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#1715097 - 02/06/21 09:19 PM What is your choice for mastering CD's?
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
When mixing down to a 2 track stereo master, what is your preference for doing so? Do you try to stay in the digital realm..ie digital tape, CD burner or computer based mastering program? I am asking this question on behalf of my grandson who is using the VS-840 and wants to move on to mastering. He is obviously limited on funds so go easy on him. Thanks for your help!
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#1715264 - 02/07/21 11:41 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
dkfackler Offline
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#1715528 - 02/09/21 05:34 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: dkfackler]
DCore Offline
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Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
In the past I have used the Phillips CDR-775 and the optical output from the VS-840. I have an opportunity to pick up an Alesis Masterlink 9600 for about the same as the used price of a Phillips CDR-775...is the Masterlink a better option than the Phillips?
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#1715532 - 02/09/21 05:51 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
uptildawn Offline
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That depends on whether or not you will miss the dual cd changer and the associated functionality of the 775, or whether you think you will take advantage of the advanced feature set the 9600 offers for recording, storing, mixing, applying dynamics effects for mastering purposes, etc.

They are two completely different beasts that happen to be capable of accepting a digital input source from you VS, played through in real time, while recording the source to CD-R/RW (and/or to hard disk in the case of the 9600).
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#1715738 - 02/10/21 05:28 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: uptildawn]
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
Could you recommend a relatively inexpensive audio interface to accept the VS840's SPDIF coax or TosLink output and connect to a laptop running Windows 10 via USB? I am still seeking options for my grandson to master his 840 songs and burn them to CD. I figure if he can keep the songs in digital form, he can use Audacity to polish them up and burn them on the family's desktop PC or laptop. If I am not using the correct terminology, please feel free to enlighten me or correct my thinking. I obviously have a lot to learn about these things.
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#1715749 - 02/10/21 06:23 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
uptildawn Offline
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I think that in all honesty you would do yourself an injustice if you did not include midi in and out in your searches. At some point your grandson is bound to find the urge to transfer individual tracks from the VS and not just 2-track mixes - at least in my opinion, having gone this route before. So I would suggest you search for midi options as well as spdif. Midi in and out might be more important than just midi in - although spdif in is obviously more crucial for this purpose than both spdif in and out. In fact, you could get away in most cases with just toslink/optical spdif, or coaxial/rca spdif, if necessary, since the VS has both - it depends on what other digital needs he may have.

Just did a quick search of Sweetwater for usb audio interface with spdif and midi (had to tick multiple boxes to get midi and spdif options) and came up with a fairly large assortment of options. https://www.sweetwater.com/c695--USB_Aud...29tcGFyZSI6W119

You could play around with the filter options and just search for spdif options and maybe come up with more low cost units to compare.

I did find this Zoom for less than 200.00 - https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/U44--zoom-u-44-handy-audio-interface
It has both in/out spdif and midi. I don't know if it's usb 1 or 2, but it's not usb 3, if that might make a difference to your grandson. I don't see it being important for this purpose. It's also very portable looking, which could be a great advantage, right? Zoom has a good track record and I have never had issue connecting my own Zoom H-6 recorder to a pc via usb.

I searched Sweetwater because it's the simplest way to find all similar currently available brands and models in one place. But you might find an ebay, reverb, or even google/bing/etc. search helpful - I would find the general search engines most helpful once I had an idea of what I was looking for. You might also want to do a youtube review search or two - especially once you have an option or two you might want to compare. Most of the youtube content providers do a good job reviewing and pointing out both pros and cons.

I hope this helps.
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#1716309 - 02/12/21 06:45 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: uptildawn]
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
Would you suppose that a Focusrite Saffire Pro 24 interface would serve him well? I have an opportunity to buy one locally. It has coax SPDIF and optical input as well as midi in and out and microphone/instrument inputs. It uses a Firewire output connection to a PC. Am I needlessly complicating my search by considering Firewire instead of USB? Am I gonna find myself in driver-search limbo looking for the right software to make this device usable? Thanks again for your advice!
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#1716340 - 02/12/21 07:45 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
uptildawn Offline
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Registered: 12/15/01
Posts: 9118
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Sorry to say that firewire has become obsolete and can hardly be found on computers today without the addition of adapters. If you have firewire already on your computer, then yeah, maybe it's okay. But firewire driver files reliability has been an issue for many people throughout its use for audio interfaces... losing contact with the interface and having to reboot to re-establish it is a big issue.

It really depends on whether or not you already have firewire ports on the computer and whether or not you are savvy with the tech and troubleshooting issues, should they arise.
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#1716345 - 02/12/21 07:58 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: uptildawn]
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
In doing some research about audio interfaces, I came across discussions about these same issues. I don't mind using older tech (obviously, since I am using the VS-840!) but I do not want to spin my wheels trying to get and keep a system functional. This particular interface seemed to offer all the digital ins that I need (ie coax, optical and midi) for the VS-840. Oh well, I'll keep looking!
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#1716459 - 02/13/21 02:37 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
I decided to go with an older Roland interface to transfer the output of a VS-840 to PC. I chose a used Roland UA-30. It has coax Spdif, TosLink optical and analog inputs with USB and analog outputs. I think this might serve as a starter interface while I continue research into more modern, fully featured interfaces with midi inputs and outputs. Once the 2 channel, stereo mix has been transferred into the PC, my grandson can tweak the mix, eq and burn it to CD using the family desktop PC. Being that he is just beginning to record, mix and burn his own music I hope this will serve him well. We shall see...
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#1716484 - 02/13/21 04:25 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
uptildawn Offline
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Registered: 12/15/01
Posts: 9118
Loc: on land
Seems like it might be okay for your basic transfer needs.
The one area that could be buggy with that unit might be the usb drivers. It seems, from comments I found online, that there were compatibility issues with the usb drivers, especially on a pc (as opposed to a mac).

Hopefully, you won't have any issues at all. It's possible that your computer will just install driver files that work fine as soon as you plug the unit into the usb port. But if not, then you will need to find and install driver files for it, since the original files were for windows 98 (not even 98se).


Edited by uptildawn (02/13/21 04:26 PM)
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#1717086 - 02/17/21 03:00 AM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: uptildawn]
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
The Roland UA-30 interface showed up today. I plugged it into the USB port and Windows 10 automatically downloaded the correct driver. I am printing and reading the manual to hook it up and test all the inputs and outputs. It received and output the coax digital signal from the 840. I will mess around with it for awhile then turn it over to my grandson. He can use the family PC to burn CDs if all checks out ok. I will keep you advised.
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#1717279 - 02/17/21 11:19 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
DCore Offline
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Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
After trying repeatedly to use the Roland bundled software to transfer my VS840 songs, I finally gave up and downloaded Audacity and had it up and running in no time. Granted, the interface lacks midi and that means I am limited to stereo 2 track mixes or mono. But, for now it is an economical way for my grandson to transfer his mixes out of the 840 and into the family PC where he can easily burn CDs. When he gets to the stage of wanting to massage all the waveforms and employ all the tricks, I will advise him to save his birthday money and get a better interface.
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#1717317 - 02/18/21 02:13 AM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: DCore]
jimmyrock Offline
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Registered: 12/18/05
Posts: 10862
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I used to record on the 840 to the cf card and then use the br8convertr tool to dconvert all the individual tracks to wavs into the PC running Reaper as the DAW...not sure if that tool works for win 7/10...
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#1720581 - 03/10/21 11:37 PM Re: What is your choice for mastering CD's? [Re: jimmyrock]
DCore Offline
Planeteer


Registered: 03/02/20
Posts: 65
Loc: Washington State
So, to update this topic, I have used this interface and had to up my PC game to solve some problems. It is particular about the USB port it is connected to. I have tried it with Toslink cable and with Coax SPDIF. The 840 has both connections. The biggest problem was getting Audacity to accept both channels of a stereo mix. My early mixes were mono and I could not understand why. I had to go to the Sound settings in the computer and change the connection from 1 channel 16 bit to 2 channels/16 bit CD quality. After changing that setting, using Audacity was fairly easy. My Grandson has used a UA-30 interface and he is also up and running. They lack balanced inputs for microphones but they have both types of digital inputs as well as analog audio. I think this interface will serve us as a beginner's level tool to help us get our mixes into a computer, edit them and burn them to CD.
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