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I've used to recording in Garageband and Adobe Audition, so this will be my first crack at recording on a analog 4-track. I've got the recorder, got a mic and cables, got some tapes, but now what??

Do I need to purchase a mixer to do a final mix down to a computer via USB?

Anyone got some tips on recording with a 4-track?

i just use an RCA > 3.5mm lead thing straight out my tascam 4 track into my PCs line in. it'd probably be better going through an interface but it seems to work fine.

Right on, not sure if my macbook has rca's...never looked.

it won't but it'll have a small headphone jack input (3.5mm as reece said). you'll need one of these:

stewart wrote:it won't but it'll have a small headphone jack input (3.5mm as reece said). you'll need one of these

Will this be as good as an interface, or is there really any difference?

Chicago Mike wrote:

stewart wrote:it won't but it'll have a small headphone jack input (3.5mm as reece said). you'll need one of these

Will this be as good as an interface, or is there really any difference?

I'm not entirely sure about headroom, but it will certainly work with the stereo RCA-to-stereo 3.5mm cable. You'll still need to obviously capture the audio into GarageBand or Audition (or Audacity, or whatever), but it's worth giving the cable a shot before laying out some dough for an interface.

I've actually gone down a similar road recently, pulling out my old Fostex 4-track. It's so much easier for me to sit down and press record on a tape machine versus taking the MBP to the desk, plugging in the interface, setting twenty different gain levels to prevent clipping at several stages, oh hey what's this going on here on the internet I should probably check this out, I could probably whack it real quick, ahhhh, what was I doing again, screw it I'm hungry.

avj wrote:

Chicago Mike wrote:

stewart wrote:it won't but it'll have a small headphone jack input (3.5mm as reece said). you'll need one of these

Will this be as good as an interface, or is there really any difference?

I'm not entirely sure about headroom, but it will certainly work with the stereo RCA-to-stereo 3.5mm cable. You'll still need to obviously capture the audio into GarageBand or Audition (or Audacity, or whatever), but it's worth giving the cable a shot before laying out some dough for an interface.

I've actually gone down a similar road recently, pulling out my old Fostex 4-track. It's so much easier for me to sit down and press record on a tape machine versus taking the MBP to the desk, plugging in the interface, setting twenty different gain levels to prevent clipping at several stages, oh hey what's this going on here on the internet I should probably check this out, I could probably whack it real quick, ahhhh, what was I doing again, screw it I'm hungry.

Yah, I want to take a different approach at recording and thought it'd be good to do some garage reocording. All my shit's at the practice space so this is cool b/c I can just strip it down to simple song ideas. Get's out of hand sometimes with everything at my fingertips.

Chicago Mike wrote:

avj wrote:

Chicago Mike wrote: Will this be as good as an interface, or is there really any difference?

I'm not entirely sure about headroom, but it will certainly work with the stereo RCA-to-stereo 3.5mm cable. You'll still need to obviously capture the audio into GarageBand or Audition (or Audacity, or whatever), but it's worth giving the cable a shot before laying out some dough for an interface.

I've actually gone down a similar road recently, pulling out my old Fostex 4-track. It's so much easier for me to sit down and press record on a tape machine versus taking the MBP to the desk, plugging in the interface, setting twenty different gain levels to prevent clipping at several stages, oh hey what's this going on here on the internet I should probably check this out, I could probably whack it real quick, ahhhh, what was I doing again, screw it I'm hungry.

Yah, I want to take a different approach at recording and thought it'd be good to do some garage reocording. All my shit's at the practice space so this is cool b/c I can just strip it down to simple song ideas. Get's out of hand sometimes with everything at my fingertips.

I didn't want to totally jack the thread here, so I made a new post here that relates to minimalistic setups and recording. I think you'll enjoy the interview; it was a real inspiration to me.

the ole tascam approach--- never hurts