So, since the last report I haven’t had a whole lot of free time. There have been shorts bursts of energy here and there, but nothing worth reporting at the time, I felt…
Now I have all the improvements in place (there are more coming, but they will all just add to this system) –
The Trident Mixer that I used to use for monitoring keyboards, etc, and parallel monitoring the tracks being recorded is in the shop… if it is fixed and functional again, my son William will use it for his music. I needed something smaller. After much Googling I found a Tascam LM-8ST. It is a one rackspace unit with 8 stereo inputs and two stereo buss outputs (both of which can be switched to mono). All my (non virtual) stuff is now connected it this. Bus 1 goes to the streeo to monitor, bus 2 goes to the new patchbay to go wherever…
The new patchbay is a Samson S-Patch Plus. It is sturdy and well designed. The Neutrik one I had before was rubbish. I had to throw it out!
Inputs and outputs to the computer (via the Apogee Ensemble) are connected to the patchbay, as are all the effects units. The patchbay also connects back to the Tascam (input 8) so that one can send a keyboard signal to the patchbay, route it through distortion and echo (or anything) and then monitor the effected signal. I am pretty pleased with myself having figured out this simple, elegant and compact system…
So what we have right now is –
Going to the Tascam –
1 – Kurzweil PC2R
2 – MiniMoog
3 – Elekron Machinedrum
4 – Dave Smith PolyEvolver
5 – Nord Lead (when Will isn’t using it)
6 – NEW Access Virus Ti Snow
7 – NEW Dave Smith Prophet ’08
8 – return from the patchbay
Ins and Outs of the patchbay –
1..8 Ensemble
9 – Kurzweil Echoplex
10 – Roland SED-100 Echo
11, 12 – Lexicon MPX 1 (stereo set up)
13 – Lexicon MPX 1 (mono)
14, 15 – Aardscape True Analogue (tape saturation emulation)
16, 17 – FMR Really Nice Compressor
18, 19 > Tascam channel 8
20 – Sansamp PSA-1 preamp
21 – Voodoolab guitar preamp
22, 23, 24 – waiting
Arriving any day now is an Electro Harmonix 2880 looper – http://www.ehx.com/products/2880. I’ll make a whole new post on this.
The last thing I want to add to the setup is a Moog Guitar, with midi. http://www.moogmusic.com/products/moog-guitars/moog-guitar-model-e1-red But it is expensive…
Here’s what the setup looks like now – http://gallery.me.com/lloydcole/100054