need advise; ditch ptle for a mixer/hd24xr or run both?

[maskedman72]

once upon a time i had a mackie 24.8 buss and a mackie mdr. my recordings with that setup sounded just the way i wanted them to sound but i was also in bad need of editing and automation so i got rid of that entire set-up and got a digi 002rack and a mytek adc. i had/have good preamps form my old setup to use with the new pt rig.(pair of ltd-1's and a gtq-2 and an mp2nv).

i have been using this ptle rig of about 3 years now and i have to admit that i have never been able to come close to the sound i was getting with my 8 buss and my mdr. with the mdr it was much bigger and full and more real sounding. more 3d sounding. i miss that sound and i wish to get it back. the question is what are my options? i know i can ditch ptle and go back to a mixer/hd recorder but i still want to have a daw for editing. my budget would be around $4,500.00

mabyee a hybrid setup of both mixer/hd recorder and a daw? i am thinking of adding a used soundcraft ghost and an alesis hd24xr. than i could get a fireport and move the audio into the daw for editing than back onto the hd24 for mixing on the ghost.

i am open to any options/ideas you might have. perhaps there is a daw platform that would let me record and mix with the board across all 24 i/o at once? it would be great to use a daw as a tape machine and do all edits in it than playback through the board.

[maskedman72]

anyone?

[Steffmo]

Get the mixer and something that gives you an additional 8 tracks of analog d/a. he behringer AD8000 might even be enough....at least to see if you like it.

You would have 16 returns from the PT rig...with a little smart subgrouping you can condnse your tracks down to that and use the console, analog outboard, and dedicated FX boxes.

The soundcraft will sound better than the mackie....should work. You might want to upgrade that D/A once you decide its working for you.

[maskedman72]

Originally Posted by Steffmo

Get the mixer and something that gives you an additional 8 tracks of analog d/a. he behringer AD8000 might even be enough....at least to see if you like it.

You would have 16 returns from the PT rig...with a little smart subgrouping you can condnse your tracks down to that and use the console, analog outboard, and dedicated FX boxes.

The soundcraft will sound better than the mackie....should work. You might want to upgrade that D/A once you decide its working for you.

so your saying to use pt as the tape machine and mix through the mixer? i would have to try this to see if it would bring back the magic that i had with my old setup. some may flame me for saying this but something tells me that using ptle for the recorder is the problem here.

like i said in my 1st post i had a great sound with the 24-8 and mdr. than i went to ptle and the thickness was suddenly missing. what i didnt mention was that about a year ago i got ahold of a sountracs topaz and an hd24xr and made a recording with it and bam!!!! the better sound was suddenly back again just the way i wanted it!

so im at a point where i am now hooked on automation and total recall but i have sacrificed the better sound for it.

right now i am running a oo2r with mytek adc and a digimax lt all clocked from the mytec. my main pers are 2 chandler ltd-1s so i should be getting good sounds but its just not happening the way my ears think it should be. there has to be a best of both worlds somehow.

[uncle duncan]

I use a HD24 for tracking, then transfer all 24 tracks in realtime into DP via a motu 2408, which has 3 banks of ADAT lightpipe. You could probably get a used 2408 pretty cheap. Or maybe RME makes a similar digital-only interface. With this setup you could use the HD24 for your A/D and D/A and stay in the computer for mixing. That's supposed to be the point of using a DAW - mix automation. But I only use my HD24 for initial tracking. For overdubs and mixing I use a Yamaha 01V96 mixer, which is really helpful when you need to recall mixes from a previous project. No guessing on the setup. If you prefer an analog mixer, you'd definitely want at least 24 channels. The 01V96 has 40, and that's barely enough, even with summing ITB, since I like all my drum channels in the mixer and not summed ITB.
With a setup like this, your bottleneck would be the limitations of PTLE. (No automatic delay compensation for plugs? You've got to be kidding!) Might be time to step up to something good. Most native DAW's run circles around PTLE, plus they don't limit your interface options, or your track count.
I'm a little skeptical of the neccessity for an analog mixer. If you get good sounds going in, why run them through another D/A - A/D conversion? Of course, many will disagree. However, a mixer definitely helps with setting up monitor mixes during tracking, which is one of the reasons I really like the 01V96. (4 separate monitor mixes.)

[maskedman72]

perhaps the best of both would be something like a mackie d8b and an mdr.

i also wonder what would happen if i switched from pt to something like nuendo. i am skepitcal that going to another daw platform would sound any better.