On 7/3/2019 12:37 PM, Bob Simon wrote:
I am getting ready to buy my first audio interface. With no digital recording experience, I need some advice on monitoring overdubs.
Do you have any experience recording, particularly with a computer, and
doing overdubs? You have a good reason to be concerned, but it's good to
know how much you already know.
I had been looking at the Focusrite Clarett 2Pre Thunderbolt audio interface (connected to my HP Spectre x360 with Thunderbolt 3) because it has especially low latency in hopes that I would be able to monitor my live overdub tracks via the DAW. However, Focusrite Tech Support suggested I get the USB version of the Clarett instead because there are problems with the Thunderbolt implementation on some Windows machines.
Thunderbolt on PCs is really rare. I can't offer you any personal
experience because it's so rare that I don't have one myself. I wish it
had been better adopted and was as mature as it is on the Macs (though
Apple is starting to drop it them selves) but I'd consider the
alternatives. I just got a press release yesterday for the 3rd
generation Focusrite Scarlett USB interfaces that have upgraded preamps
and lower latency with USB than previous versions. The Scarlett's no
slouch. I have a review of the first edition on my web site, and I can
tell you that, using its built-in DSP monitor mixer, I measured less
than 1 ms of latency from mic input to headphone output, and that's
certainly good enough to work with, even for recording vocals.
Potential Thunderbolt issues caused me re-consider my whole approach. Do you find that it's simply not practical to monitor live overdubs through the DAW due to delay introduced by the computer?
With an interface that has a built-in monitor mixer, when you set it up
correctly, the input source gets split in two directions inside the
Scarlett box. One goes to the computer for recording and the DAW
software compensates for the time delay in that route so your overdubs
come out in the right place in the project. For monitoring the input,
the signal never leaves the box, but gets sent straight out to the
monitor mix with just the delay time through the mixer, which is really
quick since all the arithmetic is done in dedicated hardware.
I imagine it would be way simpler to set up the interface routing once and forget about it but perhaps adjusting that is a necessary part of recording in a home studio. If so, then maybe spending double for the Clarett isn't justified since I'll need to manage latency through the interface routing anyway.
The way it works, you set up a monitor mix in your DAW for all the
tracks that you've previously recorded (or at least the ones you want to
include in your monitor mix for overdubbing), and that appears as a
stereo channel in the interface's mixer. That's what gets mixed with the
input source(s) when you're doing your overdubs. Since most DAW mixers
default to input monitoring when recording - where the track you're
recording gets thrown into the mix of all the other tracks - you'll need
to be sure to mute that track in the DAW mix so you don't hear it twice.
DAWs aren't smart enough to do that for you so it's just something
you'll need to remember. Otherwise, the concept works remarkably well.
And because you don't need "zero latency monitoring" within the
computer, you can set up an ample size buffer (the DAW will recognize
that and deal with it) so that you won't have any trouble with recording.
If that's true, then the Scarlett 4i4 would work fine and provides two additional preamps. Or since I plan on initially using the free version of Studio One, maybe it would be better to get the PreSonus Studio 26c or 68c, which are only $200 and $300 respectively and come with Artist.
PreSonus interfaces are pretty good, but if you're concerned about the
quality of the mic preamps, which I suspect you are since you were
considering the Clarett, I'd lean toward the Focusrite.
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