Fostex VM200 - Manual (Page 48)

Getting Started
48 VM200 User’s Guide
Keeping It Digital
Many home studios or project studios these days record to digital
audio tape or hard disk recording systems, but lacking a digital
mixer, they are forced to mix tracks using a conventional analog
mixer. This can actually add color and warmth to some tracks, but
is likely to introduce noise into the signal chain.
Once an instrument or singer’s voice has been converted to digital
audio by an analog-to-digital (A/D) converter, it is generally best to
leave the recording in the digital domain. Running the signal back
and forth through A/D and D/A converters, regardless of the quality
of the converters, unnecessarily reduces the overall quality of the sig-
nal, and hence the final recording.
With the VM200, you can record and mixdown entirely in the digital
domain. This may make a dramatic improvement in the quality of
your final recordings.
An Important Note About Word Clock Information
Before you can transfer digital audio from one device to another, the
digital audio equipment must be word clock synchronized, or timing
problems may result.
For example, if you are recording to another digital device, such as an
ADAT, DAT, or digital multitracker, you must synchronize all digital
components in your recording system to a common word clock
source.
If the VM200 is the only digital component in your recording system,
you do not need to adjust any word clock settings.
However, if you are using other digital audio components, please refer
to “Digital Connections, Word Clocks, and Sample Rates” on
page 160 for more information on synchronizing to a common word
clock source.
Stopless Rotary Controls
The VM200 uses the 12 rotary controls (also known as the Gain,
Freq, and Q controls) to adjust values for several different parame-
ters, depending on the currently-selected function page.
Unlike conventional analog control knobs, the rotary controls on the
VM200 are stopless; you can rotate them right or left endlessly.
In this way, the knobs can more easily accommodate a broad range
of parameter values.