Plugging In
To use the Guitarmaster software application you have to plug the output from your electric guitar into the "mic" or "line-in" socket on your PC's soundcard, or into a free USB socket, using an appropriate connecting lead. You essentially have three options here:
1. Use a standard cable and adaptor
You can use a standard jack cable to connect your guitar to your PC's sound card. However, a
sound card jack is a stereo jack, whereas a guitar jack is mono. If you plug a
mono jack into your soundcard, or a stereo jack into your guitar, this may not work as
(in our experience) stereo jacks don't connect very well to mono sockets and vice-versa.
For this reason we recommend the use of a lead that is designed to be mono-stereo, or that you use a regular guitar lead with an appropriate mono-stereo adaptor.
Adaptors like this are available from many suppliers. Click here to use the Google search engine to search for a suitable adaptor. Please note that we do not endorse any particular third-party product.
2. Use a quarter-inch jack to USB lead You can use a quarter-inch (6.35 mm) jack to USB connecting lead to connect your guitar to your PC. While we do not endorse any particular third-party product, an example of such a connector may be found here.
3. Construct a lead
If you're good with a soldering iron, all you need is a 3.5mm stereo jack (to go into your soundcard), a 1/4 inch mono jack (to go into your guitar) and about 2 metres of thin co-axial cable. Connect one pole only of the 3.5mm jack to the single pole on the mono jack. Click here for more detailed instructions.
Note: some newer laptops do not have a microphone ("mic") or line-in socket built in. To use Guitarmaster with PCs of this type, you will need to use a jack-to-USB lead (see Point 2 above) or alternatively purchase a mini USB sound card from a third party supplier. These normally cost less than five dollars. We do not endorse any specific product, but one example of a suitable USB adaptor is the Dynamode USB sound card, available from Amazon here.
Disclaimer: while we have tested Guitarmaster on countless PCs and had no problems, we regret that we can accept no liability for consequential loss or damage caused by the use of its software or through connecting the output of an electric guitar to your PC's soundcard. Don't use effects! Take special care when using guitars with active circuitry!
Please note that we are no longer able to supply custom connecting leads to connect your guitar to your PC. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause
