How to get rid of noise while recording the guitar?

[Yak00dza]

Hi!

I am pretty new with the music recording. I am using Reaper, and my hardware is:
Guitar -> "MXR Distortion+" pedal -> \ audiointerface -> amp sim in reaper

I am trying to record the guitar, but there is horrible noise. I tuned my pedal and volume bars to misimize it but it is still there. I tried using ReaFir plugin to remove it, and there is not any noise when the guitar is silent, but when i start playing it reapears, and there are strange sound when the guitar sound is fading out.

Is there any way to remove this noise?
Thank you!

[Stuart79]

What sort of guitar are you using? (Does it have single coil pickups?)

What sort of noise is it? Is the noise still present when you turn off your distortion pedal?

[Wonks]

What level is the guitar being recorded at?

What is your full recording setup including desktop or laptop, monitors or headphones?

Trying to work out if you may have no solid ground, or maybe a ground loop situation. But we need full details of what the kit is and how it’s all connected.

[Yak00dza]

Ok, i am here again with a bunch of additional info.

I am using the guitar with SSH pickups scheme. I play it using the humbucker one.
The guitar is at max possible volume.

I use laptop "ASUS TUF Gaming FX506HCB" and audiointerface Behringer UM2. The guitar is plugged in the INST 2 slot.

I tested my headphons and understood that strange sound while fade out process is made by them, not by guitar.

When distortion pedal is completely removed from the chain, there is a quite stable background noise with really high oscillation frequency in the area of 2-4 kHz and not so hight frequency in the area of 50 Hz - 2 kHz.

With distortion pedal added and being turned off the situation is the same. When turned one the noise is just louder.

What is the best solution to remove it?

[Wonks]

I would suggest that there is no system ground, which means that any shielding and filtering is ineffective and the overall system is picking up noise. Laptop power supplies often either have no mains ground connection or a high resistance path to ground.

What you need to do is connect something that you’d normally be expected to be at ground potential in your guitar+interface+laptop arrangement, to a solid electrical ground.

Have you got a guitar amp with a power lead? If you can plug that in but leave the amp off, then a normal guitar lead plugged into the unused channel of your interface should provide the necessary ground path.

[Yak00dza]

Hi!

I don't have an acces to my guitar today, so I can't test it. I didn't really got it. Do you want me to connect unused mic channel on interface with my amplifier?

[Wonks]

Yes. The combi jack on input one will take a standard TS jack plug. Leave the amp off but make sure it’s plugged in.

The earth connection in the amp is connected to the sleeve connection of the input jack socket. Running a lead between the amp and the interface will carry the ground connection over to the interface, which will provide a good ground for the system. This should greatly improve the noise issue, and hopefully cure it completely.

[Drew Stephenson]

Though this does assume the amp is not also a class II device.

Yak00dza, what model of amplifier is it please?

[Wonks]

I did say 'power lead' ( I would normally say 'mains lead' but that's not always clear to people outside the UK and Ireland) but, yes, not a small amp with an external PSU (though small guitar amps would probably use a class 1 PSU for better noise rejection).

[Yak00dza]

Unfortunately, that didn't work. I bought new headphones, connected them to auidiointeface and disconected EVERYTHING. Only PC->auidiointerface->headphones. Now i can hear really quaite but permanent noise. Connecting turned off amplifier to the unused auidiointerface channel created even more noise. I guess this noise is from my PC. What can i do?

[Yak00dza]

Though this does assume the amp is not also a class II device.

Yak00dza, what model of amplifier is it please?

Marshal MG10

[Wonks]

I'd have a look at this review of the UM2.

https://youtu.be/Yxh2ftsSpJg

It's not a great interface, and whilst you can get decent recordings with it, you really need to understand it and the software.

If the 48v light is on, turn the 48v switch off. You don't want it on unless you have a condenser mic in input 1.

I did ask about input levels before. How close are the recording peaks to the 0dBFS level in your DAW? What is the gain knob position on input 2? What are the settings on the Distortion+?

If you plug the guitar into input 2 without the pedal, do you still get the noise?