Recording Tutorial 101 ( Cubase, Nuendo )

A Recording’s Success includes the successful co-operation of three parts

The Computer

The Sound Engineer

The Performer

 1.The Computer

In order to record a musical track successfully u are going to need a Computer(!):P

1.1.The Hardware

You are going to need a soundcard.There are external and internal soundcards.

Internal Soundcards can be either onboard or pluged in a PCI Slot.

On board soundcards are mostly designed for gaming and movie watching.I
am pretty sure you’ve heard 5,1  / 6,1 / 7,1 Surround modes etc.

All these features are not designed for music creation.So if u don’t want lousy quality and jacks’ incompatibility you need a soundcard that specializes in sound recording.

I would recommend an external soundcard and since you are new,a cheap one.

Here u can find two suggestions I have used:

Line6 Toneport UX2 (200$)

PreSonus Firebox (270$) (Changed my mind)

Motu UltraLite (550$)

Most external soundcards have Line inputs , XLR inputs,Midi inputs and Stereo Classic jack outs.

1.2.The Software

You are going to need a Digital Audio Workstation.A Computer program that offers recording, producing and mixing of sounds in order to make music production.

This tutorial will teach you the ways of recording , using Cubase or Nuendo.

So you are going to need one of them.The prices are really high.I don’t care how are u going to get it,but if u want to move on u need to find it :P

You are going to need Plug-ins.External or semi-external applications that use Nuendo or Cubase as a host application to produce the result they are ment to.

Suggestions:

Drums:

• Groove Agent 2 : Virtual Drumer.Can either play your compositions or Play its own.Fast,Easy,Light a little unrealistic though.
• Ez-Drummer: Virtual Drumer. Can either play your compositions or Play its own.Easy,Very Realistic,High memory and Cpu usage.Totally worths it though.

Guitars:

• Line 6 Gearbox Plugin:You can only use this if u have Line 6 Toneport. Powerful guitar and bass amplifier emulator.Realistic Amps,Very nice Stomp pedals,Easy interface ,lots of presets. Light. Impossible to use with any other soundcard
• Amplitube 2 : Guitar and Bass amplifier and pedal emulator.Ultra High quality, easy interface,many presets,excellent emulation,many amps ,pedals ,cambinets ,microphones etc.High Cpu
  and memory Usage.
• GuitarRig 2 : Guitar / Bass amplifier
  and pedal emulator,general effect station. guitar and bass amplifier emulator.Realistic Amps,Very nice Stomp pedals,Easy interface ,Vastly(:P) lots of presets,Vocal Fx,Medium Cpu ,Medium memory
  usage.High Quality.Not So Professional.

 Compressors,Equalizers,Reverb,Delay,Panners,Filters:

There are many alternatives.even Cubase and Nuendo have some (ULTRA-Basic though) by default.

There is only one suggestion I can make:

Complete “Waves” Bundle.

In this Pack you can find almost everything you need.

Tuners: 

    Autotunes:Vocals,Instruments. You enter the Key and the Scale.The rest is the program’s work.The result sounds electronic though.perfect for dance.not so good for other genres cause it sounds fake.

Celemony Melodyne:

The Best tuner ever. Vocals,Instruments.You can move every single phrase of a vocal track to the correct key.a little tough to use not very useful as a plugin but extremely useful as a standalone.
 Now we are done with your computer’s setup we can move on to the serious stuff.

The Sound Engineer

You are.

You need to combine all those elements to create music.

Lets get Started.

 2.1 Channel Types

The main channel types you are going to need today are 3.

Audio,Midi and Fx.

 2.1.1.Audio Channels

I won’t be bothering you with annoying theory.An audio channel is a channel that enables you to play and edit audio.Audio is a sound you can record from your microphone , an mp3 , a wav, a guitar recording from your line in.

2.1.2 Fx Channels

These channels host effects such as delay and reverb.So an audio channel plays.If you like you can route it through the Fx channel,Fx channel takes what it needs ,Audio plays as it is and Fx plays only the filter’s result.Most probably u did not understand.Check the diagram:

Of course you can choose the amount of effected and pure sound,also known as wet and dry.

You noticed something is missing right ?

MIDI

2.1.3 MIDI Channels

MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface, IPA: /?m?di/) is an industry-standard protocol that enables electronic musical instruments,computers, and other equipment to communicate, control, and synchronize with each other. MIDI allows computers, synthesizers,MIDI controllers, sound cards, samplers and drum machines to control one another, and to exchange system data.

says Wikipedia..In other words far simpler than Wikipedia's:

Example.

You play the piano and you have a Bach's Sheet music.A sheet music defines and describes the tempo,the character,the chords,the melody,the tone the key and provides every single piece of information, you need so you can play the song in the unique way the artist wants you to.

This is exactly what you need to use MIDI for simple but enough and effective procedures.So a MIDI channel is a precise description of what you want the computer to play.It is DATA and NOT audio.It can be “translated” to audio via a VST instrument.

The term VST stands for Virtual Studio Technology , introduced by Steinberg Creator of Nuendo & Cubase and then used by the most music editing software creators.

A VST ,among others, is a VIRTUAL INSTRUMENT PLUGIN ( V.I.P (just joking:P)
which can be used to define the sound that the computer will export when it reads a sheet music.OR MIDI.

In most cases it reads the midi and translates it to audio using prerecorded samples. MIDI
enables you to choose the instrument you want your computer to use,to play Bach's Sheet music (Or every sheet music you import or compose) and play it for you in perfect timing,dynamics, feeling,tempo,volume etc.

MIDI makes your computer a flawless instrument player!

I think u got it.Just making sure:P

Out_fking_rageous!!! Presonus Discontinues Firebox,Firepod and FP10!

Why don't they discontinue their brand finaly!?

I am furious!Just read at Presonus's forum that the above products are gonna be discontinued.

Not only they left everybody waiting for a driver for 10 months when windows vista came out.

Not only they left everybody waiting for a driver for 3 months when Windows 7 came out.

Not only their service is rude ,incomplete and stupid.

They unofficialy inform us through a stupidly designed-not-working- forum ,  through one of their non-working-employees that they will leave all their customers with a bag of SHIT in their hands since they will not even release the current Os's driver!

They will discontinue the products so nobody can sell the shitbag online anymore!

Fuck off presonus.You just lost 20% of your clients.This is a good reason to get rid of your crack,hiss,pop,clip,grrr,slrrpppp,ssssss,hjiij,$##$^#^*!$ and all the stupid sounds your fuking shitbox makes.

Cock shit floppy donkey dick

How to get Pre-Sonus drivers to work with windows 7

Upgrading to windows 7 x64 from windows XP was a really big change for my computer.
Among other stuf ,i wasn't sure if i would be able to use Cubase or Nuendo at windows 7.
So i decided to keep both OSs in dual boot mode.This one required partitions , file transfers among disks , search for drivers ,driver conflicts etc.

I also use a Pre-sonus Firebox ,a firewire audio interface.
After installing windows i decided that it seemed fantastic.Very nice interface, improved taskbar, smart functions , easier procedures.No Sound though..
I know whats going on , i thought.
I forgot to install the drivers.
So i open firefox right away and google my model.
Presonus has not published any drivers for any model for windows 7.
COME ON!the beta has been out for like 6 months!And the official release 2 months!
So i needed to figure out a way to make it work with one of the old drivers.
I tried XP x64.No luck.
Then i tried Vista x64.Still no luck.This one needed a little tweak to work.

To make Presonus Firewire Drivers work with windows 7 you have to:

Download Vista driver
Open Device Manager
Find the 1394 host
Update the driver
Install the driver manually
Then browse for the windows Vista Pre sonus driver in your hard disk
Choose it from a list(2nd option)
Select the driver which has "..........(Legacy)" at the end.
Click Finish and go to the right side of your taskbar.Your system tray.
Right click the little speaker and select "Playback options"
Click on every output and test it
Disable all the outs except for the one that makes sound:P and set it as default
You're done:)

In case something pops up that informs you that the device is in use, uninstall the driver and start over.

Good Luck:)

Windows 7 x64 & Music Recording

It's amazing!
How do they always manage to build things that will never work right?
I'm sure there is a huge conspiracy under this!
Let me explain.
Recording , in any 32 bit system is a piece of cake.The drivers actually exist,the asio workS perfectly(well you know..) , the VST's won't give you a hard time , your devices are compatible.
There is a big problem though.The limitation of the RAM your system can recognize is really bad for your work(all windows 32 bit OSs cannot work with more than 4GB RAM).
Your projects keep crashing when you overload them,even with an exeptional PC.The plugins keep growing with the requirements growing in double speeds.
So the main idea is that we need to MIGRATE to a x64 system to use more Ram.
This is not so easy since there is a whole page of incompatibilities.
There are plenty of obvious solutions that i can think of but nearly none of them actually work.
Let us assume that we are using Nuendo 3 or Cubase SX 3.We all know that 95% or more than the people reading this article have never bought a single steinberg product , but they use it all the time.Of course this is normal.The prices are EXTREME,the torrents are free and the keygens are the only working-as-intended-applications in the Web.
H2O served us all well when they were in bussines.Now i've heard that they work for Steinberg:p
My way around:
1.H2O made an application that immitates the usb protection device that steinberg gives with nuendo and cubase so anybody can use it without it.

2.They made only a x86 (or 32 bit) version (Among other stuff:P) and then they were hired by Steinberg.

3.Cubase and Nuendo 1 , 2 or 3 are not compatible with x64 systems.

4.Nuendo 4 that IS partialy compatible with x64 systems has not been cracked and you cannot find it easily.

5.In the HUGE luck of finding it(like after 3 days doing deep research even in malaysian grocery forums:p) it will crash every 2,5 minutes since the 64 bit desing is really poor.

6.Forgot to mention that you have to find it pre-installed and do major hacks to get it to open in first place.

7.Cubase 4 is the same mess.

8.I am thinking about all those who actually bought Cubase 4 and realised it will not work on their system.

9.The dumbest thing about cubase 4 is that if you want to use it on x64 mode(!) ,ALL (and i mean it) your plugins have to be x64.If even one plugin is x86 the script will crash on vista and will turn in a 32 bit instance on windows 7(RAM LIMIT AGAIN).

So if Steinberg is stupid , Windows 7 is Just dumb and Windows Vista is just Retarded.

At this point i started to wonder:
(Buying a mac and Logic or Protools was a bit out of my league)
Mabye i should swich to another DAW.I did a little research and i came down with SONAR.
Everybody sais it works with 64 bit systems.It actually worked with a single download and a few clicks.
And then i thought.I DONT LIKE SONAR!.i hate it's interface.I want to go on with the DAW i've learned to use.It's impossible!How do they always manage to build things that will never work right?


10.After weeks of searching a good thing happened.actually two things.
I came across a torrent: Cubase 5 air iso.
But of course Cubase 5!it supports x64 systems but there is no cracked dongle call for x64(the immitator i was talking about before)

11.Right before deleting the torrent and getting back to Sonar x64 or Xp x32 (:P) , a miracle happened.

12.I found a realy wise dude's blog.He was talking about something entirely new.
Why don't we remove the need of cubese to ask for the dongle from its code.
he had an attachment to his post.the fixed dll of the dongle driver.

13.SO THE Solution i came up with was:
Cubase 5 air iso + fix of dongle driver

I won't link because you should search and learn.
(if you need it badly though leave your email below)