Your friend may have been referring to something you need to do to route the source through a bus to a particular track on the recorde or the mixer ... or they may have been speaking about panning in reference to positioning in a stereo recording (one pass, no mixxing).

Recording a track and the copying it and panning the two left / right is still mono ... no different than having one track panned down the middle..

Kurt Foster

Thanks for your reply. About the second part: I thought people had said in my other post that if you record a track, then duplicate it and pan them to left and right (they did say you should put different effects on them and maybe time them a few milliseconds apart), you would get a stereo sound. Have I misunderstood something? Then I have to go back to my original question from my previous post: How do you record a guitar track in stereo?

PS. I have CoolEdit Pro and I choose the "stereo" option on the left and it divides the track on my screen into two. Does that mean I am now recording in stereo? (In the past, I was unable to even get the track to split into two because I was using a mono cable. I later got a stereo cable and got rid of that problem)

"Real" stereo is the use of two mics to 2 tracks picking up one source and the difference signal generated. Copying a track and then panning it left and right is still 2 mono tracks panned left and right. Adding delay, eq or effects does create an "aural illusion" of stereo but can also create comb filter effects or in a worse case scenario, even phase cancellations ... in either case it's still 2 mono tracks panned left / right to create a stereo image .... not real stereo.

I can't address the Cool Edit Pro question .. I have no expierence with that program ... You might ask the guys in the DAW forums about that one ...

Kurt Foster

I think I'm beginning to understand... So what would your recommendation be on how to record a guitar track in stereo?

I have an FX processor with two outputs (L and R) and a PC with only one line input. After reading people's comments on my previous post, I got a stereo insert cable to come out of the two processor outputs and go into the one line in input. Is this fundamentally wrong? What's the correct way? (It appears as though my Cool Edit now records in stereo judging on how the channel looks like it's split in two on my screen, but after reading your comment I'm going to ask about it in the other forum you've mentioned).

I guess I'm being a pain in the butt about this stereo stuff but I've got to figure it out or else it's going to drive me nuts :)

To record in stereo, you will need a soundcard that has stereo inputs, Left and Right. Otherwise you can only record in mono.. one track at a time..

Kurt Foster

Got you now. Thanks a lot!