[kasperl]

I've got an acoustic bass guitar with a mic inside of it, outputting to a standard jack, which works pretty well with an amp. Unfortunately, I have no amp, and I want to be able to record from the thing anyway. Is there a cheap way of converting the signal from that mic to something a computer's line-in can take?

[Black Wolf]

You can get direct big to small plugs that'll plug into your microphone slot. My brother has one somewhere I use every so often.

[kasperl]

I've got the plug, but I'm not sure the signal is meant for something a computer can take. I'd hate to blow up a mobo by trying.....

[Black Wolf]

Worked for me. I was using an electric bass, but I very much doubt there'll be any difference.

[kasperl]

OK, I'll try it on some old computer first, just to be sure.....

Any other tips for a newbie bassist?

[phreak]

try using Line In and if thats too quiet then try the Mic jack.  The signal should not be too powerful to destroy a sound card.

[kasperl]

Shouldn't or can't?

I'm just really nervous about both the guitar's mic and the computers' mobo.

[Flipside]

As long as you are DI'ing the guitar you cannot hurt your computer. In fact, there is a higher risk (which is still minute) of placing one of those little vocals mics too close to a magnetic source and blowing a speaker with feedback.

You need to use Line-In if at all possible, Mic sockets tend to add amplification which can cause distortion. Remember to use your volume control to un-mute the input channels as well, that one caught me out any number of times

[kasperl]

DI?

And yeah, the volume mute thing has borked many a multiplayer voice system over here, too.

[Flipside]

DI = Direct Input, either you are plugging the guitar directly into the computer input socket or Micing up an amp and plugging the Mic into the computers input.

The only thing I wouldn't recommend is conecting an Amp's Headphone socket to your computer's Mic-in socket, since that signal is being amplified, but even then, there is only a very slight risk to your audio equipment and none to your computer.

[kasperl]

I haven't got an amp, so I'll just run a wire. I'll report back when I get it to work.

[kasperl]

Well, that didn't work. I tried running a wire from my guitar to my computer's line in, and it doesn't record a thing. First I thought it was recording a bit, but it turned out that was the mic I've got buried between a couple of layers of books and stuff, accidentily selected. Once I've got the input selected for the guitar, nothing happens.

I'm going to try the mic port now....

EDIT:
Nope, nothing there either.

[Flipside]

Hmmmmmmmm.... Well, all I can suggest is that (a) you make sure the volume is up at full on both the guitar and the line-in port (guitar signals are actually pretty weak) and (b) you make sure you've got 'Line-in' selected as your recording source, though that'll depend on what program you are using etc.

[Roanoke]

you can use a hi-fi as an amp too.

[kasperl]

I'm using the standard windows audio recorder and the standard windows soundpanel thingy. And yeah, all volumes are turned up to full.

EDIT: The wires are fine, I can run sound from one PC to another trough them, I can't test the jack-->minijack plug though.

[kasperl]

Originally posted by Roanoke
you can use a hi-fi as an amp too.

If I had one, yeah....

My current audio setup is having my laptop connect to a set of 2.1 speakers using a 5 meter standard audio cable, or, alternatively, plugging my MP3 discman into the same set of speakers. Aside from that, all I have is another old discman and the desktop computer I just tried this on.

[Drew]

get a berhinger combo and use the DI plug, works awesome

[pyro-manic]

Has the bass got a preamp built-in, or is it a pure acoustic with a mic?

[Clave]

You need to check the mic.

Most mic signals are very low - much too low in fact to work with line-level input.

Also the mic *may* need phantom power which is a dc supply and will be a number of different voltages depending on type (12, 24, or 48V)

There are line-level mics, but they are usually specific like the Apple one which only plugged into a specific active port that provided power.

If it's a bog standard 'passive' mic, then you'll almost certainly need a preamp of some kind - you can get small, cheapish, battery-powered ones from Radio Shack or similar places.

But you do really need to know where you are starting from....

[WMCoolmon]

Yeah, it probably needs to be preamped.