Hey everyone, I'm looking to set up a studio with my Tibook. I just want to be able to record my band and for when i just want to hear myself play. I'm thinking ill have about 10 XLR inputs at one time ( 7 drum mics, 2 guitars, 1 bass, wed record the vocals speratly). I want to be able to mix this stuff down on my computer with some type of a protools program. Would i be able to make it so each drum mic would have an individual track? Or is that not necessary? Any suggestions? Ive been reading and looking around, and am starting to understand, but not really.
Heres a basic layout of what i want:
Drum kit/guitars/bass---->Pre amp----->Computer---->Protools for mixing
is this possible? Please give me some sugestions because im so confused. And as for money, I want it to sound GOOD and CLEAN and CLEAR. But i dont want to buy a professional studio and spend thousands. Thank you so very much

well... if you really need 10 simultaneous XLR recording channels... you can spend a huge chunk of cash on multiple audio interfaces or consider getting a mixer that has optical digital output to use with an interface. There are really several ideas for your situation but I will just give you one idea and maybe someone can suggest another.

First look at the Digi002 rack inteface.
* Single FireWire connection to PC or Mac host computer
* 8 analog inputs with 4 mic preamps with individual gain and high-pass filter
* 48V phantom power enabled on channel pairs
* 8 analog outputs
* Outputs 1 & 2 mirrored on 1/4" TRS monitor output (with dedicated volume control), headphone output on 1/4" TRS (with dedicated volume control knob), and RCA-based --10dBV fixed output
* 8 channels of ADAT optical I/O or 2 channels of optical S/PDIF I/O
* 2 channels of S/PDIF I/O on RCA connectors
* Alternate source Input for direct monitoring of --10dBV audio equipment (CD players, tape players, etc.)
* 24-bit/96kHz converters, up to >108dB dynamic range and >98dB (0.002%) THD+N
* MIDI I/O--1 IN port, 2 OUT ports (16 channels in, 32 channels out)
* Footswitch for QuickPunch control
* 2U rackmountable chassis

I have the previous generation, DIGI001 and love it. You could actualy make do with the DIGI001 but it is PCI based only and thus will not work with Tibook. The DIGI002 is firewire based so it will work fine. But to get the 10 XLR inputs that you seek... you will need to use a mixer with at least 6 channels of XLR's and ADAT optical output. Simply use the mixer to run your drum mics through then send this mix out to ADAT output into the DIGI002. Then run the remaining instrument mics directly into the DIGI002. And the DIGI002 comes with ProTools LE which handles up to 32 tracks and is really easy to edit audio once you learn the basics.

And since you are talkling about recording 10+ channels simultaneously... you might want to consider getting a fast external hard drive to use solely for audio recording as the OEM internal drive might not be able to keep up with high resolution recording but I might be wrong.

Oh... and yes seperate tracks for drums is really good to have for mixing purposes as it gives you more control. You could use just a stereo mix from a mixer (but ADAT optical output on mixer will give you up to 8 channels out) with drums connected but you might find that drums don't sound right in the final mix which you could re-record again and again until you get to sound right. Drums are tough to get to sound right... takes lots of experiementing with mic positions, mics and the recording environment can change the sound dramatically but that is a whole other story

Synthetic is on the money. I have a Digi001 too, but I think the 002 is your best and almost only choice. Laptop + Digi002 = great potential. You really can't go wrong. If you wanna go cheaper, the MBox is cool, just not as sweet or powerful. But it does work. I've used one for a month or two doing some interviews.

good luck.

Don't know too much about audio inputs, but having lots of experience with video I can assure you that you're internal drive will always be faster than a FireWire drive unless there's something extremely wrong with it. FireWire's fast, and I think you get FireWire 2 on that Ti, but it won't be fast enough with that many tracks, especially if they're at 96/24.

errr uhhh.... not exactly. The internal drive is only faster if its a second internal drive without the system software loaded on it. Most all music apps suggest using second drive for audio recording because when it has to access the disk, the system accessing the same disk can slow it down plus the system disk will get fragmented quicker making it even slower. I have a Glyph firewire drive that I run can run 24-30 tracks at 41/24 no problem and its an older Glyph. I am sure the new ones will keep up with the demands of 96/24 recording.