Mic signal strength too low

[earwig forever]

I am using the Firewire Solo to interface the mic into Ableton Live 7 but the results are pretty disappointing. The signal strength is weak, meaning that I have to use saturation to bring it up to the right level for the mix, but this adds distortion. If i increase the input signal strength on the Solo I get feedback from the monitor headphones, as well as clipping. I have read that you need a preamp for vocal recording, but I thought that the Solo handles that? The mic isnt the best quality in the world, but it should be able to handle home recording. Someone said I should increase the buffer in preferences, but this is an input field, and I have no idea what is optimal for buffer settings.

[966sf]

FW solo does have a preamp. Too bad it sucks. Yup just buy a good dedicated Mic Pre or better yet a Channel Strip and throw it in line level to your FW Solo. Sure the converters on M-Audio suck balls but at least you'll have a good signal in the preamp stage! But then again if your mic sucks then what's the point of running it through a good pre???

Lesson learned:
Good Mic -> Good Pre -> Good Interface (good converters) = Good Sound!

Your setup is only as good as the weakest part of the signal chain. If one is fucked, they all are.

[Superchibisan]

what kind of mic?

[fishmonkey]

and what are you trying to record? even if your gear isn't high-end, you still should be able to get a decent level without full-on distortion...

[spiral]

The signal strength is weak, meaning that I have to use saturation to bring it up to the right level for the mix, but this adds distortion.

have you tried bringing up the signal with the utility plug in?

[capo-wear-i]

It should provide enough gain for close miking - please give more details including the exact make & model of mic, the lead you are using and the socket that you are plugging into on the audio interface. You should be using a microphone plugged into the XLR socket.

Under no circumstances should you be using utility or distortion plug-ins to bring up the level : If the signal enetering your computer is very , very low, you are effectivly only recording 12 or even 8 bits of information.

A utility plug in won't magically make this any better.

[earwig forever]

the mic is crap, as i said, it's a Proel DM200, but it is new at least. I have actually been getting better results by tweaking settings etc but if i turn the volume up to a decent level it starts to clip. It is plugged into the mic socket on my Firewire Solo.

[fishmonkey]

what are you trying to record? e.g. vocals, acoustic instruments, atmos???

[earwig forever]

It's vocals mainly, though I was planning on recording some acoustic guitar too

[rutgermuller]

I see your mic is dynamic. As far as I know condensor mics work better on soft signals and pick up more detail. But correct me when wrong.

Try a bunch of mics at your dealer and see which one work for you and your interface.

[earwig forever]

Ok, thanks, I'll check it out.

[mihai]

you need a good condenser mic for that but they do cost a little more. so far i have no issues with recording vocals with my sm57 and lexicon omega. i usually have the gain set to 3 o'clock [on the omega] and my mouth is close to the mic. it doesn't come out too quiet and then i just process with saturator, dynamic tube, and/or whatever else i need. usually i have compressor running last in the chain and that's what i also use to bring up the volume.

then again i don't use vocals often but you should still get good/decent sounding vox with your gear.

[earwig forever]

Well, I bit the bullet and bought a M-Audio Nova condenser mic, but thanks for the tip anyway

[mihai]

much better.

[Firepurge]

Hi all, so I've just got an M-Audio Vocal Studio mic but I use it for recording acoustic guitar. And I produce using Ableton Live, but the signal is very low, basically the audio I record in is very quiet.
Any thoughts on ways to fix this without buying a pre-amp?

thanks,
David