Studio recorder with talkback

Soldato
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We've got a sound recording booth at the office and we're looking for the best solution for recording and talkback. We've already got a condenser mic that trails out of there which currently goes into a Zoom H4N with two headphone outputs, one for the artist and one for the studio guy.

We tried going straight into the PC and using Audition but there was quite a bit of latency for some reason. Neither solutions also allow talkback to the artist.

We're looking at something like the Presonus Monitor Station V2 but wondered if there was a better solution that went directly into a PC via a soundcard or similar, as that station would still recording onto the Zoom or a PC but with potential latency issues.

Thanks!
 
Associate
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What are you actually recording? Voice over or podcasts ect? You need a decent mixer to be honest with good preamps and options for input and output, i'm not really a fan of the zoom product range.

Also what interface are you using to use Audition?
 
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Soldato
OP
Joined
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Location
Bristol
What are you actually recording? Voice over or podcasts ect? You need a decent mixer to be honest with good preamps and options for input and output, i'm not really a fan of the zoom product range.

Also what interface are you using to use Audition?

Recording voiceover. The recording we did before sounded absolutely fine quality-wise - it's a decent Rode condenser in an acoustic treated room etc - it was just a bit of a clunky way of recording and we didn't have a talkback function.

We can use any interface with Auditon, but we used a 3.5mm into the mic jack previously.
 
Associate
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You are going to need more kit thats for sure.

Would be handy to see how you have things layed out.

I cant remember what the routing options are for the Zoom but you could plug in a dynamic mic into the zooms other inputs (one that has a switch for on/off to make things easier) and speak to your artist that way.

Alternatively you can just hire me to do it for you ;)
 
Associate
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Yep, hence the thread. Anything better than the Presonus Monitor Station V2 though?

Define better? What are you actually looking for, Just something to provide talk back? the presonus has a talk back mic built in at least, something similar is the Mackie Big Knob Studio+ (horrible naming I know) It around the same price but it has XLR inputs which allows more flexibility other wise you will need xlr to jack adapters to plug in your current voice over mic.

Again it all comes down to the preamps, this isnt kit I would use or go for in my day to day job so I cant really talk about the quality.
 
Associate
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I think my SPL Crimson has a talkback function - never used it.
That's probably out of your price range though.
I'd use something like the Audient id14, or id4, as they have discrete class A mic preamps, the same as the Audient desks.
Be bettter quality than the zoom.
 
Associate
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A lot better priced than SPL now too - if anything, the pre amps on the Audient are cleaner than the SPL (though for my own music, I like the warmth of the SPL)
The pre-amps on the Audient are in a different class to the ones on the zoom H4npro (which I have, as well as the tascam one)
 
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