Sound cards for recording metal music?

Question

I'm a guitarist and I record music onto my computer, mainly death metal. I noticed while I was on my grandpas computer that every recording came out differently than it would have on my computer, and I use the same exact programs/settings on each computer. Sop I was thinking how big of an impact does a sound card how on recordings? Can you recommend me a sound card for recording/listening to this type of music? I already have good M-Audio speakers

CanadaRAM · Accepted Answer

Music is music -- the sound card doesn't have a particular affinity for one genre or another - there can be differences between the quality of music capture and playback based on the hardware quality.

You haven't given enough detail in your question -- what computers? What was the difference between the machines?  Were these recordings that you made on yours and grandpa's machines?  What is your signal chain to record with -- microphone? direct input? 

You have to get a proper signal chain.  Plugging a guitar straight into a computer mic input will sound awful because the impedence and the signal levels are mismatched.  If you are using a microphone, the quality of the mic and the placement / miking technique makes a big difference to the sound.  The speakers make a big difference to the quality of the playback sound.  If the signal chain is correct the sound card itself shouldn't make a huge difference unless it is defective.

Read this guide to recording guitar 
http://www.computer-answers.ca/2011/computer-questions/q-can-i-plug-my-guitar-into-the-computer/

Hardware
http://www.computer-answers.ca/2011/computer-questions/q-what-hardware-do-i-need-to-make-professional-recordings/

Software
http://www.computer-answers.ca/2011/computer-questions/windows-questions/q-what-software-do-i-need-to-make-professional-recordings/

Prudence · Answer

Er... Why not record the guitars direct into Cubase? Usually, at a minimum, you'd pan one 100% left and one 100% right, I usually do that and then two more 80% left/right making a total of 4 rhythm guitars. Bass I usually leave central as with lead vocals. All of the presets in Addictive Drums have the mics and that set to panning in a fairly standard way, you don't need to do anything there asides write your drums on a midi track and let it do the rest. ... Have the settings however you want for the guitar, experiment. I believe lots of nu metal bands use a shitty scooped sound so way too much low/high and no mids (luls, the guitar is a ******* mid range instrument but whatever). If you're recording the guitar like that you'll need to run some cabinet emulator in Cubase with impulses loaded, that or your guitar will sound like something from a raw black metal album.

pragmatic · Answer

" the sound card doesn't have a particular affinity for one genre or another "

I could not disagree more with you cause I'm experiencing a problem recording metal with my sound card now.
Every soundcard modifies the sound in a different way...for example my soundcard an Esi waveterminal 192M transforms the bass frequencies making them way too much round to be listenable...I tried with an external soundcard of a friend of mine and the result is that the sound is modified in the equalisation too but in another way wich is quite ok, the bass frequencies are a bit lowed but not really modified.
So yes soundcards "have a particular affinity for one genre or another" cause with my soundcard clear sounds are really ok but not distorted ones...

Trending News

Sound cards for recording metal music?

3 Answers