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How to Plug Bass Guitar into Laptop and Record

  • 04-07-2012 11:50pm
    #1
    ColinBassGuy
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 24 ✭


    Hey I'm looking to record some bass covers and upload them to YouTube sometime soon and I'm just wondering how I'd go about connecting my bass guitar to my laptop so that I can record it.

    What I have is :
    1. A Fleabass (Flea of RHCP's signature bass)
    2. A Line-6 Lowdown LD-15 bass amplifier
    3. Audacity
    4. A 720p webcam (no software came with it)
    5. And a few small cables lying about ,I can get more if neccessary
    What I need to know is how to plug the bass guitar into the laptop ,record it while playing along to a song and also have video to it.

    Any help is appreciated ,thanks.
    Tagged:


Comments

  • #2
    -( i )- Wicker
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 380 ✭✭-( i )- Wicker


    What I do with my guitar is connect from my pc's aux/line-in port to my FX pedals line-out/headphone port. A sound card will have better quality recording than on-board, but it should be fine.

    In your volume control, go to input-audio settings and mute all inputs except aux/line-in.


  • #3
    sponsoredwalk
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,038 ✭✭✭sponsoredwalk


    Plug your guitar lead into one of these then put it into the microphone jack & audacity should pick it up. To get better quality & more control etc... get something like this. You should be able to get, or find out about, these in any guitar shop & also these will let you play along with songs only recording the bass etc... If no one offers a better option then to get the video you could just record the video separately & overdub the good quality bass you'd recorded, mixing it all with some video program.


  • #4
    C14N
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,656 ✭✭✭C14N


    sponsoredwalk wrote: »
    Plug your guitar lead into one of these then put it into the microphone jack & audacity should pick it up. To get better quality & more control etc... get something like this. You should be able to get, or find out about, these in any guitar shop & also these will let you play along with songs only recording the bass etc... If no one offers a better option then to get the video you could just record the video separately & overdub the good quality bass you'd recorded, mixing it all with some video program.

    +1 to the second option I say. I record all bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar and drums and honestly it's worth the investment. You could probably get a cheaper audio interface than the one listed though if you shop around or get one second hand.

    Does your bass amp have an audio out? If so then you could probably plug your bass to the amp and the amp to the interface. I doubt running the bass straight in would sound very good. I personally found the easiest option to be getting an interface and a mic and recording the bass with the microphone.


  • #5
    ColinBassGuy
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 24 ✭ColinBassGuy


    C14N wrote: »
    +1 to the second option I say. I record all bass, electric guitar, acoustic guitar and drums and honestly it's worth the investment. You could probably get a cheaper audio interface than the one listed though if you shop around or get one second hand.

    Does your bass amp have an audio out? If so then you could probably plug your bass to the amp and the amp to the interface. I doubt running the bass straight in would sound very good. I personally found the easiest option to be getting an interface and a mic and recording the bass with the microphone.

    Yeah I tried plugging the bass directly in before and it sounded horrible ,it didn't even resemble the sound of anything musical haha ! My amp doesnt exactly have a port called 'Audio Out' but it has something similar called 'CD/MP3 IN' or 'Headphones/Record Out' . I'm taking a wild guess here and saying that the second option is the one I should be looking at right ? If so then are there any software programs that act as a virtual effects board that I could look into getting ?


  • #6
    C14N
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,656 ✭✭✭C14N


    ColinBassGuy wrote: »
    Yeah I tried plugging the bass directly in before and it sounded horrible ,it didn't even resemble the sound of anything musical haha ! My amp doesnt exactly have a port called 'Audio Out' but it has something similar called 'CD/MP3 IN' or 'Headphones/Record Out' . I'm taking a wild guess here and saying that the second option is the one I should be looking at right ? If so then are there any software programs that act as a virtual effects board that I could look into getting ?

    The second one is the one alright. There are some software suites with a wide range of effects and stuff but they are often quite expensive :( I think your best best might be the relatively cheap Mixcraft for $75. It's basic enough that you should be able to learn how to use it fairly quickly and it comes with different virtual amp models and effects, just not as many as the likes of Guitar Rig (which costs €400). These are made to be used with guitar but they should work on a bass too (how good they end up sounding is another issue).


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