Garageband 10.1.0 guitar sounds really bad

Hi Topper28,

The first thing I would suggest is that you check the Avid support website to review compatibility with Mbox 3 and El Capitan and to download the most current driver.

Avid Knowledge Base - Mbox Drivers

http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/compatibility/Mac-OS-X-10-11-El-Capitan -support-for-Media-Composer-Pro-Tools-Sibelius-EUCON-and-ISIS

Apple has recently released OS X 10.11 (El Capitan) as part of a free upgrade available to all Mac OS X users. Avid has not completed qualification of the new OS X 10.11 for all products and strongly recommends customers do NOT upgrade to this OS version until qualification is complete. There are open bugs and known issues with current shipping versions of some of our products that will need to be addressed prior to qualification.

Note: If you upgrade to Mac OS 10.11.x, you must uninstall Media Composer. Reinstall Media Composer after you perform the OS upgrade. If you use Avid Artist DNxIO, you must also uninstall the Desktop Video software and reinstall it after the OS upgrade.

For testing purposes:

1. Check GarageBand preferences to make sure the Mbox3 is the input. Choose your Mac's built-in output as the output.

2. Create a new project and add a guitar track.

3. Choose the correct input channel.

4. Turn on monitoring in the track header.

5. Make sure the track is record enabled.

6. Make sure the gain is turned up on the Mbox.

If the issue persists, try connecting your Gibson directly to the computer if possible, or try a different audio interface.

Connect an electric guitar

Set the input source for an electric guitar

1. Select the audio track.

2. Click the Smart Controls button to open the Smart Controls pane, then click the Inspector button .

3. In the Recording Settings section, choose one of the following from the Input pop-up menu:

   • If the guitar is connected to your computer’s audio input port, choose Built-in Input.

     If Built-in Input doesn’t appear in the menu, choose GarageBand > Preferences, click Audio/MIDI, and choose Built-in Input from the Audio Input pop-up menu.

   • If the guitar is connected to a USB port, choose the microphone.

   • If the guitar is connected to an audio interface, choose the channel number for the microphone.

     If the audio interface channels don’t appear in the menu, choose GarageBand > Preferences, click Audio/MIDI, then choose the audio interface from the Audio Input pop-up menu.

   Make sure the format matches the input. Choose a mono input for monophonic instruments (with a single channel), and choose a stereo input for stereo instruments (with a pair of channels).

4. Drag the Recording Level slider to change the input volume level for the sound source.

   If the Recording Level slider is dimmed, you can’t change the input volume in GarageBand. In this case, use the device’s own volume control.

   Turn on monitoring for an electric guitar or bass

5. In the Smart Control inspector, click the Monitoring button .

   The Monitoring button lights orange to indicate that monitoring is turned on.

Hope that helps ...