okay, well they may have sold you the right thing. but first you may need a little background to understand what's going on.

to record your guitar using a computer there are a few things you need.

a guitar and a guitar cable help to get things started.  also an audio interface (a posh name for a sound card).  without that bit you can't actually get any sound into your PC, or out of your PC for that matter, as the sound cards job is also to send sound from your PC when you play some music, to the speakers.

okay, as well as the sound card you need some software that can record audio, which is sometimes referred to as DAW software.  DAW = Digital AUdio Workstation.  Basically a fancy name for the software/the whole PC and software setup that allows you wo record.

okay, now if your BF has an electric guitar and just plays it without connecting it to an amplifier, it sounds quite dull.  electric guitars need an amplifier.  the amplifier does a lot more than just making his electric guitar louder, as they often add distortion, and they add tonal characteristics to the guitar sound, so that it sounds good.  The speaker in the amp is part of that magic too.

So where was I... well POD Farm simulates the sound of the amp and the speakers (and some cool effects too, like echo for example among many others) so depending what you've bought may mean you have the software to emulate the amplifier/speaker sounds and you may also have the audio interface.  and you may also have a cut down version of some recording software.

If they've sold you a POD Studio device then you may be ok, as they come with a cut down version of ableton which is some recording software.  if that's the case I would click on the downloads link at the top of this page and download the latest version of POD Farm.  install it on the PC your BF will use for recording then install the ableton CD (don't lose it as ableton software isn't a free download, and that CD IS your only copy), then connect the POD Studio device, and connect the guotar to the normal input, and connect some headphones to the phones output, or some speakers/monitors to the analog output (you may need an adapter).  then start the POD Farm standalone application, and you can set what effects your BF wants on the recording.  then click on the mixer tab in pod farm.  it should list 2 pairs of record sends.  1&2 and 3&4 one of them should say processed, or you can select that for either.  processed means your guitar tone with the processed effects put onto it too (the effects are your amp/speaker sounds + effects)  the record sends are like a virtual way to connect the 2 software packages.  just like in the old days where you had a real guitar amp and you'd have to put a microphone infront of it and plug that puc into a 4 track recorder.  so that cable is your record send just like you're doing in POD farm and ableton.

in ableton you should be able to select a new track, arm it for recording and select the input, which will be an ASIO input and select the pod studio send 1&2 or 3&4 (as you found earlier).  then record away.  I'm not too sharp on ableton, so you may need to check the manual for where the audio preferences are too.

i hope this helps.  if they've sold you something else then please give us as much info about what you have bought, as a line 6 pod farm (which is what you said you'd bought) doesn't make too much sense for what you could buy in a store.

also it may be worth getting your BF to set all this up, and chat to us about what issues he's having.  we're a friendly bunch.

Cheers

Rowbi

Hello,

  Are you talking about burning your recorded sessions to a disc? What recording application are you using?

  What file formats do you see?

  Line6Miller