We are podcasting our show in Estonia and we bought Soundcraft Notepad-12FX to help it out, but it seems that even if it has 4 XLR input, it doesn’t record all 4 microphones separately?
I would like to record in Audacity, and most of the time we use all 4 microphones, as we have 3 show hosts and one quest, sometimes there will be three persons. But in Audacity, only way I can record, is if I choose Mic/Line In 01/02 or Mic/Line In 03/04, but I can’t choose both of them? Is it because with that Notepad, we can only record 2 channels? Or is it possible to get all 4?
What my settings should be, to get 3-4 microphones recording for the show?
I have looked all over the internet, and haven’t found any manuals for this, yet. Maybe someone can help me please? I would be super thankful for this!
Audacity can only record from one “device” at a time, so it is limited to recording the number of channels available from the device driver.
Some device drivers may offer multiple (more than 2) channels, while others may be mono/stereo (1 or 2 channels) only.
To see the capabilities of your devices, look in “Help menu > Diagnostics > Audio device info”.
If you want help interpreting the results, post the audio device info with your reply.
My guess is you can’t do four-track with this mixer.
If you look at one top-to-bottom microphone strip, there is no provision to assign a microphone other than the PAN control—Left to Right. There is no assign a microphone to USB-1 for example. Also, there is no analog send 3 and 4, and there are only two sound meters. They’re expecting you to be happy with a stereo mixer.
The product description says you can perform effects between the USB channels with no mention of it being a four-channel mixer.
It’s common for mixers at this level to break up the USB connection into 2 stereo sets rather than 1 four-channel set. That seems to be what you have.
The manual says that the 12FX model can do 4 channels via USB. It doesn’t say if ASIO is required to do that, so we don’t know if 4 channel recording is supported by standard Windows drivers until we see the audio device info.
Each microphone strip has an EFFECTS-SEND knob. Turn that up and leave the Level knob down. Hope that Effects-Send is pre-fade. I can’t tell from the instructions. You can connect a second computer and digitizer to the AUX SEND on the far upper right.
You can’t do that with one computer. Again, Audacity only connects to one device and you can only use one Audacity at a time.
to everyone:
Thank you both for answers and getting some time to answer my problem! Sorry for the late response, holidays went by and device wasn’t with me that time. But here’s my answers:
Are you on Windows?
Are you using Audacity 2.3.0?
Yes, both. Windows 10 to be precise.
To see the capabilities of your devices, look in “Help menu > Diagnostics > Audio device info”.
If you want help interpreting the results, post the audio device info with your reply.
Device ID: 1
Device name: Mic/Line In 01/02 (Soundcraft N
Host name: MME
Recording channels: 2
Playback channels: 0
Low Recording Latency: 0.09
Low Playback Latency: 0.09
High Recording Latency: 0.18
High Playback Latency: 0.18
Supported Rates:
Device ID: 3
Device name: Mic/Line In 03/04 (Soundcraft N
Host name: MME
Recording channels: 2
Playback channels: 0
Low Recording Latency: 0.09
Low Playback Latency: 0.09
High Recording Latency: 0.18
High Playback Latency: 0.18
Supported Rates:
As I understand, there is only 2 channels, yes?
So what could be the best possible way to record 4 track? Is there some additional ways to make the best out of this Notepad-12FX or I should try and find some mixers that have 4 channels and switch?
I bet it’s two two-tracks. That’s very common in sound mixers. The ads all proclaim multi-channels, but it falls apart when you try to use it. As above, Audacity doesn’t easily support ASIO, so you can’t use that as a get-out-of-jail card.
In the Citation Needed Youtube show, there are four people around a kitchen table, each with a GoPro camera-recorder and separate microphone. You can see the multi-channel mixer in many of the shots, but somewhere in one of the episodes we were introduced to the multi-channel, stand-alone sound recorder Matt used. In some of the versions of the show, we are treated to everyone clapping once to provide the video/sound sync.
I think he’s using the GoPros sound as backup. I think I caught him doing that a couple of times.
The type of microphone is important because you can’t have the performer’s voices leaking into each other. If you do, it means you can do corrections to one voice without affecting the others.
I’ll see if I can find out how he did it.
This is the same group that showed up on an outside park shoot with a shotgun microphone with a built-in recorder. No cables. No radio connections.
I know it’s popular to think you have to go the full-on Glen Glenn Sound Studios for these things, but I think you can do very well with Extras > Voice Memo on your iPhone. Do this by yourself a couple of times to make sure you know which one of the fourteen microphones the app is going to use. Then start it up and set it on the table in the middle of the group. Most conversations are self-limiting so nobody is too loud or two soft in real life. Pick the quietest room in the house, which you should be doing even if you do get the mixer to work.
If you do need some help you can go full Hollywood. Set up the microphones and cables and mixer…and then just don’t use it—and don’t tell anybody.
That’s the desperation method anyway. You should have something to go to if the “real” recording fails even if you do get everything to work.