Ok so my band is using Audacity to record our stuff and going from an RCA (red and yellow) connector to a standard headphone jack into my laptops microphone imput. Im pretty sure this is not the way to be doing this because I want stereo sound but I think it is mono because the quality is not what I want. Is there a box I can connect via USB or anything to get good stereo sound from our mixing board to my laptop?
-Matt
Comments
No! I think that your connection is fine because you have two RC
No! I think that your connection is fine because you have two RCA going into the mic port on the lap top which is stereo. This depends (like link555 said) on if your jack that you are pluging into the laptop is stereo. mono has 1 tip and stereo has an extra ring above the tip.
Link555 wrote: Hi bwmac, sorry but I disagree with: No! I think
Link555 wrote: Hi bwmac, sorry but I disagree with:
No! I think that your connection is fine because you have two RCA going into the mic port on the lap top which is stereo.All mic jacks I have seen are 1/8" TS, not 1/8" TRS 1/8. The line in jack however is TRS 1/8".
Yes. And maybe not. Find out what the input actually is. Some soundcards have a separate mic and line input, and some may just have one input that has it's levels set in software.
If you are stuck with a mono input, you have no choice but to buy an external FireWire or USB interface, and connect that.
Unless you record one track at a time, and pan them in the software so they are right and left at the output.
BTW, mentioned in the first post is that you have an "RCA red and yellow connectors". Odd thing that is, since yellow is usually a video jack, and the cables are slightly different in electrical properties. Of course, it could just be an oddball cable or something, and may be fine. I'd still wonder about that statement, though. Should be a red and black, or red and white pair. Check that? I can see no application for a Y-stereo 1/8" to two mono RCA cables being one audio and one video. Just wondering.
Kapt.Krunch
One other thing that hasn't been mentioned yet: Some soundcards
One other thing that hasn't been mentioned yet:
Some soundcards utilize a TRS mic connector which carries voltage for certain multimedia mics (on old ISA Soundblasters it's on the tip, on others it's usually on the ring), that's something you don't want going up the wire to your mixer.
SON4R - Get a USB or FW PRE/ADC box and remove the soundcard from the equation altogether. Link posted a decent cost effective box, check it out.
Standard Stereo jack (i.e. headphone jack) has two unbalanced co
Standard Stereo jack (i.e. headphone jack) has two unbalanced connections.(Some people call them 1/8” TRS jacks) One for the left side and one for the right side. However the standard 1/8” microphone jack as only one unbalanced connection. So yes you are losing a side of audio through your mic jack.
M-audio makes so pretty cheap stereo input USB based boxes.
http://www.m-audio.com
Good Luck!