Music, Technology and Stuff

TL;DR: Yes, you will need a mic preamp. My daughter has been singing for a few years now. Even though we're in a pandemic, lots of cool stuff has happened for her this year. She has an amazing music teacher and mentor that plays guitar in a successful touring (pre-pandemic) alternative rock band. She recently started producing music with Pro Tools. We bought a house that had an exercise studio that we are turning into a music studio. Music is so much more fun than exercising! She wanted a good studio mic for Christmas this year. I wanted to get her the legendary Shure SM7B . She sings really loud, and from researching mics I knew the SM7B could take whatever she could throw at it. However, I also learned that many people need to use a mic preamp with it because the SM7B requires a lot of gain (~70 db). Also note that the SM7B isn't a condenser mic, so it doesn't need phantom power.  Behringer UMC404HD Her audio interface is the excellent Behringer U-Phoria UMC404HD . You re

My family recently moved to Denver. We are leasing a house while looking for a place to buy. We moved from Minneapolis, where we had an alarm system from Link Interactive that used alarm.com. I was able to transfer the alarm account to the nice people that bought my house. By taking over the account, Link Interactive was even able to extend the discounted price I had to the new owners. It used 2GIG equipment and I had virtually zero issues in the 5 years I had it. The 2GIG equipment is compatible with Honeywell sensors , so I was able to easily expand the system by adding a ton of sensors. The house in Denver has an Xfinity Home security system. I spent nearly 4 hours on the phone setting up the security service in my name. When it came time to configure the system, the Xfinity support tech told me that it's impossible to transfer the equipment to another person and I would need to buy all new gear.  Wait.. WHAT??!? To say it again: Can you transfer your Xfinity Home Security sys

Follow these steps to get your E-Drum Kit working with Clone Hero! People that are interested in tinkering with Midi on their E-drums may also find this interesting. My setup includes: Macbook Pro running High Sierra - not sure if it works with newer versions of macOS, but probably! Alesis Surge Mesh Kit - This is a highly rated kit at a great price! Apps I used: Midi Monitor - Get the Midi note numbers for the drum pads MidiStroke - Converts midi notes to key-presses (there are other apps that do this as well, but this one is free!) Clone Hero - You'll need to get the latest public test build (v0.24.0.1555-master when I wrote this), which you can find on their Discord. Figuring out which pad outputs which Midi note You can skip this part if you already know the midi channel & notes for your drums, or if you have an Alesis set you can probably just use my settings! Midi Monitor Plug your drums into your Mac via USB (duh!) Install Midi Mon