3rd party mic pre's *DELETED*

[infamous plague]

Post deleted by infamous plague

[Soliton]

Max input for an Mbox is TWO channels. If you somehow how hooked up external pre's into your computer, PT would not recognize the inputs. Only solution is to trade in for a 002 rack and buy an external pre (preferably with ADAT out)

[albee1952]

Or use another program to record your drums, then import the tracks to your protools session. An 002r is just over $1100 and gives you 4 mic pre's+4 line inputs+ADAT lightpipe in which can accept an 8 channel pre such as Presonus Digimax LT($699). SO for $1800 you can have 12 mic inputs which should handle any sensible drum kit. Plus you get 8 analog outputs(phone mixes and external effects?) 8 ADAT lightpipe outputs and midi I/O. Plus, you can get a great return on your Mbox as they get $400 all day on Ebay.

[infamous plague]

somebody please tell why then the industy standard is protools? I can plug anything i want into my 2" tape machine and get the sound i want, likewise i can plug any outboard mic pre into ANY other software and make it work; but i can only use protools hardware with protools software. something just isn't right about that. IF it is really as good as the rest of the world thinks it is, one should be able to use ANY interface with it. I think i might just have to sell my protools rig and switch. I got protools because i was under the impression that this was the best software on the market today SOMEONE PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME WHY I SPENT MY HARD EARNED MONEY ON SOMETHING THAT WON'T LET ME EXPRESS MY CREATIVITY

[carbonunit]

Won't let you express your creativity ????

Sorry, can't make the connection.....

[Icabod]

Does anybody still make 2" tape???

[Gunnar Hellquist]

ProTools the standard?

Well, not ProTools LE at least.

The studio standard for a long time has been the full ProTools, HD or TDM depending on generation. It has earned a reputation of beeing a stable workhorse in a professional environment. Able to handle also large large projects using old times limited computers. Giving the engineer a stable platform to use his hardware and software effects.

Did you notice I wrote stable twice? That is a keyword in the professional word. You don´t want to have a computer crash in the middle of recording Britney Spears or whatever.

ProTools LE is something very different. As it is a "native" application it does not really need any specific hardware. Just look at all the others: Cubase, Logic, Samplitude, SAW, DP, the list simply goes on.

Locking in PT LE to using only Digidesign hardware is a marketing decision. Add to that a very hyped marketing where "everyone" knows that ProTools is the standard. Especially people who has never recorded themselves. The bottomline is that Digidesign is making money on PT LE. Which to me really is a good thing, companies that does not make money stop developing and supporting the products.

Another effect is that there is comparatively very few "hacks" of PT LE floating on the net. All the others are hacked all the time, which is a major problem. I believe that a few softwares basically has died from people not buying them anymore, only hacking them up and downloading. I believe SAW almost died that way. The world is cruel.

So forget all about the "standard", and look for each software / hardware combination on its own and compare what you get to what you pay. For many PT LE is a good choice, for many other choices are better. I switched to Samplitude a year go, not planning to go back. I keep my MBox though, the resale price does not equate the value I get out of it. Has added a Motu 828mkII instead for more channels.