Turtlerock Forum

I have what I think is an earthing problem in my room which results in a buzz; most noticeable from the tom mics since they are eq'd a fair bit. I've been troubleshooting it for a while. I didn't really notice it so much until I began recording tracks for my wife's new CD, using brushes. As soon as I took the gates off the toms, it was pretty bad. The device is a FireStudio tube. I use it for drums since it has lots of inputs. The main DAW is an I7 I built; it's not the issue afaik. I've tried the FS plugged into a Macbook - same story. So far I have tried going through the PC components one by one; buying a Furman power conditioner; using a PCI FW card; removing earths; different power sources - it's all the same. The thing is - the power in the house is probably dodgy. I thought getting a new master earth might help. I tested this theory by making one of my own to a water pipe - nada - but I am not a sparky, so not surprising. Last hope has got me currently searching for 1394 adapters from 6 pin to 4 pin and back to 6pin, to see if removing the power from the FS would help (since it has mains power as well as a 6 pin FW connection, thus it's getting power twice, iykwim) Or a PCI FW with a 4 pin out - harder to find in Sydney than one would think. I have read up on this problem which is fairly common in an unbalanced home studio. So I would like to ask if anyone here has been through this and what they ended up doing. It's a drag, because I was always able to do drums at home; guitars are usually sent via the cloud and vocals tracked in a real studio. But this has really put a kink in that. Thanks for your time, much appreciated. Hi Chris, thanks for bringing your weather with you ;-)

Would a simple ground lift adapter for the offending mics work?

Had no idea about those. Certainly worth a try at that price. Thanks for posting.

Have you tried some different mic leads? Balanced and unbalanced? Does the noise change if you touch the mic?

If the FireStudio tube is in a rack with other gear on top or below, try moving it out of the rack to get it away from the power supplys of the gear next to it.....just a thought.

Is it a hum or is it a buzz? I have a Firestudio that is quite noisy when connected to my Dell (damn hash noise from the laptop power supply) but is quieter when connected to a Macbook using just battery power.

A few people that use M-Boxes and the like have had that problem through the PA, running off battery power often cuts laptop noise.

vege-mity-mite wrote:Is it a hum or is it a buzz? I have a Firestudio that is quite noisy when connected to my Dell (damn hash noise from the laptop power supply) but is quieter when connected to a Macbook using just battery power.

Thanks very much for all the replies. I finally tracked down the problem. Headphones - nice and quiet. Then, put a lead into Main Out Ch 2 (just a lead) - in fact any right hand audio out and there is the dreaded motorbike. I'm hoping this is not going to be really really expensive. Fortunately, the repairers are RODE at Silverwater, who in the past have treated me like some special person - that's right - a customer! I'm going to take it there first thing Monday morning.

I must say my dealings with Rode have always been excellent, they have gone above and beyond to fix stuff for me, and I have to remotely control from another state. JMHO.

troutstudio wrote:thanks for bringing your weather with you ;-)

Sorry

stosostu wrote:I must say my dealings with Rode have always been excellent, they have gone above and beyond to fix stuff for me, and I have to remotely control from another state. JMHO.

they run a tight ship up there, operations manager showed me around last yr for an hour or 2, it's pretty sick.