Re: Laptop live looping

["Ariel Rzezak" <arzezak@gmail.com>]

Hi Rainer.

 

Ok. Presonus Firebox it's an option. I think i've read that it doesn't has balanced outputs? Is this right? I'm listening to your album from that link. Really interesting! Is it recorded "live"?

 

Do you think it will work well using it, for example, making loops with Ableton live or Reaktor or MAX/MSP?

 

Thanks for your reply!

 

On 1/6/08, Rainer Thelonius Balthasar Straschill <rs@moinlabs.de> wrote:

>       I've already bought a macbook and want to work directly from my
guitar to it using an audio interface. The thing is, > there are hundreds of
them and i dont know wich one to choose. Also, money it's a difficulty. Here
the prices are (not >
>only in direct relation with our incomes, also with the taxes) REALLY
higher than in the US or Europe. For example, a >
>MOTU Ultralite it cost in musiciansfriend.com usd 549.99 and in reaches my
country costing usd 950. You se what i'm >
>talking about.

First of all, welcome back, Ariel. Now to your question from above:

From my experience, the small Presonus thingies give you a good bang for the
buck, although some people do prefer M-Audio in this department. For your
application (live guitar playing):

Most of the interfaces (even the small ones) give you two microphone
channels which also double as Hi-Z instrument inputs. Depending on how you
interface to the P.A., you might look for symmetrical outputs.
I personally have been using the Presonus Firebox for some time with success
and have to admit for typical live applications, the sound quality is
sufficient (check out http://blue.jamendo.com/de/album/16603/, an album
which was recorded using that interface exclusively).

That being said, I have a somewhat different approach for connecting a
guitar to a computer. A lot of computers (and especially laptop ones) have
strong EMC issues, so you wouldn't want to have a guitar cable run anywhere
near it. To work around it, I connect a small active DI (Behringer DI20)
directly to the guitar and then enter a (phantom powered) microphone input
on my interface.

Best,

       Rainer