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I/O was: Guitar Rig



hi all,
hope i'm not hijacking this thread too much, but with all the recent talk 
of laptops, software loopers and now guitar rig, my head is in a tizzy...

so here goes.

if one decides to use a laptop and software to process and loop, what is a 
viable solution for I/O if you want to use a guitar amp?

I've used a DL4 and a RC-50 for looping, along with my pedalboard, into 
various fender or fender clones (i like that sound).

As soon as i've tried to run my guitar into the computer (iMac G5 with 
Alesis IO26) into Ableton, and then back out to my guitar amp, the sound 
always seems poor....stiff, noisy, lots of hiss. I've always been so 
disappointed with the sound that i was never motivated to get the 
looping/fx paradigm setup properly for my playing.

this is running my guitar directly into the hi-z input on my alesis, 
bringing up the gain properly for Ableton, then turning down the master in 
Ableton to match closely the same level as the guitar plugged straight 
into the amp.  I can do direct monitoring on my i/o, so i do that so i get 
no latency on the direct guitar...it goes straight to the amp, and then i 
do the loops in Ableton.

I realize i probably have an impedance issue here by running the output of 
my soundcard into a front end of a guitar amp.  But is this the only 
issue?  Do i need a proper DI for the signal going in to the sound card, 
and then an impedance changer for the output?

I have plenty of guitar amps, and don't really fancy the whole 
'modeller/full spectrum PA' type paradigm.  I'm just struggling to get a 
computer i/o to act like a stompbox pedalboard and rc-50 looper.  And 
every time i try i'm very disappointed with the sound.  As soon as i plug 
into my pedalboard and looper into the amp, it seems to come back to life.

since there has been much talk about the echo audiofire 2 (which seems 
like an ideal small interface) i've gotten the bug to maybe try again, but 
i know i have enough equipment right now to troubleshoot the issue on my 
desktop system before purchasing a laptop and portable i/o.

any info is appreciated.

rich




---- Mark Smart <marksmartus@gmail.com> wrote: 
> Hi.
> I just got a copy of Native Instruments' Guitar Rig over the weekend
> and I've been playing around with it running inside Ableton. WOW, so
> cool to be able to do that with low latency.
> 
> I think I can replace my entire jazz pedalboard with the laptop. I
> figured out that the "Sub" part of the "Harmonic Synthesizer" pedal
> acts very much like the Danelectro Chili Dog that I've been using for
> so long. Since it is based on the Electro-Harmonix Micro Synth pedal,
> I suspect that Danelectro ripped off their Chili Dog circuit from the
> EH. I dunno what is going on in that circuit exactly. It's not a
> standard octave divider like the Boss OC-2, because the output doesn't
> sound like a square wave. Sounds nice in Guitar Rig if you EQ the
> treble off of it and run it through the bass amp module.
> 
> Also, Guitar Rig's "Tweedman" amp sounds just like the "Fenderizer"
> pedal I built. Until now I haven't found any programs or other gear
> that can make these two sounds, so I think now I can dispense with the
> heavy pedalboards and use my Yamaha foot pedal to control the laptop.
> I'm pretty excited!
> 
> I assume there are other Guitar Rig users on the list. I'd be
> interested in hearing suggestions. I have version 2.2. I also like the
> Looper module in Guitar Rig, but might not user it much if I am doing
> the looping with Ableton.
> 
> -- 
> Mark Smart
> http://cdbaby.com/cd/marksmart
> http://www.marksmart.net
>