutely new, off-the-shelf, brand name batteries that simply came out of the box in bad shape - i.e., not providing the expected and required power. YMMV.
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The only thing I could think of is a low battery in the preamp, but I had stuck a fresh Duracell alkaline 9v in there before the show!
Based on purely anecdotal experience, I'm guessing insufficient power to the mics due to dead batteries. [...] I experienced more than my share of absolutely new, off-the-shelf, brand name batteries that simply came out of the box in bad shape - i.e., not providing the expected and required power.
I was having similar problems with bad 9V's and posted a similar question to the one asked in this thread. I was advised to switch to Lithium, "Ultralife" brand batteries (available at Radio Shack). Haven't had the problem since. PLUS I can generally pull a few shows out of the Ultralife batteries before I get too nervous and toss them (which is important since they're about $10ea.).
If your cable is good (which it sounds like it would be, seeing as the issue only presented itself during the louder parts of the performance), I'd agree with Brian's observation and encourage you to check out the Ultralife batteries. They really saved the day for me, I'll never go back!
Best of luck, +T for the hardship
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I myself have been using the Walgreens Ultra Alkaline 9V and AA cells for about 8 years and have not found more than a couple bad cells in that time. Years ago I was told that they were "house branded" duracells, but I can't verify that. I do know that I power up my preamp as soon as I install each new set to make sure it comes on with a green (power) light before I assume that they will run for a set of music. You could use a cheap voltmeter to check the level of each one before installing it, if you're really wanting to be careful.
I know the Lithium cells run a lot longer, but they are WAY more costly, and I'm betting that you could get a bad one of those out of the package once every blue moon too. . .
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I feel your pain bro! illconditioned gave me a new hat with Sennheiser KE4-211-2's in it and I ran it into my MD at Mic In as opposed to Line In...Bocce (www.myspace.com/thebocce) sounded like crap on that tape! Mainly distortion even with the gain low and their music is basically loud as hell electronica with a drum kit. I think the KE4's were way too hot for the MD's mic pre to handle. I've learned my lesson and now I go exclusively on Line In when using the KE4's.