Help with gear and c/24

[thatboyj]

Hey family. I am pretty new at this. never was good at hooking things up, but was wondering if any one can give me some advice on hooking up my equipment with the c/24....
Equipment
digi 002r
mpc
triton extreme
roland rack
motif rack
cpu

ok what I'm trying to do here is hook up all my music gear so I dont have to be inside protools also I want a way so when I dump all of my music in protools than I can when i'm ready and not really deal with a lot of wires and switching back and forth. I went to guitar center and the guy acted like he couldn't help me out cause I didn't buy the board from them. So basically just looking for an easy way to hook up my gear and than dump all of my music into the digi 002r to track my sounds out. Any help would be appreciated..... Thanxxxx...

[Styles Bitchly]

Wow! That's almost like asking for directions to "everywhere" . . . . Right Now! Let me see if I can help out a bit, as I have also experienced the "Holy $#@!, where does this go!" syndrome.

First off all, either scope out the back of the C24, or open your manual to the page where it shows the back of the board. You've got all kinds of inputs/outputs back here. There are some "sort of" rectangle looking connectors called "D-Subs". These are the main ins/outs for your C24. You will have to buy connectors that are "D-Sub" to whatever fits the gear you're connecting.

What I did with my studio, in order to obtain the utmost in connection possibilites, was to attach everything to a patch bay - except the D-Subs that connect to my 192 I/O, which would basically be the same as connecting your 0O2R. The other D-Sub connectors go directly to a patch bay. I have patch points that represent every input and output on every piece of outboard gear I own. So, if I want to patch in a compressor (or any other piece of gear), I just plug in patch cables to make the connection. What you'll need to do is count all your inputs, outputs, and insert connections on all your gear, and that's the number of patch points you'll need. In my case I had to buy four 48 point patch bays, and all the cabling to run the correct connections. I hope this is making sense to you. Basically, what your doing is taking the connections on the backs of your gear, and moving them (via a cable) to the front of a patch bay (patch point). That way, you can connect, and disconnect to your heart's desire without having to fumble around behind the stuff.

Hopefully I have answered your question. I must admit you were pretty vague in describing what you needed, so I'm just kind of guessing at what will help.

Good Luck

[thatboyj]

First I want to say thanks for replying back.Ok this is what I'm trying to do. I want to hook up all of my music gear to run through the c24 without protools being on pretty much just monitoring through the c24. then when I get ready to track out all of my music from my mpc and keyboards I would like to record it or track it into pro tools. Also I have a set of maudio monitors and a set of krk monitors with a krk 10" sub how can I switch between both of these to here different mixes with out fooling with cables. I already have all of the dsub cables also. Any more help will be great. I will look into getting that patch bay too. What kind should I go with? considering I'm running le....Budget...hahaha... thanks family.

[Styles Bitchly]

Well, I'm not sure if the C24 will actually work without running pro tools on the computer. I've honestly never heard whether it will or not, so that's a question for one of our resident authorities.

I'm also not real familiar with the 002R, so its connections are pretty vague. I believe there are four XLR inputs on the rear, along with some 1/4" connections as well. You know what? Instead of trying to guess my way through this for you, let's do this. Where did you purchase the C24? Was a business, or a private party? If it was a business, you can get some help from them. If not. . . . well, then we're just back to "here" again, right? If it's a new C24, you can also get phone support from digidesign. You'll have to wait forever to get a live person on the line (and it's not a toll-free number, so you're being charged for the "hold" time), but it may be your best bet. the problem is that I'm just not familiar with all your gear, so I'm just going to be speculating about the proper fix.

You can look on-line for patch bays. I believe a 48 point "neutrik" (that's the manufacturer) costs under $100.00. There are many of them on the market, with many different features, but I personally like the Neutrik because of the way it can configured. There are some that have switches on them that allow to change the configuration, but I didn't trust the brand name. You'll probably have a million of opinions, and none of them will match mine!

Good Luck, I'll check back later and see if you've got any further in your quest.

[thatboyj]

thanks.. I guess we will just wait and see... any help would be helpful. Thanks.....

[chuck.dallas]

One simple approach to get started would be to patch some of your outboard instruments' alternate outputs directly into the C|24's submixer for monitoring. I believe most of your modules have more than 1 set of outputs, don't they? You can still patch the instruments' main outputs directly into the ProTools interface for tracking, overdubs, etc. But if you just want to fire up 1 or 2 modules, like the Motif and the MPC without having to load up a full ProTools session, just turn the modules on, the C|24 and the monitor amps and you're good to go.

[thatboyj]

yes I do have 4 more outs on my motif. so you say have my main outputs go into protools and have the other outs go into my submixer?. I will try that.

[chuck.dallas]

Yes, that's one way of doing it. To start, just hook up ONE of your modules this way and test to see if you'd like to do the same with the rest. For example, hook up the Motif main outputs 1-2 (not sure how they're labeled) directly into 2 of the 002R inputs, then hook up Motif outputs 3-4 into the C|24 submixer inputs 1-2. I believe you can enable all 4 Motif outputs simultaneously or maybe they already are (check the manual or test it). So whenever you're recording the Motif into P-Tools, you'll be using outputs 1-2 into the 002R. When you want to just use the Motif by itself without firing up the rest of your P-Tools gear and computer, you would use the Motif outputs 3-4 into the C|24 connected to monitors. Of course, headphones are always an alternative too.

I think Styles suggestion on a patchbay is good -- that would give you lots of flexibility. But to start off, hooking up your modules using the C|24 submixer would be quick & easy.

[Lizardpoint]

A patchbay is definately the way to go.

You can connect up to 8 stereo inputs to the C24 sub mixer and you can adjust the levels of the 8 stereo sources. There is also a master level for the submixer.
If you patch the submixer out to the external sources input then you can switch the monitor section to "External sources" and your main and aux monitors will work without PT running.

Things to note are that the submixer inputs are +4dB and alot of your keyboards/modules will be -10dB. I ended up getting an external submixer (Behringer RX1602) so I could have mixed output levels working together well (plus a simple effect loop)

The patchbay will have all your MPC/modules outs on the top row which will then be connected via normalled jacks in the Pbay to the submixer inputs on the bottom row.

Then when you want to track a keyboard part you patch that modules outputs to the C24 inputs.

Then you'll be good to go !

Happy New Year

Lizardpoint