Hiss reduction?

[Ichitootah]

Ok, so I'm a huge newbie at this audio hardware stuff, please bear with me.

Recently I got a Behringer Eurorack UB802 mixer board. It was pretty cheap, just something simple that I wanted for basically one reason. I wanted to route my electric guitar, keyboards, mic, whatever into it and then output the rack right into my computer's line in on the soundcard. That way there wouldn't be so much cable switching and stuff, everything would be simple and clean to record from the little console, or so I thought.

Well I got the board and a couple of 1/4" audio cables, and hooked it all up. I then tried to play my electric guitar which was plugged into an amp which was plugged into the rack's line in 1, and the rack itself was plugged via one of its many outs into my computer's line in. I expected to hear the guitar from my computer speakers, which I did, but there was a large amount of hiss in the signal. A huge amount actually.

I looked it up on behringer's website's faq (http://behringer-en.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/behringer_en.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_sid=KONlxl1i&p_lva=87&p_faqid=87&p_created=1078151467&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9ncmlkc29ydD0mcF9yb3dfY250PTE0J nBfc2VhcmNoX3RleHQ9JnBfcHJvZF9sdmwxPTExOCZwX3BhZ2U 9MQ**&p_li=) (even though I'm not even really sure what the problem is) and they talked about plugging everything into one electrical splitter from one main outlet. So I did this, and I still got a lot of hiss.

Their secondary suggestion is something called a "DI Box". Pretty much, I have no idea what this is or if it'll solve my problem (the hiss). I'm kind of confused, and figured I needed some more help before I made any more snap purchases. I'm hoping some of you guys do know a little more about the subject, and can help me out a bit. :)

Thanks in advance.

[PriZm]

I'm not too sure about this, but I'll tell you what somebody once told me with a similar problem.

The problem is the console is not designed to accept the signal directly from an amp, it's much too strong. The amp signal is designed for its cabinet. One simple way to solve this problem would be to mic your amp and send the mic signal to the console, or, if there's a headphone output on your amp, use that instead (although you would get a much crappier tone).

[Ichitootah]

Thanks for the tip, but I think that's not the only problem... though it may be one of them. It seems even when there's no input to the rack, and my soundcard is just plugged into the rack's out I get hiss... which seems odd.

[Potshot]

Turn the gain and level to 0 on any channel you aren't using. I used to have this problem with my UB502. Shitty noisy preamps.

edit: do not under any circumstances plug your amplifiers speaker output into anything other than a speaker cabinet. If it doesn't have a DI output or line out, don't do it.

[sgx]

I got one of these mixers to use with a shure sm57 mic and it was all hissy, so I returned it for another one (the retailer wouldn't allow refunds after 30 days after purchase and this was a christmas present...fuck). This one is a bit better, but still shitty. I wanted it for recording acoustic guitar and I don't think the quality is acceptable. I think I'm gonna ebay it off and try and just get a straight preamp for the mic.

[Ichitootah]

Meh... I guess you get what you pay for.

Anyone know of a good (pretty much) quiet, reasonably priced mixer with a decent number of inputs/outputs? I know next to nothing about the large selection. :(

[Splunkle]

Well, I haven't had any trouble the one time I used a Behringer mixer. But I may have just gooten lucky.

But the way I understood it, plugging your electric guitar amp straight into the mixer was a Thing Not To Be Done. I'm no guitarist, but I know that a lot of the shaping of the sound comes from the cabinet, so it would probably be better to mic up your cabinet. Not sure if you can afford a mike, but it will probably be better than buying a whole new mixer. Plus you can use a mike for lots of things.

Anyways, The other thing I notice is that you are using 1/4" cables. Not so hot. Last time I checked, they were unbalenced, and thus could produce a lot of noise. DI boxes fix this. Which is why, if you have one of those acoustic guitars with an internal mike and 1/4" jack at the bottom, you should have a DI box between the guitar and the mixer.

I have NFI if the amp's output is balenced. It will probably be in the amp's manual, if you still have that.

Also, quality mikes, like an SM57, use those funky cables with the 3 pins. They are balenced, and so don't use DI boxes with mikes. In fact, the DI boxes I used mike cables as its ouput.

In short:
Funky mike cables = good.
1/4" cables = bad.

Yeah, I know, all the guitars have 1/4 cables going to the amp, but that is different. This quick rule is only with Mixers and the such. I think. As I said, not pro here, so if someone more pro corrects me, go with them.

Another thing the hiss could be due to is your sound card. Unless you have a sound card actually desigined for recording, the line is probably going to be preety cheap, and so that could be producing the hiss. Try plugging your speakers straight into the mixer and see if that solves anything.

Good luck!

[Vurez]

Yeah, I have a UB802 as well and I get all kinds of hiss with it - even when nothing but headphones are plugged in. It's so bad that it's completely unusable. I'm sorry to say it, but I think it's just the unit itself. Poor quality.

[zircon]

I only get hiss with my UB502/802 when I turn up the volume very loud. At normal listening levels (the master volume and phones knobs at about 9:00) I hear absolutely no noise at all.

[Vurez]

I only get hiss with my UB502/802 when I turn up the volume very loud. At normal listening levels (the master volume and phones knobs at about 9:00) I hear absolutely no noise at all.

I guess that could be part of my problem. I generally have to boost it quite a bit as my Echo Indigo soundcard needs a line-level input signal.