Guitar -> Computer, practicing purposes, tech help needed.

[Silverburst]

Hi,

I'm in need of a little help or I'm afraid I'm gonna blow up stuff

Situation:
For practicing after 10pm etc, I would like to hook up my guitar to my pc and use software like Amplitube or Guitar Rig, using headphones, to do exercises, jam along with MP3's etc. So I used to plug in my guitar straight into the Line In of my sound blaster audigy 2, using a big jack -> small jack convertor (1/4"-1/8" if I'm correct), and it seemed to work, but the sound wasn't quite right (hissy, sharp, snap-crackle-pop). As for latency, no prob with ASIO and the Audigy 2, can even go to 2ms. Raising the latency didn't help the sound-quality.

So I start reading, and seems I would need a DI box to correct stuff like impedance, (as)symmetrical and balanced things, line levels etc. I quite new in that field so I'm looking for advice:

1. I don't want to spent a lot of money and would prefer to stick with my Audigy 2. Do I need a DI box, and which one will to the job ? I'm not gonna need it do to serious recording. Practicing in silence is the first target. I've been looking at some behringer stuff etc, but I noticed the outputs are all XLR, my Line In is a small stereo jack (1/8" if I'm right).

2. I have an ADA MP-1 preamp, could I use that to go from guitar signal to line level that will suit my sound card's Line In ?

3. Will I need a hardware cab simulator to go with a DI box ? Amplitube and Guitar Rig seem to have cab emulations or is that something totally different ?

4. Since impedance comes in the equation, I was wondering if I need to be concerned about my pickups: Dimarzio Breeds, Tonezone, and EMG81 active. (I remember the guy at a guitar store who installed the EMG81 that he had to remove the tone pot due to impedance differences between the EMG81 and the stock Ibanez V7-S1-V8 pickups).

There happen to be some V-Amp Pro for sale around here for 80€. a DI box strats around 30 new. Since the V-Amp pro has Balanced outputs, cab sim, and even a SPDIF digital output (my Audigy 2 has a 2-pin header SPDIF input somewhere on the card if I'm correct), I was wondering if it isn't a better choice than just a DI box (if I need that in the first place to solve my problem).

Thanks in advance.
a tech-puzzled guitarist

[drizzt75]

i use a mixer from my digitech warrior into my maudio audiophile and it seems to work fine i use evo's and a standard strat althuogh the warrior does have a mixer output also i use a roland vg-88 set to line out to the mixer into the card i know that creative cards are not the "best" cards for recording with asio recording tbh and a audiophile 2496 costs around 70 quid in uk if not cheeper not the best they offer but its great for 2 ms latency and is what i personally use for cubase (now using sonar cakewalk cus of vista probs with cubase )and you can pick up a mixer for peanuts to get the line input or alternativly just buy a decent multi fx pedal and run line out to the card althoough that would probably negate the need for using amplitube buta multi fx will give you more sounds to play with + be able to go sorta bypass ie use the naked signal with no effects present sould negate the need for a di box

thats my two cents worth anyhow hope it helps

you prob wont need a mixer with a single multi fx unit but as i use numorous fx units/ pedals at difrent times its easier than crawling behind my pc to change the wires

[Silverburst]

Thx for the info drizzt75, still a lot of questions unanswered. I would like keep things simple and affordable, so I would like to stick with my Audigy for now. I'm checking out the V-amp. If I can use it with the SPDIF IN... hope that could work.

[drizzt75]

yea that should work too i had a beringer sumit or other with spdif and could hook that straight into the spdif on the soundcard though tbh i wasnt satisfied with the sounds that produced

[mr.death]

I'm using a Behringer guitar link USB interface (50 bucks!) with Guitar rig 2 and after noodling around with the ASIO buffer I get 8ms latency with zero crackling and the guiytar sound is killer. If you want to go cheap(as I did) this is the way to go.

[finstah]

If your MP-1 has the switch on top you can do switch to line level

[Rip]

Originally Posted by pmike

3. Will I need a hardware cab simulator to go with a DI box ? Amplitube and Guitar Rig seem to have cab emulations or is that something totally different ?

Why not just go in through your GuitarRig pedalboard?