NM/MTR/I/DC Day

andy_k

That is, new Mixer / Multi track recorder / Interface / Daw controller, day, I finally bit the bullet and upgraded my Zoom R16 to a Tascam Model 12.
Ordered from Andertons on a Sunday evening and delivered Tuesday by DPD.
This  fortunately coincided with a few enforced days off due to some pesky virus, so I was actually home to take delivery and had the time to reorganise some things at home to make some space.
Most of my mixing and music creation is done in the box, with Reaper, and a few recent acquisitions have given me a lot of option paralysis, ie, things that were intended to inspire tend to take a while to set up, which kind of ruins the moment, so I want to streamline my recording process as much as possible.
I'm already familiar with the concept of the MTR, and had good use out of the Zoom R16, but it just feels too fragile and fiddly to have set up permanently as a studio device ready to go, and first impressions of the Tascam are that it is perfect for me.
Feels really solidly built, much more professional and looks great ( very important for my OCD )
Only downside at the moment, is I am still waiting for an SD card to be delivered, so I cant actually get anything done with it yet.
Taking the time to watch as many instructional vids as I can on YT, while I wait, although it does look very familiar, and I am also thinking which of my Reaper projects will get bounced on to it, but part of me wants to treat it as a new chapter, and the excuse to do fresh ideas.
It does feel a little like a step back into portastudio times, but one good thing is that when it is set up with Reaper, you can record to both simultaneously, so that will be an instant backup process, and when I have a few basic ideas on there for backing tracks I can record my amps silently with a Torpedo X, and a good amp sound ( stereo, or wet and DI ), and these can be set up ready to go without having to have a PC on and a DAW running.
I managed to get it set up on my Windows machine, and had music and my Reaper projects playing back through headphones on it yesterday, but haven't really been able to try a mutitrack set up yet, need that damn SD card to get some projects set up.
Antone else gone down this road?

thermionic

Yes, I bought one to replace a mixer and audio interface and it works great for me. It generally acts as a mixer, with two synths and an old rack Pod Pro permanently plugged in. I can just play them or record into Logic at the flick of a switch - just like the old Portastudio days as you say! With a mixer/interface I had to do some plugging/unplugging when going from playing to recording.

I have done next to no recording to the SD card but it’s nice to have that option -it’s a hugely versatile tool and I don’t use it to it’s full potential yet. My only criticism is that channels 1 & 2 are reserved for the audio out from the computer - in an ideal world I’d like to see a separate fader for this and have 1 & 2 as “normal” channels because there’s no reall need for a compressor, three band eq and two sends for the computer audio playback - I just want it hear it through my monitors. That’s a minor gripe though, as I have two spare channels ready to plug microphones into anyway.

The Tascam forums are a good place to go for tips and problem solving (although I’ve had no problems, there was a well-documented gripe about the headphone out which was sorted with a firmware update which I read about on there).

mrkb

I upgraded to an Allen and Heath CQ18T recently and the capability and flexibility of the current digital mixers/USB interfaces is amazing.

andy_k

In my initial testing, I have installed the drivers on my Win 11 machine, and have audio playing from the master mix channel on the Tascam, both from Foobar and Reaper, and I can see all the inputs in Reaper when I select the Model 12 as an interface.
There are the 3 way switches on the channel strips which have to be in PC mode for this to work, the other options are for Live and MTR modes, and I had this sound coming from headphones plugged into HP 1, volume on this and the Master fader had to be up, and it seemed like a very healthy level.
It came with fimware already at 1.42, which is seemingly higher than the one available for download, and it is good to know that they are on top of things.
I saw a workaround for Reaper to get the tracks correctly lined up, which involved disabling the Master in Reaper, and re assigning to new tracks 11/12, which seemed to be a solution if the problem still exists in this newer firmware-have to wait for the postman for my SD card before I can explore much further anyway.
Nice to know I am not alone with this thing as well.

andy_k

Small update,
My SD card arrived, and I was relieved to see it recognised as being usable ( I tried an older 32g one I had laying around, and despite it fitting the criteria, it would not allow me to initialise it, new one is 256G, so should be fine for now )
In preparation for this arrival, I had tried to set up a couple of old Reaper projects ready to record onto tracks on the M12, one of these is a fairly basic mix of stereo drums along with a VST bass, and a bass synth, so basically a stereo track and a couple of mono tracks.
I got it mostly working ok, despite a bit of mental gymnastics with Reapers IO matrix, the problem seems to be that Reaper is too flexible with  it's tracks, and it is too easy to have folders and busses, so you end up with a lot of IO to make work.
I had to revisit this when I got round to doing the actual recording on the M12, as it too seems to be able to do an awful lot of stuff with a fair few buttons, and the fact that it is also intended as a live mixer, means there is still a bit of confusion for me, regarding the PFL /AFL / AUX/ SUB/ MAIN/SOLO switches, very easy to miss something which mutes the whole shebang.
Early days, but its looking very promising, next steps will be doing a few overdubs on these tracks with amps, and recording some stuff back into Reaper- which should be fun.
Generally, a very good bit of kit for the money.
I also stumbled on a product called a Desksaver, which is just a fitted polycarbonate cover which will help to keep the dust out, bit expensive at around £45, but it is made in England, and does the job well, so it is a good thing to have.

thermionic

I wasn’t aware of this until last night, but Tascam have released a firmware update (1.41) which addresses a couple of issues. Most useful to me is now that there’s a menu option to route the USB computer audio (from your DAW) either to channels 1-2 (which used to be the only option), channels 9-10, or straight to the main fader. This will be a popular tweak because channels 1-2 are really designed for mic inputs (they are the only channels with insert points). I have a Lexicon reverb returning on channels 9-10 so I’m trying it on the main fader for now. This is such a great gadget for my little setup.