Recording Guitar in Ctrl Rm. Guitar - Amp Question

[brad.bjmmusic]

I want to be able to record a guitar being played in my control room from an amp in an iso booth say 50 ft away. What is the best way to connect the guitar to the amp over a long distance? A Passive or Active DI? Signal Booster (sound coloration issues)? a heavily sheilded 50' instrument cable?

[dashamu]

check out the SGI (studio guitar interface) from Radial.
It works great. Two boxes connected by XLR cable. One transmits and one receives.
Check it out.

[DavidKmusic]

Sorry to hijack but I have a related question. I want to do the same thing as the original poster. I have a plate in a closet iso with two xlr and two TRS 1/4" which run through a wall to my TRS patch bay. What is the best way to send a mono signal such as guitar to the amp through the TRS line? Would the radial unit be appropriate? If I just used a regular DI, where should it go in the chain?

Thanks

[nicpope]

Reamp, by John Cuniberti

[dashamu]

That Reamp box looks cool but I don't think that's what the original poster needs.
Re-amping is what it sounds like. Take a previously recorded track (wimpy guitar) and feed it into an amp (after the guitar player goes home) to "re-amp" it and re-record a different (better) sound.
I think this guy just wants to sit in his control room and plug into an amp in his iso booth. I'm positive the Radial SGI will work. It does for me. There is another device by Little Labs. The STD. But that requires it's own guitar cable, so...

I don't know about the TRS patchbay scenario. There's a lot of info on the SGI on the Radial website so you can check it out. Mercenary Audio sells the Little Lab unit.

Once again, I'm using the SGI and it works really well.
Good luck

[brad.bjmmusic]

on the SGI. Does the product itself include 2 boxes? is the Recieve XLR box meant for the mic line at the guitar amp?

[Flymax]

little labs STD

[stevetgn]

Try this:

Mercenary Audio - Little Labs Signal Transmission Device Mercenary Edition

[stevetgn]

Sorry FLYMAX just beat me to it above

[roscoenyc]

another option is to bring the amp into the control room and run the speaker cable to a cabinet in the booth. Then you have the short guitar cable and the amp controls right there.

[Knastratt]

Originally Posted by roscoenyc

another option is to bring the amp into the control room and run the speaker cable to a cabinet in the booth. Then you have the short guitar cable and the amp controls right there.

Definitely! I do that all the time.

[dashamu]

Originally Posted by brad.bjmmusic

on the SGI. Does the product itself include 2 boxes? is the Recieve XLR box meant for the mic line at the guitar amp?

yes, you plug your guitar into the transmit box, run a XLR cable (up to 100' to the receive box, then 1/4 inch out into your amp.
The boxes are very sturdy and yellow.

I also like the idea of an amp head in the control room with a speaker cable running to a cabinet in the booth. If you do that you'll be able to dial in your sounds without running in and out of the booth.

[drBill]

Originally Posted by dashamu

I also like the idea of an amp head in the control room with a speaker cable running to a cabinet in the booth. If you do that you'll be able to dial in your sounds without running in and out of the booth.

Unless you're using a combo amp with head and speaker in one box.

[roscoenyc]

Originally Posted by drBill

Unless you're using a combo amp with head and speaker in one box.

all the time. speaker jack out. If you want the sound of a combo amp cabinet a simple double female 1/4" jack is handy for using another combo amp's speakers.

If its a little supro/oahu/silvertone or something w no jack it's probably 5 watts and I'll either just put it outside the door or set the thing behind the outboard rack with a dynamic on it and go.

[drBill]

Originally Posted by roscoenyc

all the time. speaker jack out. If you want the sound of a combo amp cabinet a simple double female 1/4" jack is handy for using another combo amp's speakers.

Cool. didn't think of that - although it require's two amps or a spare cab.

any thoughts on guage of speaker wire to run and length issues?

[maskedman72]

i third the little labs std

[vernier]

Its better to have the amp in the control room so your guitar interacts with the amp.

[drBill]

Originally Posted by vernier

Its better to have the amp in the control room so your guitar interacts with the amp.

OK. I'll buy that. So....

Length and guage of speaker cable before I start to run into "issues" with loading the amp or tone degredation.

[peeder]

You should certainly have the amp head in the control room (or wherever the guitarist is), but if you are using a combo, then you might want to stick with the combo's own speaker, since that is likely the right speaker and enclosure for that amp.

If you want "the guitar to interact with the amp," it's going to be the guitar and speaker that have to be together, not the guitar and amp! The "interaction" is feedback.

You don't want guitar-level runs over 20 feet or so although pedals can give you more reach. Speaker-level runs can go 100 feet or more, not certain entirely what the constraints are at speaker level, but there's not going to be much in the way of noise picked up as there are no gain stages left to amplify it. I guess you might get some time-domain distortion and level drop with really long runs of DC current. Do not use shielded instrument cable for speaker wire, but you can use power cord cable for speaker wire.

[maxy]

Originally Posted by roscoenyc

another option is to bring the amp into the control room and run the speaker cable to a cabinet in the booth. Then you have the short guitar cable and the amp controls right there.

I do this too and it works great. I'd do it not other way given a choice.

[Ollie]

Two Whirlwind IMP direct boxes. 1 LONG XLR and on each end of the direct box use a 1/4 inch guitar cable: one from you guitar into the one IMP and the other 1/4 guitar cable out of the other IMP by the amp into the amp.

Done

[whitepapagold]

Originally Posted by vernier

Its better to have the amp in the control room so your guitar interacts with the amp.

Oh please.... thats completely relative....


I track clean all the time like that... OH and it sounds INCREDIBLE. Jesus, same room...

[Musiclab]

head in the control room is the only way for me, even with combos

[vernier]

OK. I'll buy that. So....

Length and guage of speaker cable before I start to run into "issues" with loading the amp or tone degredation.

No, you just put the amp and speaker cab next to you at the console ..put a 57 up to the speaker, roll tape and blast away. It's that simple.

[philosi]

This was a big issue for me too. After trying and buying many other products, the Radial system is by far the best. Second only to running a speaker cable out to the cabinet.

Running the speaker out of a combo to a different speaker is a cool idea... Think I'll give it a try. I've got a 1964 Princeton reverb that just doesn't get used enough.

[syra]

I just got the SGI and I found it changes the sound. The problem is you have to use about 5 cables to make the connection so there is a lot of room for error compared to just using 1. My point is each cable will affect the sound.

I'll try the STD this week and report back.

ps. I'm using it in a control room/live room situation...

[dashamu]

Five cables?
I use the SGI with three.
Guitar cable into box 1. Balanced cable to box 2. Guitar cable out of box 2 into amp.
If you're using stomp boxes or other devices between the guitar and the amp then, yes, more cables. But that would be the case in any scenario..
As far as the STD goes, you have to use the special cable that requires a battery.
That's a deal killer for me. A cable that needs a battery is too much of a variable.

Nothing is going to sound like plugging in to the amp, standing next to it and playing.
Putting the cab in another room, running a long speaker cable, using the SGI or STD or whatever, is going to "change" the sound. And that isn't always a bad thing.
Especially if you're able to sit in the control room and hear some loud guitar in the monitors without blowing out your ears with headphones...

So, tune up, plug in, push the red button and have at it....

[syra]

Originally Posted by dashamu

Five cables?
I use the SGI with three.
Guitar cable into box 1. Balanced cable to box 2. Guitar cable out of box 2 into amp.
If you're using stomp boxes or other devices between the guitar and the amp then, yes, more cables. But that would be the case in any scenario..
As far as the STD goes, you have to use the special cable that requires a battery.
That's a deal killer for me. A cable that needs a battery is too much of a variable.

Nothing is going to sound like plugging in to the amp, standing next to it and playing.
Putting the cab in another room, running a long speaker cable, using the SGI or STD or whatever, is going to "change" the sound. And that isn't always a bad thing.
Especially if you're able to sit in the control room and hear some loud guitar in the monitors without blowing out your ears with headphones...

So, tune up, plug in, push the red button and have at it....

As I said my situation is more traditional studio...it goes something like this: 1 cable into the box, 2 cable into patch bay, 3 cable mic tie line, 4 cable mic panel in live room into box, 5 cable into receiver box.

Have you tried the STD?

I'd love to just use a single cable but I'd need 50' and thats I guess a problem.

[Kiwiburger]

I second the Reamp idea. Running balanced line level long distances is the safest option. Certainly better than running long speaker cables, or running unbalanced instrument level.

A DI or preamp with balanced line level output (not the usual Mic level), followed by a Reamp box at the amp end would work well. The Reamp box has a custom transformer, good hum isolation, and a variable attenuator for fine tuning the input to the amp.

I just ordered my second Reamp box yesterday, for a similar application.

I like to have a low volume guitar amp in the tracking room, but it doesn't have to be the amp you actually track. You could, for example, run a Pignose or battery amp and get squealing feedback, without the bleeding ears. Down the hall, you could be micing up a much larger amp or two, at much higher volume.

[littlelabs]

I don't want to interfere here, but I just wanted to fact check.
On the STD you do have a cable which you plug the 1/4" end in the guitar, or into your last pedal. This cable has the only active device of the STD built in it, a single transistor. The other side of that cable is a male xlr which you can connect any length mic cable or snake. On the other end of that you have a little box which indeed does have two nine volts in it which last a long time (they are only powering that one transistor). From there you have two guitar level outputs one with an earth lift. The beauty of the thing is its simplicity in having only one transistor in your signal path.

It should be noted, there are other ways to do this, which you might already have what you need lying around to do it with. If you have a good active DI you can use the xlr out connected to a long mic cable and then put a re-amp box on the other end. This will do the same type thing as the Radial SGI. But in this scenario (DI>cable>re-amp or SGItx> cable >SGIrx) you will be going thru a lot more electronics, including two transformers, and this, although it's probably fine for most applications, the more picky might find, for recording, your tone altered unfavorably. Anyway just wanted to chime in because when I read:

"As far as the STD goes, you have to use the special cable that requires a battery. That's a deal killer for me. A cable that needs a battery is too much of a variable."

It made the STD sound weird and in my opinion one cable and a box with a battery is better than two boxes and a wall wart but oh well that's just me. Oh well be weird it's half the price...
Happy Holidays
Jonathan