Weird distortion..

[riPaddo]

Whenever I raise the volume of the 303, the louder it gets, to more distorted the sounds gets aswell... Any ideas or have anyone experienced this before? I haven't broken it open yet since I'm not really technical in that way..

[roygbivs]

Is the red light flashing? Sounds like you're clipping...

[riPaddo]

I don't think it's clipping. Let's say when the volume knob is at 8/9 o' clock the sound is pretty normal and from that point, the more I turn the knob "open" the louder yet distorted (feedback maybe?) the sound gets. The problem occurs in the following hook ups:

SP -> Soundcard.

SP -> MPC -> Soundcard

SP -> (DJ) Mixer -> Soundcard

SP -> (DJ) Mixer -> MPC -> Soundcard

And whatever combinations you can make with these. Though, with headphones I don't think this problem occurs (not sure about that). Also it's definatly not my soundcard.

[cartesia]

sounds like its coming into the soundcard too hot - so the clipping is occuring in the soundcard, or in software.

does your soundcard come with any kind of mixer app? also which inputs on the soundcard are you using?

[riPaddo]

sounds like its coming into the soundcard too hot - so the clipping is occuring in the soundcard, or in software.

does your soundcard come with any kind of mixer app? also which inputs on the soundcard are you using?

I have the M-Audio Fast Track Pro. I have this cable:



With a jack plug on the black part thingy, and it's inserted in the Mic/Instr input of my soundcard:



The soundcard comes with Pro Tools (though I use FL Studio), but it's definatly NOT the software since it also occurs when not having producing software open.

[cartesia]

Do you have the buttons set to 'line'?

[roygbivs]

I don't see RCA in's on this.. Am I missing something?

[formal]

I don't see RCA in's on this.. Am I missing something?

He said he uses 1/4" to RCA adapters.... Just not in those exact words. I'm guessing that's what he mean by "thingies".

I'll chime in and say he's probably coming in too hot from the SP too.

[roygbivs]

I don't see RCA in's on this.. Am I missing something?

He said he uses 1/4" to RCA adapters.... Just not in those exact words. I'm guessing that's what he mean by "thingies".

I'll chime in and say he's probably coming in too hot from the SP too.

Oh gotcha. Do you have a volume monitor for your soundcard? You can tell if the SP is clipping from there.

[formal]

Yah the FTP has indicators on the front of the unit next to the inputs. Green LEDs are good and red LEDs mean clipping

[riPaddo]

Thanks for everyone's input, I'll have a look at it and get back at this topic soon.

[roygbivs]

Also check and see if you have a software that shows your soundcards monitors, mine has this and use it all the time to make sure all my ins/outs of the card are set right.

[riPaddo]

Pushing the button to make it "Line" instead of "Inst" helped! The distortion is gone!

But now, with the volume knob at 2 o' clock the sound is at it's loudest, with noise, and at 3 o' clock the noise slighty overrules the sound and beyond it the sound gets almost entirely overruled by the noise.

Is this normal? I haven't checked for software to check if my montiors (I use Fruity Loops as my DAW) are on the right levels as Roy suggested.. Should I still do that?

Thanks again for everyone's input.

[cartesia]

what you need to do is make sure you send the signal in as hot as possible, loudest samples without distortion, turn the SP up as far as you can without clipping, and the MPC, then use the gain knobs (and any other knob that controls the input volume) on the interface, then check the audio input levels in your computers sound settings/preferences.. if your interface came with mixer software then check there too. After that point any amplification will just amplify the noise at the same amount so its no help to just turn things up in your DAW/recording software, unless you want to use a noise gate (doesnt solve the problem, but removes the hiss during silence so it is only on when there are other sounds coming through too)


Basically you want to get the volume up as early in the signal path as possible. of course things like the gain knob generally dont want to go above 80-85% - in the very top they become less efficient so more noise enters (eg with the 404, turning the volume up past 80% the noise amplifies more than the volume, so its better to have it at 80% and amplify more later)

All interfaces have a noise floor.. yours is kinda cheap so it will be a bit higher, but it should be possible to record without it being a problem.

Of course you can just switch back to instrument mode and turn down the SP/MPC, I imagine the interface has better amplification than the SP, although maybe not the MPC.