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okay so i've got my hands on this tascam 38 8-track, and it came with a tascam m-208 mixer, which has 8 ins, 4 outs (4 busses).

i want to put 3 mics on the drums (stereo overheads, snare...or maybe 4 mics if i decide to do bass drum as well), and then 2 mics on guitar and one on the bass amp, all at the same time.

the mixer obviously only allows 4 tracks to go to the 8-track at once.

is there any way to do this? surely there must be some workaround other than buying a mixer with 8 outputs? though that might be the easiest solution...

i don't have a manual for the mixer but it looks like this



orange faders = busses

it also has stereo outs, in addition to the xlr outs

should probably mention i'm open to any dodgy workarounds...

That board doesn't have any channel inserts, right?

celluloid hero wrote:i want to put 3 mics on the drums (stereo overheads, snare...or maybe 4 mics if i decide to do bass drum as well), and then 2 mics on guitar and one on the bass amp, all at the same time.

When you say '2 mics on guitar' do you mean 2 guitar amps with a mic on each or just 2 mics on one guitar amp mixed to sound nice?

If you mean the second thing then you've got enough outs: 1 for guitar (with both mics mixed and sent to the same bus/out), 1 for bass and 2 for stereo drums.

If you mean the other thing then I see what you mean and I have no ideas to help you, other than the obvious overdubs etc.

i assume no channel direct outs? how about aux sends? what are the green/blue rows? is it 4 band EQ or 2? maybe the 2 orange rows are aux sends... i wouldn't be suprised if it has at least 2 aux sends, that will give you 6 independent sends. (buss 1-4, aux 1-2) to record 6 tracks simultaneously.

if only doing 3 mics on drums i'd do K,S, OH. and if you must do stereo OH i'd leave snare to get picked in the OH and mic the K - but listen and do whatever sounds best to you of course.

ipitcher wrote:That board doesn't have any channel inserts, right?

what's a channel insert?

it has the following ins: insert, line, tape and xlr

i don't actually have it with me at the moment, it's staying at a friend's place for a week or so. but this is the back (in very poor detail. picture's off ebay):

the eq is 4-band, nick.

the green row is FLB/foldback, and the blue row is for effects.

i'll check if it has aux when i can, i didn't think of that and 6 tracks at a time is just what i need. sorry i made the thread title slightly misleading.

chuckles, i mean to do the first option, 2 mics on the same cab. i was gonna pan one left and one right but it's looking like it might not be an option. you said 1 for guitar, 1 for bass and 2 for drums but i really want 3 for drums. maybe i can mix the snare in with one of the overheads, if i get really desperate...

anyway, you guys are really helpful, it's great. i'll bump this thread back up when i have a chance to look at the mixer again. thanks so much for all the responses so far.

You've got inserts, you can half-plug in 1/4 and run them to your 8 track. you won't get anything else out of the channel strip than you preamp if you do this. So maybe buss 4 tracks to the subs to the recorder and take the other 4 from the inserts.

If you have a foldback send you could use that out for one more channel in addition to the 4 busses, making 5. The out of your effect send is 6. If you have 1 or 2 aux's that'll be 7 or 8.

If there are no aux's, and if you can unassign tracks to the L-R; take out the channels you send to the subgroups, then take two channels, pan them hard L and R and you can take the out of your L/R mix bus.

Lots of options.

thank you skatingbasser. i knew there had to be ways to do this, i've just been unaware of how. can't wait to try out what you've suggested.