Recording setup for 2 condenser Mics + Notebook

[borstolone]

Hi,
as I am a cello player from Germany, I want to record rehersals and concerts of my string quartett with my two professional condenser mics (XLR) with phantom electricity (sorry am no english native speaker).
I have a W500 Notebook of Lenovo with 8 GB RAM, running Ubuntu 12.4 Precise Pangolin which works verry well. HDD is 360 Gig, should be big enough.

Now my Questions:

1.) As I understood, I need a 2-Chanel Sound-Interface, which runs on Linux out of the box.
The possibilities I found, were:
Tascam US-122 Mk2
M-Audio Mobile Pre Mk II
Alesis IO

Which would be your recommendations?
If you have other suggestions don't hesitate to mention them.

2.) I am not keen in changing my Ubuntu 12.04 to Ubuntu Studio, because I am runnnig other nonmusical programms on this machine.
What is the recording software you suggest me to use for this job?

Thanks, Jakob

[eikakot]

Are you sure tascam us-122mk2 runs on Linux out of the box? The last time I checked it wasn't working at all on Linux. So, if you know someone who has it working, could you please share some information? It would be interesting to know more about that interface

[borstolone]

Hi eikakot,

no, you are right, tascam us-122mk2 is not supported.
Thanks for your question. I am a newbee in this business.
Jakob

[matlo]

Hi,

I use LexiconPro Omega 8x4x2 for (live)recording. (The choir in which I sing.)

My Laptop: AsysEEE 900A with xubuntu.

Some Alesis and the M-Audio is running out off the box.

[borstolone]

HI,
I just bought a used cheap alesis io2 card at ebay. I think it's a good idea to set up an environment to learn and to determine, what I really need.

Jakob

[varpa]

For your application you might consider using a portable recorder like the Zoom H4 (many other brands available). These recorders typically have fairly good built-in Mics, and some have XLR connectors + phantom power to connect external mics. The advantage is simplicity - set the thing on a stand and hit record - no messing with software, worrying about crashes, disk space, xruns. Afterwards you can copy the files to your computer and edit as desired. Also, most of these devices will function as a USB audio interface to a computer. I have a Zoom H4 and even its built-in mics make quite good recordings.

Also, concerning Ubuntu regular vs Ubuntu Studio - my opinion, not universally shared, is that it is easier to use an "audio distro" for general desktop use, than a general distro for (professional) audio use. Optimizing for audio involves some low-level tweaking of the system and some expert knowledge. Installing extra desktop applications to an audio distro is trivial - just install what you want with the software manager. It is unlikely that a desktop application will have any effect on audio. Also, with Ubuntu you can get a lot of audio applications using the kxstudio repositories.

[Pablo]

To turn plain ubuntu into a recording studio, there is an essential tweak. The user must have realtime and memlock privileges. This means you have to answer YES when prompted for jackd2 configuration when you install ardour (my recommendation, see below). If you already answered NO, you can go back to this configuration by typing in a terminal:

Code: Select all

sudo dpkg-reconfigure -p high jackd2

Again, you need YES.

However, this is not enough. Now, your username must be in the audio group. For this you have to do:

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sudo adduser your_username audio

The next time you reboot, your user will have said privileges which you can check via:

Code: Select all

ulimit -r -l

What is the recording software you suggest me to use for this job?

ardour

[matlo]

Whatever "recording" means.

I stop pulseaudio and start audacity. Turn off Wi-Fi and all other unnecessary things (screensaver). On Audacity I have set the buffer relatively large. For a live recording that is quite sufficient.

OK for what's complicated is jackd, real-time, ardor and co. the better solution but with the delay compensation in Audacity also overdubs are possible.

So long.