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The best way to make a million dollars in music is to start with two million dollars. 

I'm fortunate in that I have access to two things 1) Gear, so I can experiment and screw stuff up all by myself,  and 2) Actual sound engineers that know what they're doing and I can bug for information.  Nothing beats sitting in a control room for a few hours watching professionals do their thing.  If you can get 'em to talk about it, it's even better.

Another thing to look at is the frequency response of the mic.  Low E is about 80Hz.   Dynamic mics respond very well above the 100Hz range (where the human voice is) but tend to drop off at the lower freqs.   Most mics will come with a "frequency response curve" that will tell you where the sweet spot of the mic is.  This is particularly important if you have the mic very close to the sound source.  A lot of mics have what is called a "proximity effect" where lower frequencies are emphasized the closer you get to the mic.

It's great for vocals, but not so much for instrumentals.

What kind of pop sound is it?   Digital recordings will "pop" if you are having buffering problems (more music signal than memory to store it).   Also, check your recording levels to make sure you aren't clipping the signal.  There should be a red light or something similar that would indicate you are recording past peak levels.

Ah OK.   I was assuming you were going to record and mix the A/V separately.

If what you are recording is going to be the finished product, then I'd go with the Alesis.  You're going to want the on-board mixing and EQ stuff.  If you do decide to edit the audio later,  you still can.

One shot takes are tough. 

-J

I have deliberately tried to avoid making recommendations here as everyone is going to have specific needs and goals, but I think at this point in the discussion, I'll talk about my thinking and how I'm going about achieving my goals.  As with everything here, it is not gospel, truth, or "the right way."  It's just what I'm doing.

First, my goal is that I want to be able to record *in a controlled studio-like setting.*  That means I am not interested in mixing live sound for an audience, or recording that.  The band has a Mackie 12 channel mixer and PA system for that.  I'm more interested in what I can do in my living room.

So, how am I going about that?

The route I took was to use my DAW (Reaper) for recording and mixing, and go with straight interfaces for recording.  My reasoning behind this was that DAWs are pretty sophisticated these days, cheap, and there are lots of options.  So I decided to learn to use one well. I picked Reaper primarily because it is easy to install, cheap ($60 if you decide to pay for it, free if you don't) and has a whole lot of support behind it.   This also allowed me to invest in a better quality interface, mics, monitors, and other equipment.   I did buy a "control" surface that is nothing other than a MIDI interface that looks like a mixing board.  It gives me a physical interface (sliders, pan pots, etc...) into my DAW, which while not necessary, is convenient.

My interface decision was based on my drummer.  Good drum recordings all use multiple mics (you can get good sound with two if you set up right) but I wanted to be able to reasonably record him while still giving me the ability to track guitars and vocals.   The Tascam I bought has six inputs, so I can do that.  Two on guitar, two on drum, two on vocal.  I haven't had a chance to do that yet, but at least I know I can.

My mic decisions were based on this premis:  "Best condenser mics I can find that doesn't break my wallet."  The CAD's I bought are really nice, and I'm very happy with them.

All my guitars have names. They do their own shopping, though.

You plug XLR's and line level inputs into it, and the interface communicates with the computer.  That's how you can record simultaneous tracks without a whole lot of computer.

As far as that device goes, I don't have any personal experience with it, or with Alesis products in general.   Monitoring noise can be caused by anything from having devices plugged into different outlets to plain old poor quality headphones, so I wouldn't worry too much about that.  If you read about it everywhere, then I'd consider it, but if you read good reviews that say "monitors were quiet" then I think you could discount the negative reviews as to something specific in the reviewers setup.  And if it is a problem, Amazon's return policy is great.

Anyway, a couple of things.  All other things being equal, that looks like a good value.   

Some more things to consider that are applicable to anything you buy.

Everything is a trade off.   For example, with this device we might be trading in convenience of the on-board mixer (a nice feature) for some other area;  pre-amps or chassis quality, for example.    Every button, dial, knob, light, and connection on a device costs money to put in place, so the more of them there are, the more money you should expect to spend.  One thing I always like to do is compare what I think I want with other things in that price range, and then I like to compare similar items (on-board mixer, USB interface) with things very similar to it to find out what the high end stuff costs.

For examples, if you decide to do your mixing in a software DAW (most devices come with one) rather than on board the interface, you open yourself up to some other equipment in the $75-$100 range.   You're already using Audacity, right?

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? … EPMCMAQ4Hg

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? … EPMCMAY4UA

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? … EPMCMAc4ZA

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? … PMCMAE4qgE

There's a lot of other stuff out there.

Going the other way, on-board mixer with USB interface it looks like you're right in the ballpark for what similar models go for.   You can get a whole lot of interface and mixing board these days for not a lot of money.

This thing, for example, http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/X2442USB.aspx, runs $285 retail.

It's a good time to be a music geek. 

I'm glad you're opting for the condenser mics over the dynamic mics.   For recording, they are the right tool for the job.

Theme from Shaft!  It happens anyway.  Nothing I can do about it.

Dating it is somewhat of a challenge, as there is no known index of serial numbers.   There is one that has been dated to '47 that is a 12XXX number, while mine is 10XXX so I'm going on the assumption that they hail from the same era.   I haven't found a serial number on the amp yet, so the assumption there is that they're the original pair.  The tubes in the amp all date from the late '40s, though. I've got copies of the original spec sheet for the amplifier tube, and it's dated 1948.

What I really want to do is go dig into the Los Angeles archives and dig up the ownership chain for this company.  I know they folded into a couple of different companies and finally went under permanently in the '70s.   There has to be an archive somewhere.

The nice thing about the really old electronics is that there is absolutely no integrated circuitry on them at all, so if you have a basic understanding of electronics, they're actually pretty simple to work on.  It's all tubes, wire, and discrete components.  If you can work a soldering iron, you can work on these things.

To dork?