M-Audio Fast Track w/Reaper recording noise?

[dbx]

Hi Gang...

No time to do a search on this topic right now...just picked up a Fast Track USB audio interface and am using Reaper as my DAW...the set up was easy enough but now I notice when I record, there is some background noise, not 60 cycle hum, sounds like digital noise, almost like the sound that comes from a speaker with a cell phone around, or a kind of motorboating...I changed the latency setting to reduce this noise but it's still there...it's not acceptable for any critical recording...any tips? Running WinXP S3 with 1G RAM...thanks...

[asintoras]

How are you recording? guitars or bass facing the computer monitor? The angle of the guitar facing the monitor can be a problematic source of noise. If you have a LCD noise, you need to find the best angle... if you can turn your monitor off while recording, do it.

If there is something else, we need more explanation of the noise. White noise? Random click noises?

[dbx]

asintoras...very good...yep I was facing the laptop monitor directly...gonna plug in now with a different orientation to the screen and see if that eliminates/reduces the noise...thanks...

[dbx]

I think asintoras got some of it...I was catching the monitor/laptop noise through my pickups and it was then transferred through the Fast Track...but the main culprit is the laptop power supply. I was running off battery when running this last test. Went low on battery and when I plugged my power supply the zzzzzzzz noise came back....so I read a thread that recommended the EbTech HumX as a way to eliminate that, so I'll try that route next, thanks!!!