Tascam 122-USB

rumplstratskin

rumplstratskin

New member
I am considering the purchase of a Tascam 122-USB for recording. The ads ( of course ) say it'll do everything but lay the tracks down for you. Learned the hard way that there are probably shortcomings I don't need to find out about AFTER the puchase. Anyone have any experience with this unit?
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

I have one and it works fine. It is just a reasonable audio card. It has both mike and Line level inputs and there is a usefull "direct out" function which helps you avoid latency when recording.

Apart from that. it does the 2 essential things (recording and playback) pretty well and does not require a power supply.
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

Marinblues said:
I have one and it works fine. It is just a reasonable audio card. It has both mike and Line level inputs and there is a usefull "direct out" function which helps you avoid latency when recording.

Apart from that. it does the 2 essential things (recording and playback) pretty well and does not require a power supply.
Click to expand...

How is it on eating up the RAM? I know that Cubasis recommends 512mb. I am only running 256mb
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

rumplstratskin said:
How is it on eating up the RAM? I know that Cubasis recommends 512mb. I am only running 256mb
Click to expand...
I have 512mb. I don't use the bundled SW (cubasis) that comes with the US-122. The USB port has more effect on the CPU than on the RAM. Also, I am using USB 1.0 unfortunately.
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

Marinblues said:
I have 512mb. I don't use the bundled SW (cubasis) that comes with the US-122. The USB port has more effect on the CPU than on the RAM. Also, I am using USB 1.0 unfortunately.
Click to expand...

That's one thing about a USB port that I was wondering about. Many slightly older computers don't have USB 2.0 capabilities, like mine also being 1.0. So using an interface like the Tascam 122 that's set up for 2.0 wouldn't run as fast on my puter.
Does that affect the quality of the recording at all?
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

midnite_man said:
That's one thing about a USB port that I was wondering about. Many slightly older computers don't have USB 2.0 capabilities, like mine also being 1.0. So using an interface like the Tascam 122 that's set up for 2.0 wouldn't run as fast on my puter.
Does that affect the quality of the recording at all?
Click to expand...

I do have a 2.0 USB. Are you saying that I should be able to run this unit without forking over for the extra RAM?

Why aren't you using Cubasis? Is it a problematic program?
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

midnite_man said:
That's one thing about a USB port that I was wondering about. Many slightly older computers don't have USB 2.0 capabilities, like mine also being 1.0. So using an interface like the Tascam 122 that's set up for 2.0 wouldn't run as fast on my puter.
Does that affect the quality of the recording at all?
Click to expand...
No, not really.

USB 1.0 allows for roughly 1Mbit/s bandwidth which is more than enough for me to record my guitar track in either 16 or 24 bit. I haven't tried using 2 microphones or inputs at once but it should be ok.

I don't have any issues with playback either. Imho, USB 2.0 comes into play if you have multiple audio inputs recorded simultaneously. Also, I believe (hope) it's a more efficient protocol so it sucks up less of the cpu power. Having said that, I am recording with a PIII 650MHz. Most today's cpu's are miles bettere than that.
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

rumplstratskin said:
I do have a 2.0 USB. Are you saying that I should be able to run this unit without forking over for the extra RAM?

Why aren't you using Cubasis? Is it a problematic program?
Click to expand...
RAM should have little influence. RAM can be good to create big buffers when you record, but this applies for any card, it is not specific to the us-122.

Where did you find the 512Mb requirement (recommendation)?

I don't use Cubase because I have been using Cool Edit Pro for a while and I didn't like the Cubase interface. I also understand that the bundled Cubase version is a limited version (SE).

For what I need to do, Cool Edit is great, so why change?
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

The 512 recommendation was for the Cubasis program rather than the
122-USB.
I would be using the software included since I don't presently have an adequate recording program in my PC.
 
Re: Tascam 122-USB

Marinblues said:
RAM should have little influence. RAM can be good to create big buffers when you record, but this applies for any card, it is not specific to the us-122.

Where did you find the 512Mb requirement (recommendation)?

I don't use Cubase because I have been using Cool Edit Pro for a while and I didn't like the Cubase interface. I also understand that the bundled Cubase version is a limited version (SE).

For what I need to do, Cool Edit is great, so why change?
Click to expand...

Marin's pretty much dead on. Cool Edit worked great when I used my friends mic a while back. It's interface is easy, but yet it's very powerful. I wouldn't hesitate to use it in the future myself :)
 
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