Questions Questions

[roxy]

Hi everyone

I would imagine that you get articles like this all the time but here goes...

I'm a new ProTools User, and also new to the recording environment. I have a lot of questions that I can't ask anybody here in England as I don't know anyone else who uses ProTools.

I have quite a large budget for a home studio so I have the best gear I can find. Now I just need some information...and some talent!!

some very basic questions first...forgive me if they seem ridiculous

1. How do I play CD/DVD discs through the Digi hardware interface without routing through auxillary tracks in Pro Tools? If I select the Digidesign option in the output in the Sound control panel I get no sound, yet I can play the Alert sounds through it. I have the very latest softare from Apple - version 2.2

2. How do you convert your finished ProTools mix into a redbook CD that I can play on a normal CD player. I use Toast to backup onto a Yamaha SCSi 8424 CD-R. Do I use the same software for this?

3. Can I back up on to the DVD-Ram player as there is a much greater storage capacity?

4. Is the level of RTAS plug-ins such as reverb and compressor , etc, of a quality enough so that I don't have to buy much outboard gear? If so, which ones are hey? for instance, is it worth spending anytime of the DigiDesign D-verb that came with the system?

Finally (for now) here is the most moronic question you've probably heard so far...as a new Mac user converted from PC's, what the hell is the keyboard shortcut to open the Apple menu???


I'd be very grateful if anyone would answer these questions.

Big AL


Gear:

Apple PowerMac G4 500 27GB SCSI drive
512MB RAM
DVD RAM
Yamaha SCSI 8424 CDR
Jaz 2GB

digi 001 - Pro Tools LE 5.01

Roland XV88 Keyboard
HHB Circle 3 Active Speakers
Neumann TL 103 Mic
Shure SM58 Mic

Apple OS 9.0.4

[zavijah]

AL-

Welcome aboard.

1. I suggest running a search on the DUC (see big blue words above). There have been a number of threads addressing this topic. I believe one solution is to find a shareware CD audio player called Retro CD. It will read audio data on a CD, store it in a buffer, and play it back through Sound Manager.

2. Toast will do this, yes. For basic stuff it works fine. If you want to get into the nitty-gritty stuff, you'll need a more sophisticated program, such as Jam or MLCD.

3. You mean backup sessions and the like? AFAIK, yeah. Never done it, but I don't see why not...

4. Well, it depends on what you're shooting for, I suppose. There _is_ a difference between the quality of the bundled plug-ins and what you can get from companies like Waves and Kind of Loud. (As in, they're much nicer.) You can get by with just the bundled plug-ins, but achieving results that sound Very Good (tm) will be more of a challenge. Maybe I'm being too optimistic. Again, depends on what you need. You can download demos of plug-ins from some companies -- check their web pages.

As for outboard gear, bear in mind that the 001 induces a delay in monitoring, from I believe around 3ms up to way-too-long-to-be-useful. If you want to use outbard gear as inserts while mixing, this could be an issue.

(If you don't have one, and have the means, I'd recommend a good mic pre-amp. Will make a big difference in your sound.)

5. Uh, there isn't one. Menus can't be opened with keystrokes as they can in Windows. Sorry. :}

hope that helps

[nuke]

If you search on the user conference, you'll find a post by me explaining how to get the CD player working through your 001, on the G4 series.

There's a multi-media update from Apple to 9.0.4 that will fix the problem.

Cheers.

[hanszy7]

Hi, I back up to the DVD RAM drive that comes with the Mac, and so far I've backed five sessions without any problem.You simply drag and drop from the audio drive to the DVD.It takes about 15 minutes for a 24 track session.

[roxy]

Ok

Thanks for your warm welcome and your useful replies.

Nuke: I can't find the article you are refering to about CD/DVD with Digi 001. All I can fin dis tech article written for software programmers. Believe me, I'm not one of those! Any clues?

zavijah: After using Windows I love Mac OS,. I just can't believe there's no apple menu shortcut!! Thanks for your help otherwise

Big AL