Soundcard line-in/midi/I'm clueless issue

[flavio]

I'm trying to get this thing hooked up to play/record through my PC.

I have two RCA outs hooked up to a Y cable going into my line-in right now and I can only get sound out of my left speaker no matter which way I switch things around.

Also recording doesn't work. I'm not sure if I need to use the midi-out with the midi-in on my SBLive or if there's some other way to do it. The soundcard manual isn't much help either.

Ideas?

 

[outside looking in]

A little more information would help.

Let's see... the SBLive uses 1/8" minijacks for input/output, right? So the Y cable you're using has two RCA (male I suppose) connectors going to a single 1/8" minijack? If that is right, the first thing you should do is make sure the 1/8" minijack is a stereo jack, not a mono jack. The way those little jacks work is that different rings carry different signal paths (one for left, one for right, one for common ground). If yours has just two rings (or a tip and ring) instead of three (tip, ring, sleeve), then you're effectively summing to mono and sending that to just one channel (left, apparently).

Now, about recording... I'm guessing that since that thing has MIDI in/out, it will be needed to sequence recording properly. I think you could probably record just through the Y connection, but you'd probably miss a lot of the nifty things MIDI will let you do with that thing.

That being said, I really have no idea what that thing is, since I've never used anything like it, and can't really give much specific info on the MIDI operation.

 

[Leslie]

If that is right, the first thing you should do is make sure the 1/8" minijack is a stereo jack, not a mono jack.

* smacks self in forehead

DOH!!! That's why!



thanks for helping me understand...it was driving me nuts too

 

[flavio]

If yours has just two rings (or a tip and ring) instead of three (tip, ring, sleeve), then you're effectively summing to mono and sending that to just one channel (left, apparently).

I will have to check that. I swear I had it working before but it's very possible that I grabbed a different Y-adapter this time. I'll take a look when I get home from work.

Still doesn't seem to explain why I'm not able to record, but I'm going to hope that it fixes it anyway.

I'm guessing that since that thing has MIDI in/out, it will be needed to sequence recording properly. I think you could probably record just through the Y connection, but you'd probably miss a lot of the nifty things MIDI will let you do with that thing.

Ideally, I believe I should be using the midi connections. Although in practice I have no understanding of midi at this point.

The SBLive has a daughter-card which has midi-in/out on it although the connectors are smaller than the midi connectors on the 303. I tried to get an adapter at shop once and the guys had no idea what I was talking about.

I ended up with a adapter that I believe goes through the joystick port.

 

[outside looking in]

Well, from my understanding of the SBLive you should be able to record any signal coming in on the 'line in' input. So, you shouldn't have to use MIDI to record (though I would guess that the 303 does a lot of neat stuff through MIDI... like allowing your computer to apply various sampled sounds to the "music" being sent to it by the 303).

It could just be a setting in the SBLive control panel somewhere that affects where it records from (probably either mic or line input). Could be as simple as a box not being checked. If I remember tonight I'll take a look at my SBLive settings and see if I find anything suspicious.

 

[flavio]

Edit:

Forget all that. I found my other adapter which makes it so it now plays in stereo. I can also record now by switching between Mic and Line-In.

I have another adapter which converts the midi-out to the smaller midi-in that the SBLive card uses. I haven't been able to get anything from that yet though.

I'm not even sure where to start with the midi connections or even how to test to see if it's working.

 

[flavio]

bumped with update.