Guitar 1/4" to 1/8" into mac audio-in?

[stevietheb]

Is anyone doing this? Is the signal weak? Latency issues?

I'm trying to find the cheapest way to get the guitar in the machine.

thanks!

[tjwett]

a few things to consider. your guitar is a 1/4" MONO out, your Mac is an 1/8" STEREO in. your sound is gonna be coming in only on one side into GB. i suggest you pickup a splitter cable, or ideally, a little mixer. a preamp wouldn't hurt either, unless your guitar has active pickups. you should take a trip to the local music store and tell them what you're looking to do.

[crazytom]

Originally posted by stevietheb
Is anyone doing this? Is the signal weak? Latency issues?

I'm trying to find the cheapest way to get the guitar in the machine.

thanks!

Using a 1/4" to 1/8" adapter, the signal is weak, but not completely unuseable.

To get decent quality, you'll want some kind of pre-amp (Radio Shack should have a cheap, small mixer). Also, you'll want a long guitar cord if you have a CRT monitor. Having humbucking pickups help, but they aren't 100% in noise rejection.

And, no, there's no latency issues.

[Crazy Canuck]

Thats what I'm doing, 1/4" to 1/8", no problems here. I'm using a 1/4" mono to 1/8" mono adapter, and it seams to be fine. If you can find one, a mono to stereo would be ideal.

I'm also using my mic the same way, but include an xlr to 1/4" as well.

Good luck.

[stevietheb]

I think that's what I'll do--try the radioshack solution and see if that fits my needs. If it doesn't, then move up to a preamp with some nice connections and controls, or a cheapo mixer.

Thanks

[cyberonyx]

what about a bluetooth plug? does one exist? i love my bluetooth mouse, keyboard, headset, phone etc. a guitar plug would be so cool to just strut around while garageband does its amp stuff and whatever else.

[kettle]

Originally posted by crazytom
Also, you'll want a long guitar cord if you have a CRT monitor. Having humbucking pickups help, but they aren't 100% in noise rejection.

You could experiment with the angle of the guitar to the monitors, I can usually find a sweet spot where the rfresh rate noise nearly dies off completely.

[stevietheb]

hahahhahahahaha...I'll have to look into that! I can throw some headphones, and strut all over my apartment doing my best impressions of Eddie Van Halen, Keith Richards, Pete Townshend et al. hahhahaha

[MattG]

I got the little Radioshack adapter. It works ok--you could get pretty acceptable results using this. I also tried putting some effects pedals in between the guitar and the computer--my Ibanez Tube Screamer made for a pretty good sound.

[jpmack]

I got a Radio Shack adapter that has a 1/4" mono plug for my guitar and a 1/8" stereo jack, and bought a 16' shielded cable with 1/8" stereo plugs on each end. That way I don't have a heavy guitar cord to drag around and plug into the rather fragile jack on my PB. All for under $15, and it works great.

Plug in headphones, launch the freeware app LineIn, and my PB is now my practice amp as well!

Here's the adapter:
Inline Stereo Adapter (http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&category%5Fname=CTLG%5F007%5F002%5F001%5F001&product%5Fid=274%2D348)