MBox 2

[RunsWithBuffalo]

Hey yall,

I have to record a song for a friends movie he is entering in a film contest and it will get shown to 400+ people. Needless to say, it needs to be good. Currently i am recording through my line in and thats just not going to cut it.

I have been looking at an MBox 2 for a while and i got Guitar Center to go down to 370 on it. (The normal one, not the factory plugins one).

What do you guys think? Is it worth it? should i look for something else? I would hate to leave Cool Edit for Pro Tools but PT can work with Reason and my Midi keyboard.

Thanks

[mattinbeloit]

Hey yall,

I have to record a song for a friends movie he is entering in a film contest and it will get shown to 400+ people. Needless to say, it needs to be good. Currently i am recording through my line in and thats just not going to cut it.

I have been looking at an MBox 2 for a while and i got Guitar Center to go down to 370 on it. (The normal one, not the factory plugins one).

What do you guys think? Is it worth it? should i look for something else? I would hate to leave Cool Edit for Pro Tools but PT can work with Reason and my Midi keyboard.

Thanks

Ya, the Mbox2 is a great interface and is just as good with the original except it has midi. Make sure you read up on doing midi with protools because rewire (the program that syncs reason and protools) can be a little tricky and buggy at times. It sounds like you are getting a good deal, and the stock software pluggins that come in protools are not all that bad, but if you have a bit more money, see if you can get some better software, especially one for reverb. Other then that, the compressors, limiters, eq etc. that come with protools are very good. I would warn you though, if you plan on doing more with midi then audio, proools is not your best choice as it is not the best midi program even when using reason with it. I love protools but I have the opportunity to work with some really nice mics and stuff so I hardly touch midi, I'm heavily audio based. I just remember the few times I did use midi and reason I had some problems (Which include the first and only time I have frozen protools and the first and only time I have had to restart a mac because of a freeze...). If you are going to be doing a lot of midi and some audio work, i would suggest another option, like Mark of the Unicorn.

[RunsWithBuffalo]

Thanks matt,

I do plan to do mostly audio stuff with a little bit of midi for string arrangements and some piano but other than that not a whole lot.

A quick question though, how much hardrive space should i have open for PT? Cool edit isnt too terrible but i hear that PT is a beast with RAM and hardrive space.

Thanks again, and if anyone else has some input or other suggestions, they are welcome. I'm looking to do this soon.

[mattinbeloit]

Thanks matt,

I do plan to do mostly audio stuff with a little bit of midi for string arrangements and some piano but other than that not a whole lot.

A quick question though, how much hardrive space should i have open for PT? Cool edit isnt too terrible but i hear that PT is a beast with RAM and hardrive space.

Thanks again, and if anyone else has some input or other suggestions, they are welcome. I'm looking to do this soon.

I'm not quite sure off the top of my head. I use an ibook with about 712 MB RAM with an MBox when I am doing field recordings. I ually have a mixer with 4-8 mics and send the stereo form the mixer to the Mbox and I have never had problems. One thing to consider with protools though (I do this in the studio and in the field) is to buy an external hard drive and save stuff on there. Make sure you have a least 2 or 3 gigs open on your computer then just save everything to the external, that helps alot. Just make sure that you get one that run at at least 7200 RPM. If you have the money, invest in one, ProTools really likes them.