Recording what my headphones hear / fully digital capturing

[Michael Kazmierski]

What if I say that instead of an IPod I have an electronic bagpipe that uses a 3.5mm stereo plug?
My goal is to record the pipes directly, digitally (without any analog hiss). In other words, trying to record the instrument in a bit-perfect digital capture.
The Behrenger interface is not acceptable to me because there is even a slight amount of annoying hiss. I CANNOT HAVE HISS!!!!!!!!!!!
And yes, I always turn all forms of dither off in Audacity because to me this is annoying too.
Really hasn't anyone invented such a recording device yet? Something that records from a 3.5MM stereo input using a directly digital capture?
You know how when you plug headphones into the device and it's turned off, you hear absolutely nothing? When you record the silence from the device your headphones would be plugged into using maybe a Behrenger or other interface, there is HISS, not silence. My goal is that if there's silence when plugged into headphones there must be silence from the interface connections, if that makes sense.
Ultimately it would be like Wasapi Loopback but it would just get the audio from the external device such as the electronic bagpipe.
I hope this makes sense.

[Michael Kazmierski]

I'm trying to think of another way to say this here.
1. The electronic pipes are turned off, and I have headphones plugged into them at the moment. Total sIlence.
2. If I plug a 3.5mm cable from an audio interface into the instrument and haven't turned the instrument on yet, I'm absolutely sure there will be hiss as opposed to silence when just headphones are plugged in. If the instrument is totally silent at any given moment my recording MUST be totally silent at those times, such as when the instrument is turned off. Hiss is totally unacceptable.
I hope that makes more sense. Electronic bagpipes don't use files so recording it digitally is the only way I can get the sounds.
I'm pretty sure even having not tried these interfaces that there is guaranteed to be some hiss and not silence. WHY THE HELL IS THAT!

[kozikowski]

My goal is to record the pipes directly, digitally (without any analog hiss). In other words, trying to record the instrument in a bit-perfect digital capture.

What are the pipes? Part numbers, web page or makers info.

Koz

[Michael Kazmierski]

It's an old Ross Technology programmable electronic bagpipe I got in 2006.
Basically to put it bluntly: If I have headphones plugged in and the switch is turned off, there is of course silence.
My goal is to make a recording of the same thing and end up with total silence as well. Any noise floor is completely destructive.
Like if my headphones are plugged into a device and there is absolute silence, my ultimate goal is there to be absolute silence when I unplug the headphones and switch to whatever audio interface I would record with. That way I'd hear even the quietest sounds that the pipes would have, if any.

[kozikowski]

Studios get around some quality problems by using 96000 sample rate and 24-bit data depth. Sometimes called 96/24. Not the home standard of 44100 and 16-bit. 44.1/16 So we can start there.

Monitoring is going to be the worst problem because Line Level or volume is handled by 30 volt supply rails (+/- 15 volts), not the 5 volts (or less) that comes out of a USB interface. That's frequently 2.5 volts or less by the time you actually hear it. The 5 volt thing has always been a compromise, but most users go shopping for price followed in the far distance by quality, so 5 volts it is.

Most home systems are never going to get close to your goal. We should remember your show is going through three conversions: Pipes Analog to Digital, Digital back down to Analog (the digital in the middle doesn't add noise) and volume boosting to run the headphones. The process picks up a tiny bit of hiss at each step.

I know you have absolutely no interest in this, but what happens to the pipe noise when you turn them on? Everything about music production is a juggling act and if the pipes are noisy, you should contrast that with the rest of the system. The system will never get quieter than the loudest noises.

Nor should you go "diving for noise." No music system will survive if you crank the volumes all the way up. We warn people to set a comfortable volume for the performance and then, without touching anything, listen for background noise.

Koz

[steve]

I'm pretty sure even having not tried these interfaces that there is guaranteed to be some hiss and not silence. WHY THE HELL IS THAT!

It's because all electronic components produce some noise - it is an unavoidable fact. Even a piece of copper wire produces a tiny bit of noise ("thermal noise") when electricity passes through it. Audio circuits are designed to minimise noise, but the design has to make compromises between sound quality and cost. A pre-amp with a noise floor below -100 dB is more expensive to make, (thus more expensive to buy), than a pre-amp with a noise floor of around -80 dB. How big is your budget?

My goal is to record the pipes directly, digitally (without any analog hiss).

Do your electronic bagpipes have a digital output?
From looking at their website, I don't see any models that have digital output (http://www.rosspipes.com/#pipes-section), which model do you have?

[Michael Kazmierski]

@Steve,
I have the original style Ross pipes (no harmony feature, with toggle switches, able to be played in different keys), as well as an extinct Deger pipes I bought from a friend which also has an on-off sensor. (Sadly, even though the website is still up, Deger is no longer around). When I turn on the Ross there is a slight repetitive clicking noise before it beeps.
For some reason I had the idea that if it's possible to capture the sound directly digitally using Loopback, then I had the feeling it must be possible to capture sounds from headphone outputs of devices this same way, no? How can Loopback be entirely hiss-free and audio interfaces have hiss, if silence on headphones is pure silence then?
Silence on loopback = same silence with just headphones.
This same silence is replaced by hiss with ADC's I've heard of. I'm trying to get the least noise floor but as simple a connection as possible (no real use for 1/4 inch, FireWire, etc, literally just a USB device because my laptop has no Line-In). Surprised they don't make something simple such as a mere USB to 3.5 male plug.
Re:Budget: I'm saving up for two sets of Italian bagpipes that cost $2000 total, so I'd hazard a guess that any of the lowest-noise, but simple-layout interfaces wouldn't even cost that much? (Again, I'm not the biggest fan of fancy devices with a multitude of inputs and outputs, just a simple one that converts from USB to Line-in with as little noise floor as humanly possible).

[steve]

"Loopback" recording is when the audio data that is being sent (played) from the computer to the headphone socket / speakers, is also fed back ("looped back") to the recording input. Because this is all in the digital domain, there is no added noise.

The headphone output from your Ross pipes is an "analog" signal. To get that into a computer program, it has to be digitised through an "analog to digital converter" ("ADC" or "A/D converter"). This conversion is done with a "sound card" or "audio interface".

The sound cards built into most computers usually have poor recording quality and quite a lot of noise. USB audio interfaces provide an inexpensive way to upgrade the audio input of the computer, though note that the very cheap interfaces (less than about $25) are usually rubbish quality. "Inexpensive" sound cards (such as the Behringer um2 or umc22, from around $40), provide much better sound quality (and much less noise) than the built in sound card of most computers. There are also more expensive USB sound cards that may provide more features, and possibly even better sound quality.

You may want to consider an interface that supports 2 microphones, if there's a possibility that you may want to use 2 microphones some time in the future.

[Michael Kazmierski]

Hi,
I've noticed that even though the Behringer UCM 22 has a super low noise floor (-125 dB or so), it only has 1/4 inch jacks.
Is there an interface with a noise floor as low as this one but with 1/8 jacks? Or do I need to get a pack of adapters so that I can use 1/8 inch jacks with it? I'm trying to record my Ross pipes that use a 1/8 jack (or 3.5 mm jack).
Thanks


Michael