Hello Phil, I just purchased the Tascam dp 24 sd multirack recorder. After many years of recording with open tape decks this new recorder is a little bit of a challenge. Thank you for your tutorials they are helping me tremendously!
@PATRICK PERONE Elvis Tribute Artist thanks for the feedback Patrick. The Step-by-Step guide may also help if you are interested... details here: www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html Good luck with your recordings for 2019.
@@mabcomp1 yes you're right of course :) ... but if you read the first line of the 'freebies' page www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/freebies.html you'll see there's no deception involved - it's just that most things there are free, but a few items are priced as I can't go giving away everything for nothing! The tutorial videos took many man-hours to put together but are free for anyone. I purposely don't include adverts (I don't like them so why inflict them on others) so don't make any money from RUclips. I feel it's justified to charge for the step-by-step guide which also took a lot of work for the 114 pages. Hope that explains it :) Thanks for stopping by.
That was so helpful, I'd been scratching my head for a couple of hours wondering why everything sounded crap and in mono, Thanks sooooo much :-) I'm a happy man now
Phil. Thank you very much one more time. Only now, six months after using my tascam I felt the need for more clues and did not know how to do it. I was preparing a recording for a children's choir at a church that I will be conducting from tomorrow. He was preparing the instrumental part by recording each instrument at a time, all on lane 1 and then used the "move paste" or "copy paste" to send to another track. At one point there were empty tracks, but tascam did not give me the option to carry the recorded material to them. So I was converting each one to mono to show up this option. I was sad to think Tascam had fooled me by saying that the recorder had 32 recording devices when in fact it would have only 24 since mono recording reduced the tracks. Undeterred, I decided to attend your class that a few months ago I did not understand. Today was very clear to me. Thank you very much, Phil. God bless you richly. I would like to contribute financially to you, but at the moment I am going through some difficulties and I need to honor some of the debts I have, but I came to thank you from my heart for your wonderful journey of helping people. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Joanilson from Brazil.
+Joanilson Rodrigues, thank you for your kind words Joanilson. No worries re. donations; they are a nice way to show appreciation for the work involved but not everyone can or wants to do this, and that is entirely their choice. Another option for moving tracks is the Clone Track function. This avoids having to specify IN & OUT points as with Copy & Move. The cloning is instantaneous, then you can delete the original track using the Clean Out function. The Undo button is very useful if you delete the wrong track my mistake :) Maybe also set the no. of undo levels to 10 in Menu, Preference. All the best to you.
Thank you Phil. I think I forgot to explain that when recording the backing track I realised the whistle in 'Winds of Change was too loud so I stopped recording, edited down the whistle in Cakewalk and then hit play & record to overwrtite what I recorded. I didn't realise that my first recording hasn't been overwritten and was still there. I went back to zero on the counter but that didn't work. My brain was using the Tascam like an old reel to reel tape recorder. Anyway, when I discovered both recordings where there I found the end point using the jog wheel to access the point in the recording I wanted, turned down both faders and pressed play & record until I had passed the point of where the first track ended. That wiped out the recording and now I just have the track I wanted. Probably did it all wrong but my ancient brain can understand what I did. Thanks to you I have learned the following: How to create a track. How to name the track. How to assign a track. How to pan both left & right inputs. How to use the Monitor and Stereo out. Still not got the source buttons sorted but I seem to have stumbled on what works. I am naming each cable I am using after removing them from the Yamaha and replacing some olderleads. I have tested that the 'monitor out' is routed correctly to my hifi amp and that 'stero out' is routed to my Compressor/Limiter and then on to my mini disc recorder. Never too sure about using the compressor. The best facility ofthis Alesis is the noise gate, but now I I have those lovely mute buttons back I may not need it to cancel out any clicks on my recordings. I spend too much time using the noise gate trying to get both left & right channels to end together. This is an experience for me and I hope I am not being a nuisance but its always good to discuss with others any new stuff you are using. I will finish labelling the cables today and then comes the major problem. Introducing my guitar and finding 'Small Hall Reverb' to add to a dry recording and to use it in play for rehearsal. My guitar is through a Fender Mustang amp that Fender have programmed for me to the 1957 setting I wanted. They listened to me play and then made the patch for me, sending it to my amp using WiFi. Also to my phone so if I want to go to a guitar shop and test any guitars, as long as there is a Fender amp in store I just need to point my phone at it and my sound is installed. Very clever. Then the signal goes through a 20 year old Zoom 508 programmed by Geoff Strachan for sounds of The Shadows. This was invaluable when I used to do 3 Gigs a week performing a tribute to The Shadows. I will now learn 'Wind Of Change' before I look for my reverbs so if I get a good result I can just record it, then on to mini disc, and finally a copy to CD written optically and then back to the PC to save as a WAV file for sending on to the studio for my next CD. I wait until I have all 20 tracks done then send the WAV files using SMASH to the studio. Best bulk transfer I have used. Thanks again for listening. Peter. PS Please send me a note of your address if you would like a complimedntary copy of my new CD or anything on my web site.
@Peter Williams Ok Peter, thanks. Glad it's all coming together. You did explain about the whistle being too loud and having to re-record the backing. I was only commenting about your statement "turned down both faders and pressed play & record". Turning down faders is not necessary as they do not control the recording level. You could have left them up and the track would still have been erased. I also notice you say "pressed play & record". This is not necessary either. You do not need to press Play. It's not quite like the old tape machines where you had to press both buttons at the same time. You only need to press Record. In fact it's safer to just press Record even though pressing both buttons seems to work, because if you accidentally press the Play button a fraction before the Record button, the machine will just start playing; it won't record. Anyway, these are all minor points :) Fascinated to hear about the Fender programming system; I didn't know about this, but sounds a great idea. Thank you for your offers. Might be better to use email for more details (and also easier for me to use if you have any more questions - I find RUclips messaging is a bit cumbersome). My address is patipping at gmail dot com.
Thank you for your reply. I'm glad you enjoyed my videos. I have just finished my 24th guitar instrumental CD and realised it was time to dump the Yamaha AW16G as like myself, it is worn out! I'm pleased to be going back to Tascam but as yet, haven't plugged it in, but the manual is already in the bin like every other manual I have ever had. I have never used the on board recording facilities other than my backing tracks and guitar. I send the stereo mix to my Alesis 3632 Compressor and work from there. The Portastudio to me is really a tape recorder. Great for recording backing tracks, guitar and panning. I edit the tracks in midi on Cakewalk Sonar which I have custom made in Denmark giving my trackmaker sufficient funds to live in the lap of lusxury, or so it seems looking at my bank balance!! I find panning an art form as some instruments can vanish if I go to a full pan left or right. Only the hall reverb access is preventing me from setting up the Tascam. I learnt on the old 688 usuing external FX and I sorely missed the mute buttons when it died. As you can hear from my videos I love the clean sound. Bert Weedon always told me less is more. A very good teacher and could get very cross if I made any mistakes, as he told me if I read the piece correctly there would be no mistakes! Anyway, not sure if I should look for an old external reverb unit which would give me control. My Fender amp goes directly to an ancient ZOOM FX programmed by Geoffrey Strachan. Apparently worth money these days. The Tascam to suit me would need a switch and control to access the FX to switch between dry and added FX divided between Monitor Out and Setereo Out in an ideal world. Is that possible? The only on board FX I used on the Yamaha was Hall Reverb. Thanks again for your asdvice but I need to get it as simple as using an old reel to reel tape recorder. Thank you.
@Peter Williams Well you've done an excellent job. Wish I could play guitar half as well as you :) Yes the DP machine can be used just like a tape recorder; that's one of its attractions. The complications come when you want to add fx or do any processing, and then you just have to bite the bullet and enter the wonderful world of multi-track recording. You've already exploited some of that potential by using the tracks for different takes and then deciding which is the best, but there's so much more than that. The internal send effect system is worth getting to grips with as it opens up a lot of potential within the machine. It's covered in video #5. As mentioned before, once you enable send-1 you can add one of the many effect types in the send effect section to any track (or tracks) during playback, and it will mixed along with the backing and appear at the stereo outputs so you can pass it through your Alesis unit. I know it may not be applicable to you (yet!), but you could also use the send outputs (there are 2 completely separate signals) for anything else, such as independent sub-mixes for other performers who maybe want to just hear the backing and not your guitar (say), or maybe they want to hear the guitar but not quite so loud. The possibilities are limited by your imagination :) But there's nothing to stop you using the machine as you are, and simply adding an external reverb unit in the signal path. This may be a better choice for you if you can get a good quality one and don't mind the extra wiring. Either way, if you want easy step by step instructions for various tasks on the DP machine, my Step-by-Step guide may help. Full details are here www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html There's a small extract from the guide you can view/download which contains the full index plus a few random pages so you can see what topics it covers and whether you like the style.
@KountryCuz1 thank you Danny and nice to hear from you after all these years. Nice to see your channel still going strong. Good luck with your lap steel projects. You make it look so easy :)
Hello Phil. First of all, thank you very much for your altruism, it's nice to find people like you in the network. I'm very new in the hardware mixing/recording world, and I have a couple of doubts (hundreds, being honest). Le me "briefly" introduce my personal situation: Music is my hobby. I've been playing electric guitar since i was 11 years old (I'm 27 righ now). Pro Tools has been my main software this las 2-3 years, with a modest audio interface, and a modest PC. As a result, I'm SICK of PC and software! Lately I've been learning synth/drum machine sequencing and I'm finaly geting what is meant to be a "live set up": Waldorf Blofeld (Stereo Synt) and Moog Minitaur (Mono synth), are going to be sequenced from a Elektron Digitakt (Stereo Drum machine/Sampler) while I play guitar and sing. I was going to purchase a Yamaha MG12XU as my mixer (being only able to record my stereo signal in a DAW) when i found Tascam DP-32-SD and your brilliant tutorials, wich convinced me on buying the tascam with no doubt. Now my newbie questions are: 1.- Is the general quality of sound going to be affected by the fact of being a digital mixer instead of an analog mixer when playing live? Isn't it, really? 2.- I'd also like to use a Lexicon MX400 efect processor to process the 2 aux send, wich means I'm runing out of inputs (2 stereo signals + 2 fx returns + 3 mono signals (moog+voice+guitar) = 9 inputs. Is there any adaptor to put together a L&R signal in just one tascam input, being able to route it to a stereo tascam track without loosing it's stereo character? I'm not sure if I'm explaining myself well. Thanks in advance. Excuse me for my english and the long text. Hope you can help me. Hugs from Spain!
+RolanRock thank you for the kind words re. the videos, glad they are useful for you. The machine is capable of CD-quality and beyond. A commercial CD uses 16-bit, 44.1KHz digital format, which is the lowest of the 4 possible quality settings. Whether or not you can hear a difference between this and whatever analogue mixer you are wanting to compare it with really depends on your expectations, and all the other gear in the chain of course, such as the power amps, loudspeakers etc. As you've already seen, the machine is limited to 8 inputs, so again it depends on what your requirements are. You can certainly combine/mix as many signals as you like using an external mixer, digital or analogue, and then use its stereo output to feed 2 inputs on the dp32. The 2 inputs could either be assigned directly to the stereo bus so they come out live in stereo, and/or you could assign them to a stereo track for recording. The disadvantage is that the mix of these external signals cannot be changed after the recording, so if multi-track recording & mixing is really what you want, but with more than 8 inputs, then this may not be the right machine for you. I don't know if there are any other free-standing machines out there which can handle more than 8 simultaneous inputs - maybe the Zoom Livetrack? You may have to stick with a computer-based solution with an audio-USB interface which can handle lots of inputs.... but make sure you really do want to record more than 8 things simultaneously - one of the advantages with these multi-track machines is that you can overdub or layer things gradually and build up many more tracks which you can then mix and master later in the process. If there's only one of you, then you may find the latter approach is more manageable, in which case this machine may be perfect for you! Re. the MX400 - the only thing I would check is whether the send levels on the dp32 are sufficient to drive the Lexicon. I know of one user with a LX300 who found the input lights were barely flickering even with the send levels up full. Some FX boxes have a switch on their inputs to allow the lower level '-10' signals to be used, but I notice the MX300 & MX400 do not, and they work best with the higher '+4' signals. May be worth asking on the Tascam forum to see if anyone has tried this.
Thank you very much for the quick answer. Great MX400 advice, I'll check the forum. Tascam is on it's way home :) Now it's time to finish seeing your tutorial series. Regards!
Hi Phil, I bought the DP24SD to replace my worn out over complicated Yamaha AW16G. It has recorded 23 albums for me but sadly the inputs and faders are failing, so time for it to go. I won't miss it as this replaced a previous Tascam. A great big heavy lump of a machine. Tascam 688 sounds about right. I do miss that one. However, I don't need all the functions as with any Portastudio I send my custom made midi track from Cakewalk Sonar to the portastudio. Tracks 3 & 4 with a pan at about 12L & 12R. I find panning at a full 16 left & right tends to hide instruments. After recording my backing track I use all the other tracks to rehearse my guitar until I find the track I like best. I mix down through an Alesis 3632 compressor to mini disk that has the auto pause function, then optically copied to a music CD. I then convert to WAV on my PC. I havent set up the Tascam yet as I am concerned about reverb. I layer a hall reverb over my guitar tracks and I thought I would ask you is that easy on this machine? I only add reverb to my guitar not to the finished track. I like to record 'Dry' using my Fender Mustang amp and then fiddle with it. Your tutorials are enjoayable and anything is better than reading a manual. I have never read a manual so thank you for the great videos.
@Peter Williams Hi Peter, thank you for the kind words; glad you found the videos useful. Adding reverb *can* be easy, but it depends on your workflow and how you define easy :) Whatever your workflow is, the reverb effect is only available in the Send effect section so you need to be comfortable with using the send system. This system 'taps off' a proportion of your guitar track(s) onto the send paths. You can normally choose either send-1 or send-2 or both, but the internal send effect is only connected to send-1 so you have to use that. So for each guitar track you want to apply reverb to, turn the send-1 control on (for reverb you would normally set it to POST), and then turn up the send-1 level and the overall master send-1 level. This will route a proportion of the guitar track(s) into the send effect. You then need to go into the effects section and select the reverb, turn it on, and adjust the reverb type and return level. The latter gets the reverb output back to the stereo bus where it will be mixed with whatever other tracks you are playing (i.e. the ones whose track faders are turned up), such as the backing tracks and/or the dry guitar track(s). Your workflow will then dictate what you do with this mix. 1. The simplest method is to feed this mix straight into your external gear, so do all the above in multi-track mode. 2. If you want to record the mix on the DP machine first and then play it back later into your external gear, do the above in mixdown mode. 3. If you want to record the reverb to a spare track so you can do options 1 or 2 later, do the above in bounce mode. Obviously in this case you would only turn up the track fader for the guitar track. You will end up with a new track containing the reverb'd guitar, so you can then blend this with the other tracks during the mix later. Hope this helps. P.S. some great guitar playing on your videos - very smooth :)
Hello dear Phil. First of all you did a hell of a job on these tutorials. One word spoken, masterful. Still a bit confused I have a question. I have recorded a drum kit by using 6 microphones on track 1 - 6. Lateron I want to edit the drums with an external equalizer and a compressor, finally they are way better then the built in ones :-) ... but the noise suppressor does a good job. I have allready set the drum kit faders and panning to my liking and finally would do a stereo mixdown onto track 7 - 8 for further processing. So now going through your video, it would be possible feeding the external EQ & COMP over the send outputs 1 & 2 for L/R signals and then back into the machine and hopefully still keep the original stereo picture of the drum kit. Right or wrong? I would much appreciate an answer. Sincerely Mike. P.S. I would have tried it out my self already but the whole recording equipment is setup perfectly in our rehearsal room and I want to finish the whole song recording first of all. I guess you understand that. ;-) If there is another way to donate other by using paypal, let me know. Sorry I don´t use paypal.
@if6was9 ´ thanks for the kind words, Mike. Yes you can use send 1 & 2 for a stereo send, as long as the left and right signals exist on separate tracks. If they are only on a stereo track, the left & right sides will be summed to mono when they go onto the send bus. If you have them split on separate mono tracks, you can use send-1 with one track, and send-2 for the other. When you say you plan on doing a "stereo mixdown" onto tracks 7 & 8, I presume you mean bounce, not mixdown. Mixdown creates a master file, which is completely separate to normal track files. You cannot 'see' a mixdown in multitrack mode as it is not a track. If you want to continue processing a mix in multitrack mode, bouncing is easier than mixdown as the mix is created directly onto normal tracks. This sounds exactly what you want as you can choose to bounce onto 2 mono tracks and keep the left and right signals separate for use with the sends as described above. If you bounce to a stereo track, you won't be able to use the sends this way. It *is* possible to get a mixdown file back into multitrack mode, but you need to use a computer to copy it from the song folder into the AudioDepot folder so it can be imported back into the song... but I think this will only let you import the file onto a stereo track as opposed to 2 separate mono tracks, so you won't be able to use the sends as planned... note I haven't confirmed this so may be wrong. Re. donations, other options are direct bank transfer or a cheque through normal post. I can let you have more details for either of these if you contact me via email. My address is at the bottom of the page on my philizound.co.uk website.
@@philtipping Hello Phil. Yes that´s exactly what I meant. Bouncing track 1 - 6 onto track 7 & 8. I´m German, so sometimes I get mixed up by technical terms in english :-) But great, so I did understood your overall tutorial. So that counts for your effort. Thank you again for clearing things up. You have been a great help for that. You mentioned the audio-depot. I worked already with copying stereo-tracks from the pc into the machines depot and as far as I remember you can choose their destination, either on two mono-tracks or one stereo-track. Anyway, I will contact you via e-mail for further doings. Sincerely Mike P.S. So far I´m really amazed how good this machine works for live-recordings, (in my case: drums (6 mics) & guitar (2 mics). Also thinking about the low price, I remember back in the mid 90´s working with the Tascam 488 MKII, which cost a fortune back in those days. End of the 80´s I used a Tascam Portastudio 244. Man, a long time has passed away since then. ;-) Cheers!
@Jeffrey Holmes I presume you watched the series starting at #1? If you have and are still put off, the step-by-step can get you off the ground very quickly without getting distracted by the details. Full details are here www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html The machine is a complete recording studio in a box, so if studio facilities are what you want, you'll find other machines just as hard (although as far as I know, there's only the Zoom R series which do similar things). If you want to record and overdub using multi-track techniques and then edit, bounce, mix and master all in one box, you'll have to accept that this will involve a learning curve. When you pay for time in a pro studio, you're paying for the recording engineer's skill as well as the gear. If you want a simpler way of recording and either just want a basic mix or are happy using a computer if you want to do more post processing, there are other machines such as the Model series or the Zoom Livetrak series. These let you record and do a basic mix, but lots of other things have to done with a computer. It's a tricky decision :) Thanks for stopping by. Hope you find what you're looking for.
Hi Phil, Thank you for all your help. So far I have plugged it in and in multi track mode I selected channels 3 & 4 and using the assign & faders set a level for my backing track in rec armed and ready. I then discovered how to pan both left & right to minus 50 and plus 50. I also did a full format to the SD card. That took ages. My mistake was as I was recording the backing track to Wind Of Change I found the whistle was too high so I stopped and pressed rewind and started to record it again. But, I was not aware that it had saved the previous recording and it won’t let me delete the track. I went to the end of the track and I then used the jog knob to wind back the audio very carefully to the end of the song and pressed record with both faders down and recorded over what I wanted to get rid of which was after my good recording . Not sure if this was correct but it worked. So how to you clean a track out when you have made a cock up like I just did? My next project is to see if the track I recorded will play through the Stereo out to my external gear. Monitor out plays fine, but I haven’t hooked up stereo out yet. So far so good. Peter
@Peter Williams If you want to delete a whole track, press Track Edit and use the 'Clean Out' function. Another option is to just press Undo and your last operation will be undone. You mention turning both faders down when you attempted to delete the track. Just to clarify, the track faders do not alter the *recorded* signal; they only control the playback signal. The reason it worked was because you had no signal at the input while it was recording. Panning does not affect the recording either; only the playback. I presume you are assigning the 2 inputs which are connected to your computer (for the backing track) to 2 separate mono tracks so that you can pan them to your desired 50/50 values. If so, you can adjust the panning *after* the recording if you like. Panning only affects the signal you hear when playing back, or the monitored signal during the recording; it does not affect the recorded signal itself. When you playback, any tracks which have their faders up will go to the stereo output via the master stereo fader. These tracks also pass through the track pan controls on their way to the stereo outputs, so this is when you need to set them correctly. These tracks can also be tapped off in varying proportions to the 'eff send' outputs if you configure the send system correctly. This can be used to drive external gear if you want, or the internal send effect for adding reverb etc. Good luck.
I am considering this item but everyone that I have spoken to about it tells me not to buy it because of the limitations and frustrations of editing on such a small screen... why is there not the option to connect to a larger monitor?
Good point +FilmBizDude - there is no connector for an external monitor - unless someone comes up with a DIY mod :). I would suggest you try before you buy if possible, or if you're in the UK or have similar 'distance-buying regulations', you can buy it with the option of returning it for a full refund if you're not happy. I don't find the screen size too bad - for me, the frustrating is only being able to edit one item at a time as there's only one set of EQ, Pan & Send knobs, but for me it's a small price to pay for having all this functionality in one box. There are very few alternatives unless you go down the generic 'personal computer'-based route, but then you'll need to cost in an audio interface and a work-surface interface if you want hands-on faders & knobs. Even Tascam's Track Factory is just an ordinary PC, albeit optimised and pre-installed with a conventional DAW (Sonar), and a hardware audio interface thrown in to save you the hassle of setting up a system. At the end of the day, all these generic computer systems are still designed to be a jack-of-all-trades driven with a qwerty keyboard and a mouse, which is one of my pet hates for music creativity and the driving force for designing Sequetron :) ... as opposed to machines like this one with dedicated embedded processors/computers with possibly their own operating systems. Good luck and hope you find a solution.
FilmBizDude true it has its limitations, but it's worth the $500 bucks you pay for them. I recorded this song with these mix and I love it, here it is ruclips.net/video/cIXg54gqv1k/видео.html
Hi Phil, you’re videos are brilliant. I am currently watching all your videos on the dp24 and this video is where I am up to so far. I’m a rookie. I am simply trying to record my guitar without getting any fuzzy noises in the background. The more I watch the more I realised how daft I was to even attempt to operate the machine with just the manual haha. Now I realise I probably wasn’t even recording the guitar through stereo. I was literally just plugging it into an input on the back of the machine, adding some guitar effects and hitting record. I’m just wondering will you cover more on how to record guitar throughout these videos that you’ve uploaded? I am going to watch them all regardless, I’m just wondering if these videos are directed at sound engineers etc, or whether I might be able to figure this out haha. Thank you and sorry if what I have said is a bit all over the place, I’m just in the process of learning a lot. And I won’t give up haha. Alex.
@Alexander Parsons no worries Alex, we all had to start somewhere... at least you're not afraid of trying things :) Nothing wrong with plugging a guitar straight in. If it's an electric with passive pickups, you might try input H with the slide-switch on the back set to Guitar. It may improve things, it may not, but it's worth trying. Setting a good recording level is recommended, and you've probably realised it's only the input Trim which affects this. The dynamics effects work on the input signals, so you may find the compressor helps to smooth things out, although these *will* be recorded so use with caution. It sometimes better to record with no effects and add them later via bouncing or at mixdown time, then you can try things over & again without having to re-record the original music. But that's getting into more than I can cover in this comment, so carry on with the videos. There are no videos on recording specific instruments though - that's a whole other set of topics. The video series tries to explain how the signal paths relate to the controls on the panel. The idea was to give you an understanding of the routing potential of the machine so you can 'wire' it up any way you want - there's no way I can foresee all the different things people want to do. I agree this can be a bit intimidating at first, but the machine is a complete recording studio after all, so you have to accept there's going to be some new terms and techniques to learn - if you stepped into a real studio, you'd still need engineer's skills to get the most out of the gear. If you want to get off the ground quicker, the step-by-step guide looks at the machine from a more practical viewpoint as opposed to 'going under the hood' so maybe check out the contents list to see if it covers the things you're interested in www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/TascamDp24-32-HowToGuide-166-Sample.pdf ... and if you still have questions after that, I'm happy to offer support. It's easier for me if you use my email address (on the bottom of the page on my philizound.co.uk website). I'm sure you'll get to grips with it if you persevere... plenty of time at the moment! Good luck. Phil.
Phil Tipping Thank you Phil. Truly appreciate your support. I have a few things to do today with misses, once I am free I will give and an email and check out the link. Honestly thanks a bunch mate, people like yourself make the world spin!
Hello, Phil, and thank you for all of this extraordinarily-helpful information (all of which are really great toward minimizing a lot of 'head-scratching'). I have a new DP-24SD. Sitting with my unit and this 'Stereo' tutorial in front of me on my PC, I followed every step (several times, including L and R panning) along with you, but when I raise my 'Stereo' fader to the max, no signal bars appear on the little screen, as they do on yours. Can you please give me your thoughts on this ? Thanks, Doug in Chicago
@One Bad Apple Hi Doug, thank you for the kind words; glad the videos are helping. Where on the video are you looking? Are you using live inputs? If so, have you assigned them the same way? It's better for me to use emails, so if you want to contact me that way, we can try and sort it out. My email is on the bottom of the page on my philizound.co.uk website.
Hi Phil. Thanks for your brilliant tutorials on this, it's really awesome! I have one thing that I can't find anything on. When recording a stereo signal from two mono inputs is there any way to chain the input levels on the two mono inputs? I find it a little difficult to set the precise input levels correctly. What I normally do it turn left side up until I see it clipping and then find a level just below the clipping point and then I do the same thing with the right input level. I know there is a possibility of turning the input levels to maximum on both sides and then control the input from the device connected but I presume it creates more noise compared to the previous mentioned method. If there is a way to set the input levels simultaneously on both left and right it would be a lot easier to control.
@yezdk thanks for the kind words. Yes it is difficult to get both trims set to exactly the same level unless you use e.g. a test tone... but if you assign them to a stereo track you can use the balance control to compensate. It does exactly what you want - it adjusts the relative levels of the left & right sides. You're correct in thinking turning up the trims full is *not* the right way. It will introduce unnecessary noise... and you can't guarantee that the fully clockwise positions match across the 8 pre-amps. If your source has its own level control, I would also set the trims to the 1 o'clock position first (unity gain) and adjust the source so the signal is at the -12dB level. Only adjust the trims if the source level range is not sufficient. After recording, compensate for any imbalance by using the stereo balance control. This is all in the Step-by-Step guide if you want further info; full details here www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html
Hi Phil: The first 2 inputs I am sending a music mix. The other 6 inputs are for drum mics. How can I get the complete 8 inputs to the stereo out, which I am sending to a video camera. I am not making a recording, I just arm the 8 recording buttons to get the mix all together.
+amy cardu hi - there are 2 ways of sending the inputs to the stereo outputs. One is shown in the "basic mixer" videos (3A onwards), and use the Assign switch to route them directly to the stereo bus. This is the simplest route, but the disadvantage is that the input levels are controlled by faders inside the mixer screen so it's a bit more cumbersome if you need to change them frequently. The other method is shown in the "advanced mixer" videos (6A), where the inputs are assigned to tracks, the tracks are armed but you don't press Record. The assigned inputs then appear on the stereo bus as this is effectively what you would monitor if you were recording. The advantage this way is that the levels of each input are now controlled by the physical track faders. Both methods allow the dynamic effects to be used, the Send effect to be added, and the input EQs to be used. The 2nd method allows one of the tracks to have an insert (guitar) effect added. It also allows any of the track EQs to be used - that's in addition to the input EQs. Hope that helps.
Hey Phil, I just got a DP-24SD, so I'm following your tutorial carefully. I just have one question. Why is there to SENDs, SEND 1 and SEND 2, if we can only add an effect on SEND 1, and send it on the STEREO BUS ? SEND 2 cannot be transferred on STEREO BUS, so what use can be made of SEND 2 ?
@Kerryann MARTIAL the send outputs are so useful, you might ask why are there *only* 2? Each send output offers a submix of any of the track and input signals. You can connect these to performers (via headphone amps, say) so they can play in sync. You *could* just connect the monitor output to all the band members, but say the vocalist just wants the drum beat, and say the drummer just wants vocals loud, but the guitars quieter, having control over each submix is a good thing. Another use is for connecting external effects units - the sends go to the effect inputs, and the effect outputs (returns) go back to spare inputs on the DP machine... you can choose to record these inputs or just route them direct to the stereo bus for monitoring (or even route them out of the other send output!). Each send output is mono, but if you want a stereo send, you can use send-1 for left signals, and send-2 for right. The internal send effect is always 'wired in' to the send-1 signal but it's up to you whether or not you use the effect. If you don't want to use it, just turn it off in the effects screen - the signal always goes to the socket regardless. How you mix & match these is up to you. You could have the internal effect on send-1 and an external effect on send-2, or you could have 2 external effects on send-1 & send-2 respectively, or the internal effect on send-1 and a performer's feed on send-2, etc. it's just limited by your imagination :) I think videos 5 & 6B have more info. Hope that helps, Phil.
Hi Phil and thank you very much for all your great work! I just got the 32sd a couple weeks ago, and I'm having trouble panning anything. I turn the pan knob and the dial on the screen is moving but the sound stays te same? Most recorders I've used allow you to pan in either direction after recording the track but this one is not moving...what am I doing wrong?
@Tripp Smythe thanks for the feedback. The pan knob only affects the 'current item' - it's shown at the top-right of the mixer screen and could be an input or a track. You select the current item by pressing a track select button or an input source button - it will light up. In your case if you want to pan a recorded track during playback or mixdown, you need to make sure the track select button is lit. You don't need to have the mixer screen open as the pan and other knobs will all operate on the current item regardless of the mixer screen. If this doesn't work, you need to check what signal you are actually listening to. This is why I rant on about the block diagram :) If you are monitoring the stereo output (Monitor Select = Stereo), then the track pan effect should be audible. If you are monitoring something else, such as the Send signal, you won't hear any pan effects. Hope this helps.
@@philtipping Nothing worked so I called tech. We were on the phone testing this and that for a good half hour, and he said, "you need to send in the machine, something is wrong with it." So I got it packed up and ready to ship. Once again thanks again Phil, you gave me the knowledge I needed to get to the bottom of this!
@@trippsmythe9964 sorry to hear that. The only other things I can think of are: 1. Are you using the latest firmware? 2. How are you monitoring the sound? If you're only using headphones/earbuds, you could have a faulty or incorrect headphone adapter which converts everything to mono. If you've double-checked using the monitor or stereo outputs at the back, then yes it does sound like a faulty machine. Hope you get it sorted.
@@philtipping Yes Sir, we went over the output with the tech, he made sure I was using the 1/4" monitor out using monitor speakers. He had me create a new song, and yes, still no pannig so yeah I think it needs servicing, thanks again brother Phil!
Hello Phil! Thanks so much for your great videos! I have a question concerning the stereo routing. I use my laptop to make drum tracks for my music. I am using a 1/8" stereo male to (2) 1/4" mono cable (exactly like the one you pictured) to connect my computer to my DP-24. Your video shows (basically) the way I have been recording: from (Input A/B) to a stereo track. In the video you say that a stereo track does not need panning. What I'd like to know is: does this mean I do NOT have to pan the INPUTS (say, A/B: in from my computer using the aforementioned cable) hard L and R?? I get that I don't need to pan a stereo TRACK, but am unsure about the need to pan the inputs assigned to it. Thanks!
Hi +oneminuszero and thanks for the kind words. You don't have to pan the inputs if they are going to a stereo track. The splitter cable and your assignments have done that for you by routing left & right to their respective sides of the stereo track. Panning affects how a signal is split at the point where it joins the stereo bus, regardless of how the signal got there. If you're connecting a mono source to the stereo bus, either directly from an input, or from a mono track, you need to pan using the respective pan control. If you're connecting a stereo source (it can only be a stereo track because there are no stereo inputs), then you don't need to pan as the stereo track is internally wired so that its left & right outputs are connected to the left & right sides of the stereo bus. You just have the balance control for correcting any left/right imbalance in the original stereo spread - I use the balance for correcting old tape/cassette recordings, especially if the tape was worn or the heads were dirty, or with old vinyl record decks where the pickup head wasn't set up correctly... showing my age now :) Hope this helps.
Phil Tipping first: thank you so much for answering. I'm still a bit confused, though I'm probably just overthinking this. You mentioned that if you were using mono inputs you needed to pan to keep the stereo image. If I'm using a stereo 1/8" male (from computer) to TWO 1/4" makes (say, input A and B), doesn't that mean the inputs ARE mono, since the cable turns a stereo into two mono plugs? I know I'm connecting it to the stereo 13/14 track, but since the inputs are mono this means I still don't need to bother with pan? Sorry for being confusing!
No worries +Channel Zero, it's a confusing subject and really needs going back to basics to understand what the underlying signals are... unfortunately that means it's going to be a long reply :) but here goes... To create a mono signal in the first place, say using a microphone, you'd use one microphone pointing at the source, say a band. If you play that signal through a single speaker, the sound will appear to come from that speaker - there's nowhere else for it to come from - so the band will appear to be inside that speaker. All the instruments will be squashed up into a single point, so you wouldn't be able to tell how the band was laid out - where the guitarist is, where the drums are, etc. If you play that signal on a stereo system, i.e. through two speakers placed left & right, with equal amounts going to each, the band will still sound squashed, and they will also appear to come from a single point in the middle even though there is no speaker there - this is the 'stereo field', which is all an illusion. If you turn up the volume of the left speaker, and turn down the right, the band will appear to move to a position nearer to the left speaker. Adjusting the volume like this is the same as you sending more or less of the signal to the left & right speakers, in other words, you're 'panning' the signal. If you pan it hard left, all the signal goes to the left speaker, and nothing goes to the right, so you're back to the original scenario where you have one speaker and everything appears to come from that point. But no matter how you pan this signal, it will still only come from a single point in space because it's a mono signal. The band will remain squashed even though you're listening to it on a stereo system. Now to stereo signals... using the same setup, you'd use two microphones, both pointing at the band but angled or positioned so one picks up sounds from the left-hand side, the other from the right. So each microphone is capturing a mono signal (that's all the mics can do), but the actual signals are subtly different as they are from a different 'viewpoint'. They only make stereo when they are played back in a special way as a pair. It's like vision, where your left & right eyes see the same view but from a slightly different perspective. Your brain merges the 2 optical signals and gives you 3D (visual stereo if you like). It now depends on what you do with these two mono signals. You're right in that each of these is mono, and if you route either of them as in the above mono scenarios, you'll get the same squashed effect. In order to hear the band in stereo, both signals need to played through 2 speakers with the left (mono) signal going to the left speaker, and the right signal solely to the right speaker. The band will then appear (in your head) to be spread out between the two speakers and you'll be able to visualise the positions of all the players. The crucial thing is to keep left & right signals separated all the way to the speakers. If either of the signals 'leaks' over to the other speaker, the stereo illusion will be lost or reduced. So back to your computer scenario, you've got your left & right signals on two separate cables. You're right, they are both mono signals, but they must be kept separated if you want to hear stereo. You use two mono inputs on the mixer - fair enough, but now you have a decision as to how they end up on the stereo bus... which will eventually go to your left & right speakers. Option 1 is to route them independently direct to the stereo bus, in which case you have to pan the left input left, and the right input right - using the input pans. Option 2 is to route them independently to 2 mono tracks, then pan the mono tracks onto the stereo bus using the track pans. In both these cases, if you don't pan, each mono signal will be split equally across left and right sides of the stereo bus, i.e. it will appear central in the stereo field when you listen (that's what the C stands for on the pan controls), so you will have lost the stereo effect - the band will appear squashed to a single point. Option 3 is to route them to a stereo track. When you assign, say inputs A & B to a stereo track, it means A goes to the left part of the track, and B goes to the right, so the track itself keeps the 2 signals separate. The stereo track output is pre-wired onto the stereo bus such that its left part goes to the left side and vice versa, so again the signals are kept separate. So using this option retains the stereo effect without having to pan anything. Phew! Bit long-winded I'm afraid, but hope that's helped. Just shout if it's still not right :)
Phil Tipping I can't thank you enough for taking the time to explain that! I've actually been recording using TASCAM 4-tracks since 1993. I was given a copy of 'The Recording Studio Handbook' by a friend who attended Full Sail Audio-Video Technical College in Florida (the book was the basic textbook used at that time)...and you did a MUCH better job of explaining stereo/mono panning and the stereo field than the book! I've only recently gone to digital, and tho I find the DP-24 a bit odd to use in places, with your help I feel much more confident with the machine. Thanks again
Phil Tipping I would like to add one further thing just so I'm sure I get the options you've outlined. I'm sorry to be taking up so much of your time! What is the difference between Option 1 and Option 3? Let me see if I can answer it; if I can then I understand perfectly. Option 1: two inputs using a cable from a stereo source. Input A panned hard L and Input B panned hard R. The two inputs would be assigned to the stereo bus (or recorded onto two mono tracks; if this is performed, the track pans must ALSO be panned to preserve the image). Option 3: Input A and Input B are assigned directly to a stereo track (say 13/14). Because it is a stereo track, panning is not required on either the inputs or on the tracks (tracks route it L and R automatically). so...did I get it right? Thanks Phil!
Hey Phil, good tutorial thank you. I've been recording my tracks in two mono on the combined tracks..... say 9/10 but then doing my mixing on the computer. Panning on two separate tracks in daw. I did not do the separate panning on the tascam recording in. Would that make a difference in my recording ? I'm aware it would if I was mixing in the tascam. I would think those two separate mono tracks would have the same sound just separated to two channels when dropping them into the computer.
@djspinista thanks for the feedback. There is no need to pan anything during recording; panning only affects the playback or monitoring of the signals. If you record to 2 mono tracks, you only need to pan these left & right when playing them back (which includes mixing or bouncing). If you export them to a DAW, you need to pan them left & right within the DAW. If you record to a stereo track, there is no need to pan anything during playback or mixing. However, if you export a stereo track, the DP machine generates 2 separate files for left & right so you have to treat them as mono files inside a DAW and pan them left & right as before. If you mixdown in the DP machine, it generates a single stereo file. You can copy this to a DAW (you do *not* 'export' it) and play it back without having to pan anything. Hope that makes sense. There's a large section explaining stereo in the step-by-step guide if you want more info www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html
@@philtipping hey Phil I have another question for you , is it possible to do automation using bounce tracks ? For example do pan sweeps print that to your new track. From my understanding it's not but figured I'd ask.
@@djspinista as far as I recall, very few controls work during bouncing (I think only the track faders work), unlike mixdown where all the controls can be used on-the-fly. Pan sweeps will definitely be recorded during mixdown. I think the restriction is because the track select & input source buttons have a different function in bounce mode, so can't be used to select a track/input as the target of the knobs (eq, pan etc.). The later videos touch on this, e.g. no. 9 - bouncing vs mixdown
@@philtipping oh okay, that's what I though . So detailed mixes should be done in a daw . I dont have enough arms to do what I want in mixdown on one take .
@John Rodriguez I presume you mean can you control the dp24 via MIDI? I don't have the MIDI model but have a look at the manual... page 75 shows how to control the transport remotely, and pages 101 onwards show the various track settings which can be remotely controlled. Try asking on the Tascam forum - there are definitely members using MIDI with their dp24 machines, so should be able to offer better advice.
I want to connect my Tascam DP 24 on my PC I do not know what cable one should use for it to work on my PC makes me a tutorial to see how it can be connecter please bro👍
I may be on the wrong video. But I'm having an issue trying to find out how to record multiple microphones simultaneously. After assigning the track to the mics and arming them. I can only select one source to record and not of the other armed tracks record anything. So basically. While recording a drum track with multiple mics. All i end up with is a bass drum. I'm getting super frustrated.
@Scooter Wallace the track select buttons have nothing to do with recording - don't listen to myths on social media ;) You are correct in that you assign the different inputs (A to H) to different tracks (1 to 24 or 32 depending on your machine), and arming each of those tracks by pressing their Rec buttons. If you do this, all the tracks should record their assigned inputs when you press the main Record button. There are several things to check, e.g. before you press Record, can you see the meter bars for each track moving in the home screen when you play some drums? There are other possibilities which may need a lot of explaining. Contact me via my email address on the philizound.co.uk website and I'll try and help, or take a look at my step-by-step guide, also available on the website.
@@philtipping Thank you for replying! I have found my issue. It wasn't the dp24sd at all. Turns out I needed new mic cables. Sorry to have bothered you.
Hello Phil, I just purchased the Tascam dp 24 sd multirack recorder. After many years of recording with open tape decks this new recorder is a little bit of a challenge. Thank you for your tutorials they are helping me tremendously!
@PATRICK PERONE Elvis Tribute Artist thanks for the feedback Patrick. The Step-by-Step guide may also help if you are interested... details here: www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html Good luck with your recordings for 2019.
@@philtipping Hi All looks good. I notice in the Site address it says Freebies though?
@@mabcomp1 yes you're right of course :) ... but if you read the first line of the 'freebies' page www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/freebies.html you'll see there's no deception involved - it's just that most things there are free, but a few items are priced as I can't go giving away everything for nothing! The tutorial videos took many man-hours to put together but are free for anyone. I purposely don't include adverts (I don't like them so why inflict them on others) so don't make any money from RUclips. I feel it's justified to charge for the step-by-step guide which also took a lot of work for the 114 pages. Hope that explains it :) Thanks for stopping by.
That was so helpful, I'd been scratching my head for a couple of hours wondering why everything sounded crap and in mono, Thanks sooooo much :-) I'm a happy man now
@michael e thanks Michael, glad it helped.
Phil. Thank you very much one more time. Only now, six months after using my tascam I felt the need for more clues and did not know how to do it. I was preparing a recording for a children's choir at a church that I will be conducting from tomorrow. He was preparing the instrumental part by recording each instrument at a time, all on lane 1 and then used the "move paste" or "copy paste" to send to another track.
At one point there were empty tracks, but tascam did not give me the option to carry the recorded material to them. So I was converting each one to mono to show up this option. I was sad to think Tascam had fooled me by saying that the recorder had 32 recording devices when in fact it would have only 24 since mono recording reduced the tracks. Undeterred, I decided to attend your class that a few months ago I did not understand.
Today was very clear to me. Thank you very much, Phil. God bless you richly. I would like to contribute financially to you, but at the moment I am going through some difficulties and I need to honor some of the debts I have, but I came to thank you from my heart for your wonderful journey of helping people. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Joanilson from Brazil.
+Joanilson Rodrigues, thank you for your kind words Joanilson. No worries re. donations; they are a nice way to show appreciation for the work involved but not everyone can or wants to do this, and that is entirely their choice. Another option for moving tracks is the Clone Track function. This avoids having to specify IN & OUT points as with Copy & Move. The cloning is instantaneous, then you can delete the original track using the Clean Out function. The Undo button is very useful if you delete the wrong track my mistake :) Maybe also set the no. of undo levels to 10 in Menu, Preference.
All the best to you.
Thank you Phil. I think I forgot to explain that when recording the backing track I realised the whistle in 'Winds of Change was too loud so I stopped recording, edited down the whistle in Cakewalk and then hit play & record to overwrtite what I recorded. I didn't realise that my first recording hasn't been overwritten and was still there. I went back to zero on the counter but that didn't work. My brain was using the Tascam like an old reel to reel tape recorder. Anyway, when I discovered both recordings where there I found the end point using the jog wheel to access the point in the recording I wanted, turned down both faders and pressed play & record until I had passed the point of where the first track ended. That wiped out the recording and now I just have the track I wanted. Probably did it all wrong but my ancient brain can understand what I did. Thanks to you I have learned the following:
How to create a track. How to name the track. How to assign a track. How to pan both left & right inputs. How to use the Monitor and Stereo out. Still not got the source buttons sorted but I seem to have stumbled on what works. I am naming each cable I am using after removing them from the Yamaha and replacing some olderleads. I have tested that the 'monitor out' is routed correctly to my hifi amp and that 'stero out' is routed to my Compressor/Limiter and then on to my mini disc recorder. Never too sure about using the compressor. The best facility ofthis Alesis is the noise gate, but now I I have those lovely mute buttons back I may not need it to cancel out any clicks on my recordings. I spend too much time using the noise gate trying to get both left & right channels to end together. This is an experience for me and I hope I am not being a nuisance but its always good to discuss with others any new stuff you are using. I will finish labelling the cables today and then comes the major problem. Introducing my guitar and finding 'Small Hall Reverb' to add to a dry recording and to use it in play for rehearsal. My guitar is through a Fender Mustang amp that Fender have programmed for me to the 1957 setting I wanted. They listened to me play and then made the patch for me, sending it to my amp using WiFi. Also to my phone so if I want to go to a guitar shop and test any guitars, as long as there is a Fender amp in store I just need to point my phone at it and my sound is installed. Very clever. Then the signal goes through a 20 year old Zoom 508 programmed by Geoff Strachan for sounds of The Shadows. This was invaluable when I used to do 3 Gigs a week performing a tribute to The Shadows. I will now learn 'Wind Of Change' before I look for my reverbs so if I get a good result I can just record it, then on to mini disc, and finally a copy to CD written optically and then back to the PC to save as a WAV file for sending on to the studio for my next CD. I wait until I have all 20 tracks done then send the WAV files using SMASH to the studio. Best bulk transfer I have used. Thanks again for listening. Peter.
PS Please send me a note of your address if you would like a complimedntary copy of my new CD or anything on my web site.
@Peter Williams Ok Peter, thanks. Glad it's all coming together. You did explain about the whistle being too loud and having to re-record the backing.
I was only commenting about your statement "turned down both faders and pressed play & record". Turning down faders is not necessary as they do not control the recording level. You could have left them up and the track would still have been erased.
I also notice you say "pressed play & record". This is not necessary either. You do not need to press Play. It's not quite like the old tape machines where you had to press both buttons at the same time. You only need to press Record. In fact it's safer to just press Record even though pressing both buttons seems to work, because if you accidentally press the Play button a fraction before the Record button, the machine will just start playing; it won't record.
Anyway, these are all minor points :)
Fascinated to hear about the Fender programming system; I didn't know about this, but sounds a great idea.
Thank you for your offers. Might be better to use email for more details (and also easier for me to use if you have any more questions - I find RUclips messaging is a bit cumbersome). My address is patipping at gmail dot com.
Thank you for your reply. I'm glad you enjoyed my videos. I have just finished my 24th guitar instrumental CD and realised it was time to dump the Yamaha AW16G as like myself, it is worn out! I'm pleased to be going back to Tascam but as yet, haven't plugged it in, but the manual is already in the bin like every other manual I have ever had. I have never used the on board recording facilities other than my backing tracks and guitar. I send the stereo mix to my Alesis 3632 Compressor and work from there. The Portastudio to me is really a tape recorder. Great for recording backing tracks, guitar and panning. I edit the tracks in midi on Cakewalk Sonar which I have custom made in Denmark giving my trackmaker sufficient funds to live in the lap of lusxury, or so it seems looking at my bank balance!! I find panning an art form as some instruments can vanish if I go to a full pan left or right. Only the hall reverb access is preventing me from setting up the Tascam. I learnt on the old 688 usuing external FX and I sorely missed the mute buttons when it died. As you can hear from my videos I love the clean sound. Bert Weedon always told me less is more. A very good teacher and could get very cross if I made any mistakes, as he told me if I read the piece correctly there would be no mistakes! Anyway, not sure if I should look for an old external reverb unit which would give me control. My Fender amp goes directly to an ancient ZOOM FX programmed by Geoffrey Strachan. Apparently worth money these days. The Tascam to suit me would need a switch and control to access the FX to switch between dry and added FX divided between Monitor Out and Setereo Out in an ideal world. Is that possible? The only on board FX I used on the Yamaha was Hall Reverb. Thanks again for your asdvice but I need to get it as simple as using an old reel to reel tape recorder. Thank you.
@Peter Williams Well you've done an excellent job. Wish I could play guitar half as well as you :)
Yes the DP machine can be used just like a tape recorder; that's one of its attractions. The complications come when you want to add fx or do any processing, and then you just have to bite the bullet and enter the wonderful world of multi-track recording. You've already exploited some of that potential by using the tracks for different takes and then deciding which is the best, but there's so much more than that.
The internal send effect system is worth getting to grips with as it opens up a lot of potential within the machine. It's covered in video #5. As mentioned before, once you enable send-1 you can add one of the many effect types in the send effect section to any track (or tracks) during playback, and it will mixed along with the backing and appear at the stereo outputs so you can pass it through your Alesis unit.
I know it may not be applicable to you (yet!), but you could also use the send outputs (there are 2 completely separate signals) for anything else, such as independent sub-mixes for other performers who maybe want to just hear the backing and not your guitar (say), or maybe they want to hear the guitar but not quite so loud. The possibilities are limited by your imagination :)
But there's nothing to stop you using the machine as you are, and simply adding an external reverb unit in the signal path. This may be a better choice for you if you can get a good quality one and don't mind the extra wiring.
Either way, if you want easy step by step instructions for various tasks on the DP machine, my Step-by-Step guide may help. Full details are here www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html There's a small extract from the guide you can view/download which contains the full index plus a few random pages so you can see what topics it covers and whether you like the style.
Thank you for your great effort, hope some people realize how much they are getting and donate something.
Thank you for the kind words and support Vladimir.
Thank you for the tutorial, I got mine in 2013 and still working great.
Thanks for the feedback +J0ZZE123
Wow I Get it now Thanks For All your Tascam Dp 32 Videos Great Work
@KountryCuz1 thank you Danny and nice to hear from you after all these years. Nice to see your channel still going strong. Good luck with your lap steel projects. You make it look so easy :)
Hello Phil.
First of all, thank you very much for your altruism, it's nice to find people like you in the network.
I'm very new in the hardware mixing/recording world, and I have a couple of doubts (hundreds, being honest). Le me "briefly" introduce my personal situation:
Music is my hobby. I've been playing electric guitar since i was 11 years old (I'm 27 righ now). Pro Tools has been my main software this las 2-3 years, with a modest audio interface, and a modest PC. As a result, I'm SICK of PC and software! Lately I've been learning synth/drum machine sequencing and I'm finaly geting what is meant to be a "live set up":
Waldorf Blofeld (Stereo Synt) and Moog Minitaur (Mono synth), are going to be sequenced from a Elektron Digitakt (Stereo Drum machine/Sampler) while I play guitar and sing.
I was going to purchase a Yamaha MG12XU as my mixer (being only able to record my stereo signal in a DAW) when i found Tascam DP-32-SD and your brilliant tutorials, wich convinced me on buying the tascam with no doubt. Now my newbie questions are:
1.- Is the general quality of sound going to be affected by the fact of being a digital mixer instead of an analog mixer when playing live? Isn't it, really?
2.- I'd also like to use a Lexicon MX400 efect processor to process the 2 aux send, wich means I'm runing out of inputs (2 stereo signals + 2 fx returns + 3 mono signals (moog+voice+guitar) = 9 inputs. Is there any adaptor to put together a L&R signal in just one tascam input, being able to route it to a stereo tascam track without loosing it's stereo character? I'm not sure if I'm explaining myself well.
Thanks in advance. Excuse me for my english and the long text. Hope you can help me.
Hugs from Spain!
+RolanRock thank you for the kind words re. the videos, glad they are useful for you. The machine is capable of CD-quality and beyond. A commercial CD uses 16-bit, 44.1KHz digital format, which is the lowest of the 4 possible quality settings. Whether or not you can hear a difference between this and whatever analogue mixer you are wanting to compare it with really depends on your expectations, and all the other gear in the chain of course, such as the power amps, loudspeakers etc. As you've already seen, the machine is limited to 8 inputs, so again it depends on what your requirements are. You can certainly combine/mix as many signals as you like using an external mixer, digital or analogue, and then use its stereo output to feed 2 inputs on the dp32. The 2 inputs could either be assigned directly to the stereo bus so they come out live in stereo, and/or you could assign them to a stereo track for recording. The disadvantage is that the mix of these external signals cannot be changed after the recording, so if multi-track recording & mixing is really what you want, but with more than 8 inputs, then this may not be the right machine for you. I don't know if there are any other free-standing machines out there which can handle more than 8 simultaneous inputs - maybe the Zoom Livetrack? You may have to stick with a computer-based solution with an audio-USB interface which can handle lots of inputs.... but make sure you really do want to record more than 8 things simultaneously - one of the advantages with these multi-track machines is that you can overdub or layer things gradually and build up many more tracks which you can then mix and master later in the process. If there's only one of you, then you may find the latter approach is more manageable, in which case this machine may be perfect for you!
Re. the MX400 - the only thing I would check is whether the send levels on the dp32 are sufficient to drive the Lexicon. I know of one user with a LX300 who found the input lights were barely flickering even with the send levels up full. Some FX boxes have a switch on their inputs to allow the lower level '-10' signals to be used, but I notice the MX300 & MX400 do not, and they work best with the higher '+4' signals. May be worth asking on the Tascam forum to see if anyone has tried this.
Thank you very much for the quick answer. Great MX400 advice, I'll check the forum. Tascam is on it's way home :)
Now it's time to finish seeing your tutorial series.
Regards!
Hi Phil,
I bought the DP24SD to replace my worn out over complicated Yamaha AW16G. It has recorded 23 albums for me but sadly the inputs and faders are failing, so time for it to go. I won't miss it as this replaced a previous Tascam. A great big heavy lump of a machine. Tascam 688 sounds about right. I do miss that one. However, I don't need all the functions as with any Portastudio I send my custom made midi track from Cakewalk Sonar to the portastudio. Tracks 3 & 4 with a pan at about 12L & 12R. I find panning at a full 16 left & right tends to hide instruments. After recording my backing track I use all the other tracks to rehearse my guitar until I find the track I like best. I mix down through an Alesis 3632 compressor to mini disk that has the auto pause function, then optically copied to a music CD. I then convert to WAV on my PC. I havent set up the Tascam yet as I am concerned about reverb. I layer a hall reverb over my guitar tracks and I thought I would ask you is that easy on this machine? I only add reverb to my guitar not to the finished track. I like to record 'Dry' using my Fender Mustang amp and then fiddle with it. Your tutorials are enjoayable and anything is better than reading a manual. I have never read a manual so thank you for the great videos.
@Peter Williams Hi Peter, thank you for the kind words; glad you found the videos useful. Adding reverb *can* be easy, but it depends on your workflow and how you define easy :)
Whatever your workflow is, the reverb effect is only available in the Send effect section so you need to be comfortable with using the send system. This system 'taps off' a proportion of your guitar track(s) onto the send paths. You can normally choose either send-1 or send-2 or both, but the internal send effect is only connected to send-1 so you have to use that. So for each guitar track you want to apply reverb to, turn the send-1 control on (for reverb you would normally set it to POST), and then turn up the send-1 level and the overall master send-1 level.
This will route a proportion of the guitar track(s) into the send effect.
You then need to go into the effects section and select the reverb, turn it on, and adjust the reverb type and return level. The latter gets the reverb output back to the stereo bus where it will be mixed with whatever other tracks you are playing (i.e. the ones whose track faders are turned up), such as the backing tracks and/or the dry guitar track(s).
Your workflow will then dictate what you do with this mix.
1. The simplest method is to feed this mix straight into your external gear, so do all the above in multi-track mode.
2. If you want to record the mix on the DP machine first and then play it back later into your external gear, do the above in mixdown mode.
3. If you want to record the reverb to a spare track so you can do options 1 or 2 later, do the above in bounce mode. Obviously in this case you would only turn up the track fader for the guitar track. You will end up with a new track containing the reverb'd guitar, so you can then blend this with the other tracks during the mix later.
Hope this helps.
P.S. some great guitar playing on your videos - very smooth :)
Hello dear Phil. First of all you did a hell of a job on these tutorials. One word spoken, masterful. Still a bit confused I have a question. I have recorded a drum kit by using 6 microphones on track 1 - 6. Lateron I want to edit the drums with an external equalizer and a compressor, finally they are way better then the built in ones :-) ... but the noise suppressor does a good job. I have allready set the drum kit faders and panning to my liking and finally would do a stereo mixdown onto track 7 - 8 for further processing. So now going through your video, it would be possible feeding the external EQ & COMP over the send outputs 1 & 2 for L/R signals and then back into the machine and hopefully still keep the original stereo picture of the drum kit. Right or wrong? I would much appreciate an answer. Sincerely Mike.
P.S. I would have tried it out my self already but the whole recording equipment is setup perfectly in our rehearsal room and I want to finish the whole song recording first of all.
I guess you understand that. ;-) If there is another way to donate other by using paypal, let me know. Sorry I don´t use paypal.
@if6was9 ´ thanks for the kind words, Mike.
Yes you can use send 1 & 2 for a stereo send, as long as the left and right signals exist on separate tracks. If they are only on a stereo track, the left & right sides will be summed to mono when they go onto the send bus. If you have them split on separate mono tracks, you can use send-1 with one track, and send-2 for the other.
When you say you plan on doing a "stereo mixdown" onto tracks 7 & 8, I presume you mean bounce, not mixdown. Mixdown creates a master file, which is completely separate to normal track files. You cannot 'see' a mixdown in multitrack mode as it is not a track.
If you want to continue processing a mix in multitrack mode, bouncing is easier than mixdown as the mix is created directly onto normal tracks. This sounds exactly what you want as you can choose to bounce onto 2 mono tracks and keep the left and right signals separate for use with the sends as described above. If you bounce to a stereo track, you won't be able to use the sends this way.
It *is* possible to get a mixdown file back into multitrack mode, but you need to use a computer to copy it from the song folder into the AudioDepot folder so it can be imported back into the song... but I think this will only let you import the file onto a stereo track as opposed to 2 separate mono tracks, so you won't be able to use the sends as planned... note I haven't confirmed this so may be wrong.
Re. donations, other options are direct bank transfer or a cheque through normal post. I can let you have more details for either of these if you contact me via email. My address is at the bottom of the page on my philizound.co.uk website.
@@philtipping Hello Phil. Yes that´s exactly what I meant. Bouncing track 1 - 6 onto track 7 & 8. I´m German, so sometimes I get mixed up by technical terms in english :-) But great, so I did understood your overall tutorial. So that counts for your effort. Thank you again for clearing things up. You have been a great help for that.
You mentioned the audio-depot. I worked already with copying stereo-tracks from the pc into the machines depot and as far as I remember you can choose their destination, either on two mono-tracks or one stereo-track. Anyway, I will contact you via e-mail for further doings. Sincerely Mike
P.S. So far I´m really amazed how good this machine works for live-recordings, (in my case: drums (6 mics) & guitar (2 mics). Also thinking about the low price, I remember back in the mid 90´s working with the Tascam 488 MKII, which cost a fortune back in those days. End of the 80´s I used a Tascam Portastudio 244. Man, a long time has passed away since then. ;-) Cheers!
I was thinking about buying this. After watching this video. Not a chance.
@Jeffrey Holmes I presume you watched the series starting at #1? If you have and are still put off, the step-by-step can get you off the ground very quickly without getting distracted by the details. Full details are here www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html
The machine is a complete recording studio in a box, so if studio facilities are what you want, you'll find other machines just as hard (although as far as I know, there's only the Zoom R series which do similar things).
If you want to record and overdub using multi-track techniques and then edit, bounce, mix and master all in one box, you'll have to accept that this will involve a learning curve. When you pay for time in a pro studio, you're paying for the recording engineer's skill as well as the gear.
If you want a simpler way of recording and either just want a basic mix or are happy using a computer if you want to do more post processing, there are other machines such as the Model series or the Zoom Livetrak series. These let you record and do a basic mix, but lots of other things have to done with a computer. It's a tricky decision :)
Thanks for stopping by. Hope you find what you're looking for.
Hi Phil,
Thank you for all your help. So far I have plugged it in and in multi track mode I selected channels 3 & 4 and using the assign & faders set a level for my backing track in rec armed and ready. I then discovered how to pan both left & right to minus 50 and plus 50. I also did a full format to the SD card. That took ages. My mistake was as I was recording the backing track to Wind Of Change I found the whistle was too high so I stopped and pressed rewind and started to record it again. But, I was not aware that it had saved the previous recording and it won’t let me delete the track. I went to the end of the track and I then used the jog knob to wind back the audio very carefully to the end of the song and pressed record with both faders down and recorded over what I wanted to get rid of which was after my good recording . Not sure if this was correct but it worked.
So how to you clean a track out when you have made a cock up like I just did? My next project is to see if the track I recorded will play through the Stereo out to my external gear. Monitor out plays fine, but I haven’t hooked up stereo out yet.
So far so good.
Peter
@Peter Williams If you want to delete a whole track, press Track Edit and use the 'Clean Out' function. Another option is to just press Undo and your last operation will be undone.
You mention turning both faders down when you attempted to delete the track. Just to clarify, the track faders do not alter the *recorded* signal; they only control the playback signal. The reason it worked was because you had no signal at the input while it was recording.
Panning does not affect the recording either; only the playback.
I presume you are assigning the 2 inputs which are connected to your computer (for the backing track) to 2 separate mono tracks so that you can pan them to your desired 50/50 values. If so, you can adjust the panning *after* the recording if you like. Panning only affects the signal you hear when playing back, or the monitored signal during the recording; it does not affect the recorded signal itself.
When you playback, any tracks which have their faders up will go to the stereo output via the master stereo fader. These tracks also pass through the track pan controls on their way to the stereo outputs, so this is when you need to set them correctly.
These tracks can also be tapped off in varying proportions to the 'eff send' outputs if you configure the send system correctly. This can be used to drive external gear if you want, or the internal send effect for adding reverb etc.
Good luck.
I am considering this item but everyone that I have spoken to about it tells me not to buy it because of the limitations and frustrations of editing on such a small screen... why is there not the option to connect to a larger monitor?
Good point +FilmBizDude - there is no connector for an external monitor - unless someone comes up with a DIY mod :). I would suggest you try before you buy if possible, or if you're in the UK or have similar 'distance-buying regulations', you can buy it with the option of returning it for a full refund if you're not happy. I don't find the screen size too bad - for me, the frustrating is only being able to edit one item at a time as there's only one set of EQ, Pan & Send knobs, but for me it's a small price to pay for having all this functionality in one box. There are very few alternatives unless you go down the generic 'personal computer'-based route, but then you'll need to cost in an audio interface and a work-surface interface if you want hands-on faders & knobs. Even Tascam's Track Factory is just an ordinary PC, albeit optimised and pre-installed with a conventional DAW (Sonar), and a hardware audio interface thrown in to save you the hassle of setting up a system. At the end of the day, all these generic computer systems are still designed to be a jack-of-all-trades driven with a qwerty keyboard and a mouse, which is one of my pet hates for music creativity and the driving force for designing Sequetron :) ... as opposed to machines like this one with dedicated embedded processors/computers with possibly their own operating systems. Good luck and hope you find a solution.
FilmBizDude true it has its limitations, but it's worth the $500 bucks you pay for them. I recorded this song with these mix and I love it, here it is
ruclips.net/video/cIXg54gqv1k/видео.html
Hi Phil, you’re videos are brilliant. I am currently watching all your videos on the dp24 and this video is where I am up to so far. I’m a rookie. I am simply trying to record my guitar without getting any fuzzy noises in the background. The more I watch the more I realised how daft I was to even attempt to operate the machine with just the manual haha. Now I realise I probably wasn’t even recording the guitar through stereo. I was literally just plugging it into an input on the back of the machine, adding some guitar effects and hitting record. I’m just wondering will you cover more on how to record guitar throughout these videos that you’ve uploaded? I am going to watch them all regardless, I’m just wondering if these videos are directed at sound engineers etc, or whether I might be able to figure this out haha. Thank you and sorry if what I have said is a bit all over the place, I’m just in the process of learning a lot. And I won’t give up haha. Alex.
@Alexander Parsons no worries Alex, we all had to start somewhere... at least you're not afraid of trying things :) Nothing wrong with plugging a guitar straight in. If it's an electric with passive pickups, you might try input H with the slide-switch on the back set to Guitar. It may improve things, it may not, but it's worth trying. Setting a good recording level is recommended, and you've probably realised it's only the input Trim which affects this. The dynamics effects work on the input signals, so you may find the compressor helps to smooth things out, although these *will* be recorded so use with caution. It sometimes better to record with no effects and add them later via bouncing or at mixdown time, then you can try things over & again without having to re-record the original music. But that's getting into more than I can cover in this comment, so carry on with the videos.
There are no videos on recording specific instruments though - that's a whole other set of topics. The video series tries to explain how the signal paths relate to the controls on the panel. The idea was to give you an understanding of the routing potential of the machine so you can 'wire' it up any way you want - there's no way I can foresee all the different things people want to do. I agree this can be a bit intimidating at first, but the machine is a complete recording studio after all, so you have to accept there's going to be some new terms and techniques to learn - if you stepped into a real studio, you'd still need engineer's skills to get the most out of the gear.
If you want to get off the ground quicker, the step-by-step guide looks at the machine from a more practical viewpoint as opposed to 'going under the hood' so maybe check out the contents list to see if it covers the things you're interested in www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/TascamDp24-32-HowToGuide-166-Sample.pdf ... and if you still have questions after that, I'm happy to offer support. It's easier for me if you use my email address (on the bottom of the page on my philizound.co.uk website). I'm sure you'll get to grips with it if you persevere... plenty of time at the moment! Good luck.
Phil.
Phil Tipping Thank you Phil. Truly appreciate your support. I have a few things to do today with misses, once I am free I will give and an email and check out the link. Honestly thanks a bunch mate, people like yourself make the world spin!
Phil Tipping I have sent you an email Phil 😊
Hello, Phil, and thank you for all of this extraordinarily-helpful information (all of which are really great toward minimizing a lot of 'head-scratching').
I have a new DP-24SD. Sitting with my unit and this 'Stereo' tutorial in front of me on my PC, I followed every step (several times, including L and R panning) along with you, but when I raise my 'Stereo' fader to the max, no signal bars appear on the little screen, as they do on yours.
Can you please give me your thoughts on this ?
Thanks,
Doug in Chicago
@One Bad Apple Hi Doug, thank you for the kind words; glad the videos are helping.
Where on the video are you looking? Are you using live inputs? If so, have you assigned them the same way? It's better for me to use emails, so if you want to contact me that way, we can try and sort it out. My email is on the bottom of the page on my philizound.co.uk website.
@@philtipping Thanks for your very prompt reply, Phil. I just placed your website in 'Favorites' and will send you an email later today.
@@onebadapple5053 ok Doug, Email received and replied to, so we'll continue there.
Hi Phil. Thanks for your brilliant tutorials on this, it's really awesome!
I have one thing that I can't find anything on. When recording a stereo signal from two mono inputs is there any way to chain the input levels on the two mono inputs?
I find it a little difficult to set the precise input levels correctly.
What I normally do it turn left side up until I see it clipping and then find a level just below the clipping point and then I do the same thing with the right input level.
I know there is a possibility of turning the input levels to maximum on both sides and then control the input from the device connected but I presume it creates more noise compared to the previous mentioned method.
If there is a way to set the input levels simultaneously on both left and right it would be a lot easier to control.
@yezdk thanks for the kind words. Yes it is difficult to get both trims set to exactly the same level unless you use e.g. a test tone... but if you assign them to a stereo track you can use the balance control to compensate. It does exactly what you want - it adjusts the relative levels of the left & right sides.
You're correct in thinking turning up the trims full is *not* the right way. It will introduce unnecessary noise... and you can't guarantee that the fully clockwise positions match across the 8 pre-amps. If your source has its own level control, I would also set the trims to the 1 o'clock position first (unity gain) and adjust the source so the signal is at the -12dB level. Only adjust the trims if the source level range is not sufficient. After recording, compensate for any imbalance by using the stereo balance control.
This is all in the Step-by-Step guide if you want further info; full details here www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html
@@philtipping thanks m8!
Hi Phil: The first 2 inputs I am sending a music mix. The other 6 inputs are for drum mics. How can I get the complete 8 inputs to the stereo out, which I am sending to a video camera. I am not making a recording, I just arm the 8 recording buttons to get the mix all together.
+amy cardu hi - there are 2 ways of sending the inputs to the stereo outputs. One is shown in the "basic mixer" videos (3A onwards), and use the Assign switch to route them directly to the stereo bus. This is the simplest route, but the disadvantage is that the input levels are controlled by faders inside the mixer screen so it's a bit more cumbersome if you need to change them frequently. The other method is shown in the "advanced mixer" videos (6A), where the inputs are assigned to tracks, the tracks are armed but you don't press Record. The assigned inputs then appear on the stereo bus as this is effectively what you would monitor if you were recording. The advantage this way is that the levels of each input are now controlled by the physical track faders.
Both methods allow the dynamic effects to be used, the Send effect to be added, and the input EQs to be used.
The 2nd method allows one of the tracks to have an insert (guitar) effect added. It also allows any of the track EQs to be used - that's in addition to the input EQs.
Hope that helps.
Hey Phil, I just got a DP-24SD, so I'm following your tutorial carefully. I just have one question. Why is there to SENDs, SEND 1 and SEND 2, if we can only add an effect on SEND 1, and send it on the STEREO BUS ? SEND 2 cannot be transferred on STEREO BUS, so what use can be made of SEND 2 ?
@Kerryann MARTIAL the send outputs are so useful, you might ask why are there *only* 2? Each send output offers a submix of any of the track and input signals.
You can connect these to performers (via headphone amps, say) so they can play in sync. You *could* just connect the monitor output to all the band members, but say the vocalist just wants the drum beat, and say the drummer just wants vocals loud, but the guitars quieter, having control over each submix is a good thing.
Another use is for connecting external effects units - the sends go to the effect inputs, and the effect outputs (returns) go back to spare inputs on the DP machine... you can choose to record these inputs or just route them direct to the stereo bus for monitoring (or even route them out of the other send output!).
Each send output is mono, but if you want a stereo send, you can use send-1 for left signals, and send-2 for right.
The internal send effect is always 'wired in' to the send-1 signal but it's up to you whether or not you use the effect. If you don't want to use it, just turn it off in the effects screen - the signal always goes to the socket regardless.
How you mix & match these is up to you. You could have the internal effect on send-1 and an external effect on send-2, or you could have 2 external effects on send-1 & send-2 respectively, or the internal effect on send-1 and a performer's feed on send-2, etc. it's just limited by your imagination :)
I think videos 5 & 6B have more info.
Hope that helps,
Phil.
@@philtipping Ok I understand now the various uses of SEND, and its importance. Thank you for your work and your response !
Hi Phil and thank you very much for all your great work! I just got the 32sd a couple weeks ago, and I'm having trouble panning anything. I turn the pan knob and the dial on the screen is moving but the sound stays te same? Most recorders I've used allow you to pan in either direction after recording the track but this one is not moving...what am I doing wrong?
@Tripp Smythe thanks for the feedback. The pan knob only affects the 'current item' - it's shown at the top-right of the mixer screen and could be an input or a track. You select the current item by pressing a track select button or an input source button - it will light up. In your case if you want to pan a recorded track during playback or mixdown, you need to make sure the track select button is lit. You don't need to have the mixer screen open as the pan and other knobs will all operate on the current item regardless of the mixer screen. If this doesn't work, you need to check what signal you are actually listening to. This is why I rant on about the block diagram :) If you are monitoring the stereo output (Monitor Select = Stereo), then the track pan effect should be audible. If you are monitoring something else, such as the Send signal, you won't hear any pan effects. Hope this helps.
@@philtipping Nothing worked so I called tech. We were on the phone testing this and that for a good half hour, and he said, "you need to send in the machine, something is wrong with it." So I got it packed up and ready to ship. Once again thanks again Phil, you gave me the knowledge I needed to get to the bottom of this!
@@trippsmythe9964 sorry to hear that. The only other things I can think of are:
1. Are you using the latest firmware?
2. How are you monitoring the sound? If you're only using headphones/earbuds, you could have a faulty or incorrect headphone adapter which converts everything to mono. If you've double-checked using the monitor or stereo outputs at the back, then yes it does sound like a faulty machine. Hope you get it sorted.
@@philtipping Yes Sir, we went over the output with the tech, he made sure I was using the 1/4" monitor out using monitor speakers. He had me create a new song, and yes, still no pannig so yeah I think it needs servicing, thanks again brother Phil!
Hello Phil! Thanks so much for your great videos! I have a question concerning the stereo routing. I use my laptop to make drum tracks for my music. I am using a 1/8" stereo male to (2) 1/4" mono cable (exactly like the one you pictured) to connect my computer to my DP-24. Your video shows (basically) the way I have been recording: from (Input A/B) to a stereo track. In the video you say that a stereo track does not need panning. What I'd like to know is: does this mean I do NOT have to pan the INPUTS (say, A/B: in from my computer using the aforementioned cable) hard L and R?? I get that I don't need to pan a stereo TRACK, but am unsure about the need to pan the inputs assigned to it. Thanks!
Hi +oneminuszero and thanks for the kind words. You don't have to pan the inputs if they are going to a stereo track. The splitter cable and your assignments have done that for you by routing left & right to their respective sides of the stereo track.
Panning affects how a signal is split at the point where it joins the stereo bus, regardless of how the signal got there. If you're connecting a mono source to the stereo bus, either directly from an input, or from a mono track, you need to pan using the respective pan control.
If you're connecting a stereo source (it can only be a stereo track because there are no stereo inputs), then you don't need to pan as the stereo track is internally wired so that its left & right outputs are connected to the left & right sides of the stereo bus. You just have the balance control for correcting any left/right imbalance in the original stereo spread - I use the balance for correcting old tape/cassette recordings, especially if the tape was worn or the heads were dirty, or with old vinyl record decks where the pickup head wasn't set up correctly... showing my age now :) Hope this helps.
Phil Tipping first: thank you so much for answering. I'm still a bit confused, though I'm probably just overthinking this. You mentioned that if you were using mono inputs you needed to pan to keep the stereo image. If I'm using a stereo 1/8" male (from computer) to TWO 1/4" makes (say, input A and B), doesn't that mean the inputs ARE mono, since the cable turns a stereo into two mono plugs? I know I'm connecting it to the stereo 13/14 track, but since the inputs are mono this means I still don't need to bother with pan? Sorry for being confusing!
No worries +Channel Zero, it's a confusing subject and really needs going back to basics to understand what the underlying signals are... unfortunately that means it's going to be a long reply :) but here goes...
To create a mono signal in the first place, say using a microphone, you'd use one microphone pointing at the source, say a band.
If you play that signal through a single speaker, the sound will appear to come from that speaker - there's nowhere else for it to come from - so the band will appear to be inside that speaker. All the instruments will be squashed up into a single point, so you wouldn't be able to tell how the band was laid out - where the guitarist is, where the drums are, etc.
If you play that signal on a stereo system, i.e. through two speakers placed left & right, with equal amounts going to each, the band will still sound squashed, and they will also appear to come from a single point in the middle even though there is no speaker there - this is the 'stereo field', which is all an illusion.
If you turn up the volume of the left speaker, and turn down the right, the band will appear to move to a position nearer to the left speaker. Adjusting the volume like this is the same as you sending more or less of the signal to the left & right speakers, in other words, you're 'panning' the signal. If you pan it hard left, all the signal goes to the left speaker, and nothing goes to the right, so you're back to the original scenario where you have one speaker and everything appears to come from that point.
But no matter how you pan this signal, it will still only come from a single point in space because it's a mono signal. The band will remain squashed even though you're listening to it on a stereo system.
Now to stereo signals... using the same setup, you'd use two microphones, both pointing at the band but angled or positioned so one picks up sounds from the left-hand side, the other from the right. So each microphone is capturing a mono signal (that's all the mics can do), but the actual signals are subtly different as they are from a different 'viewpoint'. They only make stereo when they are played back in a special way as a pair. It's like vision, where your left & right eyes see the same view but from a slightly different perspective. Your brain merges the 2 optical signals and gives you 3D (visual stereo if you like).
It now depends on what you do with these two mono signals. You're right in that each of these is mono, and if you route either of them as in the above mono scenarios, you'll get the same squashed effect.
In order to hear the band in stereo, both signals need to played through 2 speakers with the left (mono) signal going to the left speaker, and the right signal solely to the right speaker. The band will then appear (in your head) to be spread out between the two speakers and you'll be able to visualise the positions of all the players.
The crucial thing is to keep left & right signals separated all the way to the speakers. If either of the signals 'leaks' over to the other speaker, the stereo illusion will be lost or reduced.
So back to your computer scenario, you've got your left & right signals on two separate cables. You're right, they are both mono signals, but they must be kept separated if you want to hear stereo. You use two mono inputs on the mixer - fair enough, but now you have a decision as to how they end up on the stereo bus... which will eventually go to your left & right speakers.
Option 1 is to route them independently direct to the stereo bus, in which case you have to pan the left input left, and the right input right - using the input pans.
Option 2 is to route them independently to 2 mono tracks, then pan the mono tracks onto the stereo bus using the track pans.
In both these cases, if you don't pan, each mono signal will be split equally across left and right sides of the stereo bus, i.e. it will appear central in the stereo field when you listen (that's what the C stands for on the pan controls), so you will have lost the stereo effect - the band will appear squashed to a single point.
Option 3 is to route them to a stereo track. When you assign, say inputs A & B to a stereo track, it means A goes to the left part of the track, and B goes to the right, so the track itself keeps the 2 signals separate. The stereo track output is pre-wired onto the stereo bus such that its left part goes to the left side and vice versa, so again the signals are kept separate. So using this option retains the stereo effect without having to pan anything.
Phew! Bit long-winded I'm afraid, but hope that's helped. Just shout if it's still not right :)
Phil Tipping I can't thank you enough for taking the time to explain that! I've actually been recording using TASCAM 4-tracks since 1993. I was given a copy of 'The Recording Studio Handbook' by a friend who attended Full Sail Audio-Video Technical College in Florida (the book was the basic textbook used at that time)...and you did a MUCH better job of explaining stereo/mono panning and the stereo field than the book! I've only recently gone to digital, and tho I find the DP-24 a bit odd to use in places, with your help I feel much more confident with the machine. Thanks again
Phil Tipping I would like to add one further thing just so I'm sure I get the options you've outlined. I'm sorry to be taking up so much of your time! What is the difference between Option 1 and Option 3? Let me see if I can answer it; if I can then I understand perfectly. Option 1: two inputs using a cable from a stereo source. Input A panned hard L and Input B panned hard R. The two inputs would be assigned to the stereo bus (or recorded onto two mono tracks; if this is performed, the track pans must ALSO be panned to preserve the image). Option 3: Input A and Input B are assigned directly to a stereo track (say 13/14). Because it is a stereo track, panning is not required on either the inputs or on the tracks (tracks route it L and R automatically). so...did I get it right? Thanks Phil!
Hey Phil, good tutorial thank you. I've been recording my tracks in two mono on the combined tracks..... say 9/10 but then doing my mixing on the computer. Panning on two separate tracks in daw. I did not do the separate panning on the tascam recording in. Would that make a difference in my recording ? I'm aware it would if I was mixing in the tascam. I would think those two separate mono tracks would have the same sound just separated to two channels when dropping them into the computer.
@djspinista thanks for the feedback. There is no need to pan anything during recording; panning only affects the playback or monitoring of the signals.
If you record to 2 mono tracks, you only need to pan these left & right when playing them back (which includes mixing or bouncing). If you export them to a DAW, you need to pan them left & right within the DAW.
If you record to a stereo track, there is no need to pan anything during playback or mixing. However, if you export a stereo track, the DP machine generates 2 separate files for left & right so you have to treat them as mono files inside a DAW and pan them left & right as before.
If you mixdown in the DP machine, it generates a single stereo file. You can copy this to a DAW (you do *not* 'export' it) and play it back without having to pan anything.
Hope that makes sense. There's a large section explaining stereo in the step-by-step guide if you want more info www.philizound.co.uk/freebies/dp24-32/dp24-32.html
@@philtipping thanks , makes perfect sense appreciate the help .
@@philtipping hey Phil I have another question for you , is it possible to do automation using bounce tracks ? For example do pan sweeps print that to your new track. From my understanding it's not but figured I'd ask.
@@djspinista as far as I recall, very few controls work during bouncing (I think only the track faders work), unlike mixdown where all the controls can be used on-the-fly. Pan sweeps will definitely be recorded during mixdown. I think the restriction is because the track select & input source buttons have a different function in bounce mode, so can't be used to select a track/input as the target of the knobs (eq, pan etc.). The later videos touch on this, e.g. no. 9 - bouncing vs mixdown
@@philtipping oh okay, that's what I though . So detailed mixes should be done in a daw . I dont have enough arms to do what I want in mixdown on one take .
Is there anyway to connect a d j controller to the tascam DP24?
@John Rodriguez I presume you mean can you control the dp24 via MIDI? I don't have the MIDI model but have a look at the manual... page 75 shows how to control the transport remotely, and pages 101 onwards show the various track settings which can be remotely controlled. Try asking on the Tascam forum - there are definitely members using MIDI with their dp24 machines, so should be able to offer better advice.
I want to connect my Tascam DP 24 on my PC I do not know what cable one should use for it to work on my PC makes me a tutorial to see how it can be connecter please bro👍
Hi again Lansan - you posted the same question on the part 4 video, so have answered it there - ruclips.net/video/i8hIfj9kT3w/видео.html
I may be on the wrong video. But I'm having an issue trying to find out how to record multiple microphones simultaneously. After assigning the track to the mics and arming them. I can only select one source to record and not of the other armed tracks record anything.
So basically. While recording a drum track with multiple mics. All i end up with is a bass drum.
I'm getting super frustrated.
@Scooter Wallace the track select buttons have nothing to do with recording - don't listen to myths on social media ;)
You are correct in that you assign the different inputs (A to H) to different tracks (1 to 24 or 32 depending on your machine), and arming each of those tracks by pressing their Rec buttons.
If you do this, all the tracks should record their assigned inputs when you press the main Record button.
There are several things to check, e.g. before you press Record, can you see the meter bars for each track moving in the home screen when you play some drums? There are other possibilities which may need a lot of explaining. Contact me via my email address on the philizound.co.uk website and I'll try and help, or take a look at my step-by-step guide, also available on the website.
@@philtipping
Thank you for replying! I have found my issue. It wasn't the dp24sd at all. Turns out I needed new mic cables. Sorry to have bothered you.
@@scooterwallace6119 No problem - always worth asking :) Good luck with your recordings.