Essentially, the mic signal goes through the mixer channel, via the pre-fade send and out of the pre-fade send jack without interacting with anything else the mixer may be doing, almost as though it were going through a separate piece of hardware. This is normally used to set up monitor mixes, but in the smaller studio it can be fed directly into the soundcard input as a means of routing the mic signal separately.
On a standard mixer with no multiple busses or other fancy routing options, the easiest way to use a mic channel for feeding a soundcard is to turn its fader fully down and then use the pre-fade send control to send the mic signal to the mixer's pre-fade output jack. In many home studios, vocal and instrumental parts are overdubbed one at a time, so a single input is often sufficient. Provided that you have one spare mixer channel with a mic input, you can use it to feed a signal into the computer for recording, thereby saving the expense of a dedicated voice channel or stand-alone mic preamp.
The MIDI tracks may or may not have effects available to them depending on the design and type of soundcard you're using. Because of this limitation, your computer audio tracks need to be treated using plug-in effects and processors before they are sent out to the mixer. However, what you have to bear in mind when using a soundcard with stereo outs is that all the computer audio tracks (and maybe some MIDI parts too if you're using your soundcard's synth chip) emerge ready mixed, so there's no way to add hardware effects to some tracks of your computer audio mix and not to others. If you're new to recording, you can simply plug your mixer outputs into any spare Aux, CD or Tuner inputs on the back of your hi-fi amp.Ī conventional hardware effects box can be used via the post-fade aux sends and aux returns of the mixer and this allows you to add different amounts of effect to each sound being mixed. The system shown here uses a conventional hi-fi amp and speakers as a monitoring system, and this also has the advantage that the signal routing to and from the stereo recorder is handled by the amplifier. A computer audio system with a two-in, two-out audio interface.The mixer output carries a stereo analogue mix of your music that can be recorded to any mastering machine of your choice or even back to a new audio file via the stereo inputs of your audio interface/soundcard. Because systems have a habit of growing, try to get a mixer with a few more channels than you currently need.įigure 1.
The number of inputs required depends on how much hardware you want to plug into them, but you don't need mic inputs on every channel. Small desktop mixers are no longer high-cost items, and even a modest mixer provides a convenient means to combine the outputs from your soundcard and the outputs from your external MIDI sound sources. A Simple Monitoring Setupįor users with a simple stereo-in, stereo-out audio interface, the solution shown in Figure 1 is both simple and affordable. What may be less easy to sort out is the best way to integrate external MIDI instruments and effects boxes into the system. This important subject area was covered in detail in SOS April 2002, although the use of a mixer in this capacity is also covered briefly here.
For example, you may wish to use a high-quality signal from a capacitor microphone rather than relying on your soundcard's mic/line inputs and bundled plastic microphone, which means either using a separate recording channel or mixer.
#External audio mixer for pc how to#
Here's how to hook it all together for maximum flexibility.Īlthough it is possible to compose and mix music entirely on a computer, most practical music recording systems include some external hardware elements, which is where life can get confusing. You can achieve a lot with just a computer and a soundcard, but when you want to accommodate external sound sources or record with high-quality microphones then you really need to add a hardware mixer to your setup.
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