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wowser

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 25, 2004
895
0
Inglaterra, Europa
OK - I am aiming to get a new acoustic guitar (a Tanglewood Baby, should you ask), but one with no pickup / electronics (nor do I want to install them). Previously I recorded with my Strat plugged straight into my eMac's line-in, with pretty OK results. I wonder how i can record an acoustic with it. The eMac's own microphone is too noisy, so I was wondering about an instrument mic like Shure's PG57 ( http://www.shure.com/microphones/models/pg57.asp ) . Could i hook this up straight to the line-in, or will I need some sort of preamp? (the costs rise...) . I was also wondering if I could use Griffin's iMic instead of a preamp. It is all getting very confusing! I am inclined to go down the microphone route, as that way I could also record other live instruments. Sound quality doesn't have to be wonderful, but demo-quality would be nice. Any ideas> :eek:
 

Horrortaxi

macrumors 68020
Jul 6, 2003
2,240
0
Los Angeles
Mic it.

By the way, if you did need a preamp for anything, the iMic would not be a substitute. But any mic you can get that has a 1/8" jack ought to work fine.
 

stevehaslip

macrumors 6502a
Apr 30, 2004
657
0
The Ocean Floor
i know many people on music production degrees and they all mic up their instruments like you are thinking. Its cost effective because you can record many different kinds of instruments all with the same equipment. They mostly use pre amps like the Mbox its not that cheap, but they all swear by it and let me tell you that the results i've heard from it were great.
 

stevehaslip

macrumors 6502a
Apr 30, 2004
657
0
The Ocean Floor
im not sure how well it would work. i've never used something like that before. In principle it should be fine, but don't try without a pre-amp because the signal from the mic will be far too weak to pick up. The only problem that you might have is that if the range of frequencies that it amplifies/picks up is smaller than the range of frequencies that your drum kit (or whatever) produces. You'll probably still get an alright performance but somethings might not sound as perfect as you'd like. But for demo purposes it looks good. (for all i know the pre-amp you linked to might amplify everything it we can hear) have fun!
 
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