<p>Not exactly true, musicprnt – the new macbook pros have firewire 800 – and if you search Amazon, there is also a $10 converter for OLD macs where you can convert 800 to 400. (All the other macbooks have kicked firewire.) Just a dad is cct. that presonus firewire gives best preamp for the $ – accdng to by S’s instructor. Right now a $500 investment (see Sweetwater or Musician Friend) will give you all the recording power you need (and more). Logic express is fairly cheap (can get academic verison) and plays nicely with the other kids on the block. But this may be way more power than what’s needed for a pre-screening – and all has a learning curve. So it might be better to take advantage of someone who really loves to do live sound reinforcement : ) If the OP wants to make quality recordings in the future, the investment would be worthwhile, as it would not be wasted and is a good skill to develop.
So, with all the above said, S. had recorded parts of his portfolio, which was a sort of prescreening, in garage band. Other parts through better mics, mixers and digital interface in logic in a home-basement-studio he created; still other parts in a studio on protools, baby grand ribbon mics et al. (Guess which sounded better… Net result was he got in : )
Hope that helps.
Cheers,
K
PS - Not sure I agree that firewire is going the way of the dinosaur, at least in pro deployments. Still faster and better for music editing and film. Just means you end up selecting more pro-oriented interface gear and drives. But willing to be wrong : ) (After all, beta was better than vhs…: )</p>