What is the cheapest way to record onto garageband? (don't really care about sound)

[boogaloo]

Hi everybody,

I have just gotten a Mac and I have recently been thinking of recording walking basslines on to garageband to play melodies, and solos over it. This is just for practicing at this point. So, seeing as how I am strapped for cash, I was wondering what is the cheapest way to go about this.

By the way, if you couldn't already tell I am technologically retarded. I looked in the stickies about recording and even that went over my head. I am having trouble understanding line in and line out (yea I got what they are, audio coming out and in, but what kind of cable can be used to go from a bass to a computer? I should probably just go to radioshack.)

Thanks for any of the help

[adube810]

you can buy a 2 dollar 1/4 in instrument cable to headphone jack (female to male) and plug ur bass into the microphone input and record directly through garageband but dont forget to change your input settings in your garageband prefrences and also you have to set that track to be mono and turn on monitoring so you can play through your computer speakers. if you want to be really slick you can get the revrse of that adapter and hook that up to your audio out to your bassamp or have your computer be in your effects loop

[Dave Muscato]

Wouldn't you need a DI to do that, though?

If you REALLY want the cheapest way and REALLY don't care about audio quality, use your computer's built-in mic: Just hit "record," and play away

[nrssab]

I heared something about a soundcard cable, from soundtech. It isn't soo cheap about $40 but they say its quality, but I have no experience with it. I'm just thinking about ordering it or not.

[warnergt]

It depends which Mac you have. Many have an analog input jack; some don't.

If it has analog input, all you need is an adapter to convert from your plug to the computer jack. Also, you may need a preamp if it is a line level input. Otherwise, you will need some sort of digital interface.

[sleepy_monkey]

Originally Posted by Dave Muscato

Wouldn't you need a DI to do that, though?

If you REALLY want the cheapest way and REALLY don't care about audio quality, use your computer's built-in mic: Just hit "record," and play away

No, you don't need a DI. I thought the same thing but I record without one all the time and the quality is surprisingly good. Good enough for myspace, etc..anyways.

[ogrossman]

Originally Posted by nrssab

I heared something about a soundcard cable, from soundtech. It isn't soo cheap about $40 but they say its quality, but I have no experience with it. I'm just thinking about ordering it or not.

This sounds like one of the USB converters that are on the market. I use an iMic that cost about $40 and it has pretty good sound quality. It works fine with garage band. It has two channels in and two channels out (headphone).