Any ideas where this buzz noise came from?

Hello,

this weird buzz has been on a few of my recordings lately. cannot tell where its coming from. wondered if you all perhaps my have a good idea. you can listen to it on my bandcamp page.

fuzz in gb | Nick Melton

i am working in garageband. recording a stereo real instrument track. my mixer is an alesis multimix4USB (a little 4 channel mixer with USB out). my mic is a behringer b1.

are you using balanced cables with your mic?

yeah definitely. its a pretty high quality monster cable, too.
and the noise is happening not every time i record, but still somewhat regularly.

hmm, well, i cant actually listen to the track for some reason, i can only really guess why its happening. can you describe it a little more?

It doesn't sound like the distortion that you get when the input levels are to high.
I don't think it has anything to do with GB.
I would start by eliminating equipment.

You can verify that by plugging the guitar straight in using a 3.5mm jack adapter if it has a built in pick up.
Then mic it up without the mixer.
I would think that it is the signal from the mixer or a dodgy cable.

What other electronics are near the computer and mic? This sounds like it might be either electrical/rf interference. I get a similar sound at work if my iPhone is too close to the computer

Is this an intermittent issue? If so, are you able to determine the interval of time in between each occurrence, or more to the point, do you know when it will happen each time?

This does sound like some form of RF interference, that can be triggered by a number of things. I'd start by removing any piece of electrical equipment that was recently added to your rig (could be anything.. lamp etc). Could be that the power output is "dirty", and this is enhancing any RF noise accumulated.

I'd also try removing your rig from its current location (wall socket) and placing it elsewhere, just to troubleshoot. And, without spending too much money on unnecessarily expensive brand name junk (sorry, Monster falls into that category) you could also try using an isobar with different dB levels of electrical attenuation to sort of 'soak up' some of that dirty power before it reaches your main board and such.

D.

I do a bit of voice chatting, so I've come across this before. Oddly, the buzzing disappears depending on location, from where I'm using the troubled mic from. When using the troubled mic at my iMac, I'd place my hand on my iMac, the buzzing disappears. So I'm assuming it's a grounding issue.

None of the electrical outlets in the house are grounded. So I decided to ground my computer myself by unconventional means. I attached a wire to the stand of my iMac, attached the other end of the wire to a grounding rod, and placed the ground wire outside my window into the ground. I'm not recommending this solution, but it worked.

In the end, I just decided to go back to my old mic, instead of the new buzzing one. :-/

If you are using a DI with a ground lift you could try that.