Audacity Forum

I found this on page 5 of the Owner's Manual:

Direct monitoring function allows input monitoring without latency

I didn't research how to set that up, but it does have that capability.

(Sometimes certain features of a multi-channel interface are accessed with a special software application, so you might have to set-up the direct monitoring through the computer.)



BTW - I don't want to complicate your life, but if you are doing multitrack recording & mixing, you probably should be using a DAW (REAPER, SONAR, Cubase, etc.) instead of an audio editor like Audacity. Things will probably be easier (or more straightforward) once you get past the learning curve.

There's a piece of this we don't know.

There are the adjustments on mixers which support overdubbing and that's what those knobs say: USB<---------->LIVE MONITOR (or something similar).

At one extreme, they let you listen to the USB connection or Audacity Playback, and at the other, you listen to your live microphone. Stop somewhere in the middle for a pleasant mix of the two.

It's also odd that you can't hear the live performance but the Audacity playback seems to work OK. It usually works the other way around. People works for days so they can hear Audacity, but the live microphone works straight out of the box. There's red danger flags all over this.

I know you probably already had the equipment, but this is insanely complicated hardware to record a Shure SM-57. Also, if it's a gift from the angels, why is it discontinued?

Koz

kozikowski wrote:There's a piece of this we don't know.

There are the adjustments on mixers which support overdubbing and that's what those knobs say: USB<---------->LIVE MONITOR (or something similar).

At one extreme, they let you listen to the USB connection or Audacity Playback, and at the other, you listen to your live microphone. Stop somewhere in the middle for a pleasant mix of the two.

It's also odd that you can't hear the live performance but the Audacity playback seems to work OK. It usually works the other way around. People works for days so they can hear Audacity, but the live microphone works straight out of the box. There's red danger flags all over this.

I know you probably already had the equipment, but this is insanely complicated hardware to record a Shure SM-57. Also, if it's a gift from the angels, why is it discontinued?

Koz

As it is now I can put down tracks-bass line and vocals via the Tascam and they play back fine. The only thing is I can't hear what I'm putting down thru the headphones-can hear any of the play back. Of course I can hear my own voice without the headphones and I put a mic in front of the guitar amp so I still hear that.

As for Cubase I have that. It came with the Tascam. And I have the ProTools free intro package. I am or was working on Pro tools but I can't get any sound. Just some setting I don't have right. I had the same problem with Cubase but I found the setting for that. And the two DAW's seem to use the same template somewhat but I haven't found the right setting for volume out on ProTools. They have a 'school' you can get and I plan to do that. When I was working on Cubase some months ago I came across more than one post saying it was unnecessarily complicated and you know how those Germans are. Over engineer everything. LOL For most people I don't think you can poke around for hours on end trying to figure it out, unless you have a scrip for tranquilizers. You really need some kind of training program. I know there are You Tubes on them. I like Audacity because for now anyway it will do whatever I need to do. I've used it for a long time.

The only thing is I can't hear what I'm putting down thru the headphones

And that point right there is extraordinarily unusual. Suppose you weren't overdubbing? The whole monitor section of the unit would be of no value.

I think that's worth taking it up with Tascam support.

Koz

This is a copy from the Tascam manual. Turns out Monitor knob controls the volume of the house monitor or speakers much like the headphone volume controls the headphone volume.

The Mix knob instructions are, well, instructive. Yours doesn't do what they claim it does (attached).

Koz

There is one more. People new at recording aren't accustomed to watching volume indicators. With your microphone plugged into #1 and the #1 volume control cranked all the way up, can you make the little red overload light come on? Keep speaking louder and louder until it does. It will not damage anything. The unit and the microphone are expected to handle volumes even higher than that. Dynamic (moving coil) microphones like the SM57 are nearly indestructible.

That volume is the maximum possible performance volume before distortion. Only a handful of dB lower volume than that is where optimum performance volume is. So no, you probably can't sing into the microphone from across the room.

Yes, in normal operation, the error light supposed to flash when you get too loud in your performance, but there is also a condition where you create a very, very low recording and are unaware of it. The 1800 has no indicators for that. One of the symptoms of that is the headphone mix fails. Your voice is there, but it's not loud enough to be useful.

Koz

deric23 wrote:I see there are some settings for overdubbing under 'transport' in the open Audacity screen.

Have you tried those?

Overdubbing needs to be on, or Audacity won't send out the song while recording...

And I suppose Audacity will send playback to outputs one and two by default, but I don't know, as I've never tried the US1800 with Audacity. So you might need to try outputs 3 and 4 too.

BTW, the Tascam is one of the easiest devices in it's class. The software setup only sets sampling rate and spdif in/out. No software mixer, no routing. All input channels get sent to monitoring at the same level. No choice, no gain controls. One weak point is that it only has 44 dB gain on the mic inputs, which is not enough for an SM57. Unless you're a real loud singer.

I think for Protools and Cubase you need to set the master bus to the appropriate outputs to get sound. I don't know the routing matrix in PT Free, but usually in a DAW, you need to set that too, routing each input channel to the master bus. And of course, you need to slide the faders in the mixer up AND in the master channel.

DAW's require setting up (and saving) a project before doing anything else. That requires reading the manual and thinking about stuff like sample rate. It's not something you learn by watching a 5 min. Youtube vid.

The only daw that is easier, is Presonus Studio One 3, because it comes with templates for the most popular projects. One of those is a 16-track rock song, fi. It comes completely labeled, with even the faders set to probably good levels for drums, guitar and so on. That gets you going a lot faster.

One limitation of Protools free you need to know about, is that you can't open it's projects in other Protools versions. Seems like a serious shortcoming to me if you are thinking of passing the project to someone else to continue mixing/mastering your song.

But Audacity should do fine to learn the basics...

Overdubbing needs to be on, or Audacity won't send out the song while recording...

That is the normal problem. This problem is Audacity works just fine, we can't send the local microphone to the headphones. That should work with no Audacity at all.

It doesn't.

Koz

kozikowski wrote:

Overdubbing needs to be on, or Audacity won't send out the song while recording...

That is the normal problem. This problem is Audacity works just fine, we can't send the local microphone to the headphones. That should work with no Audacity at all.

It doesn't.

Koz

Sorry, Koz, missed that after several reads.

But maybe it does work, only you can't hear it because the level is too low?

44 dB of gain is about the lowest you get on preamps. And the SM57 is a very quiet dynamic, meant to not distort too heavily with screaming metal singers.

When you're recording your own voice, it's hard to tell. You could use another signal, one you can't hear naturally.

Otherwise, the monitoring system in the interface is broken.

@deric23

Is the interface still under warranty?

I've covered most if not all of what has been posted here but I will go over it. Thanks for the several suggestions.
Just to recap-I start the song Monterey in Audacity. I'm hearing it through the headphones. I hit record and start playing along on guitar which I hear from the amp speakers and which are mic'd to the Tascam but I don't hear it from the phones, only Monterey. I watch the Audacity screen showing Monterey playing as well as the guitar input. Then I back up to start and hear the guitar track thru the phones. Now at least I can put down multiple tracks and edit. All works fine except that one thing with the headphones.