Sound recording/studio software

entropy

My stepdad has these tapes back when he was young and in a band (highschool or so). The problem was - they couldn't afford decent recording equipment. They did it all on a boombox mic, lol. So now he would like to record it to a CD, and possibly play with things to make them sound better (drums too soft or loud, guitar thin, cymbals spilling over into everything). I've got the right soundcard for it (M-Audio, woot, lol), and the tape deck from my component system, but I need to know a few things.

What is the BEST software to do this in? And will I be able to at least make them sound normal, instead of crappy-mic quality?

Thanks guys, I know a lot of you do this, so I'm looking forward to some good solutions

Dexter

The best software would probably be Protools...but it's not cheap. The "Pro" part is for real, it is what professional audio post houses use.

Other than that, there are a few good shareware apps that can do some good audio editing and effects. What you want to do will be very hard, since everything was recorded on the same track, so any effect you do will affect all the instruments. You will have to make multiple copies of the track, do different effects to each layer, and hope it does not sound like shiat...

Sorry if that is not encouraging, but the GIGO principle is going to have a lot of say in this project.

Dexter...

madmat

You might also check into CoolEdit Pro too, iirc anyways, it's supposed to be a pretty killer recording suite.

entropy

I have a few questions, now. I got my turntable hooked up (I'm recording ... records ... to play around with CoolEdit Pro). Now, I figured out the levels thing had to do with how the Recording Levels were amped.

But where should I put it? If I put it too far, CoolEdit goes into the red and just flat out stops. If I leave it down, it's too quiet. Do I need to find a happy medium? And what does "Clip" have to do with anything? Does it say, "Hold on! If you go higher than [whatever], you're gonna lose quality!"? I opened up a regular mp3 in CoolEdit, and the audio leves still went off the top and bottom at points. So what gives? To me it looks like you don't want the levels above or below those white bars (respectively). So why ARE they? Did someone just rip them poorly? Any help would be hugely appreciated

Edit:
Should I just record at whatever default levels it gives me, then amp it via software, instead of the hardware? And what's a good dB level to get at? I take it 0 is the highest you want to be (seems all to common ... look at that first screenshot ... looks like if you go above or near 0 dB, things get poor quality).

Edit 2: I also have Adobe Audition 1.5, which apparently bought, integrated, and upgraded CoolEdit Pro. Should I be using that, instead?

*sigh* Edit 3: Last question. Promise. When I'm recording, is it taking the completely raw data? Or is the card already processing it with its effects (such as X3 Surround, which I have on right now)? If it is, then that means it's adding extra bass and stuff in there, which I don't want on raw recordings.

dancer

Hi, i use audition personly to edit all the audio for our dance studio.

Clipping is like when it gets too loud and starts to get distorted.

Norm when i take it from an external source i don't want it peaking past about -3db.

I then Amp it using the Effects menu, and they come out pretty nice.

This is with an audigy2 zs, so i can't comment on what it'll be like with your card, but i would turn off all of the cards extra settings.

Audition suits my need very well and it has improved from CEP as i used that before Audition.

Hope this helps.

Freemymelody

wow someone read my mind...

entropy

Thanks a ton

I have an M-Audio Revolution 5.1, which more or less, I've heard is extremely good for both playback and recording (though not *spectacular* in games).

Thanks for all the helpful tips!