Someone with experience with recording gear.

[ThumbFreak]

Hey guys, I need some recommendation. I'm a noob at these things and I really want to learn and get as much experience with recording as possible.

The band I'm in wants to record some of our songs and the guitarist and I have been talking about getting our own home studio going.

What gear would I need? Recommend a recording software? If someone would be nice enough to just list off the gear in a list that would get us started and whats needed to get this plan going.


Thanks, Ben

[Charling]

well, the list will be ever expanding depending on the quality of recordings you want.

at a minimum you will need a pc or mac, pretty quick with a fair bit of ram (1gb will do but the more the better). you will need a soundcard which is how the sound gets into your computer. and you will need a program to record in.

the ones ive worked with are logic and cubase and they are both great. I know digital performer and sonar are good too, as is protools but it gets a little more complex with a protools setup as you have to get hardware to match the program which can get pricey.

there not much between any of them, try a few demos and see which one takes your fancy, thats all there is too it really, they will all do basic recording competently.

soundcard is the big one, the number of 'ins' is how many instruments you can record simultaneosly, ie a one-in soundcard will only record one track at a time, no matter what, so you can record bass etc all at the same time but they wont be seperated onto a track for each instrument, rather all bundled together on one track.

this is no good, if you are going to record drums then you will need 6 or 7 ins to do a good job, but more is preferable. to record the whole band at once you will need allot more!

something cheap and pretty good is the m-audio delta 1010lt (10 ins 10 outs). easy to install and goes for about £120

you will of course need mics, to get a good drum sound you will need (at least!). a good kick mic, three or four dynamics (like sm57, but there are allot of others out there) and two or more condensers (rode nt1's are very nice for the price).

you can get by with less however, but you will have less control over the drum sound. i would recommend getting a few yourself and borrowing the rest untill you get into it and you are sure you want to drop the cash!

you will need some kind or mixer in between the mic's and the soundcard. the mixer will need as many channels as you will want to use simultaneously and will need phantom power. you can get something that will do the job very cheap these days. but bear in mind the quality of your recording is subtly affected at this stage, so a good mixer/channel strip will make the recordings sparkle a little extra, whereas a bad one may sound cold or muddy. its a budget thing really, but i can recommend the mackie 1402 which is only a little over £200, sounds great and has all the inputs etc you will need.

lastly if you want to get a good sound you will need a good set of speakers.

you can get by on a high quality pair of hi fi speakers you may have but only if you get very used to how they sound, and how bands you like sound on them.

when you are ready you should get a pair of monitor speakers, but dont waste the cash getting an entry level system, its much more cost effective to wait and save up and get a good midrange set, especially if the alternative is a good set of hifi's you know really well (thats the important part, i cant stress enough that to get good mix's you need to know your speakers inside out).

so you need

mics, cables, mixer, soundcard, computer, software, speakers

if you chose well and do your research you will be able to get a system which gets some very good recordings, but be aware that very good recordings (like the ones our favorite bands are on ) were done on seriously good gear. if you are serious about the quality i would suggest you budget AT LEAST £2000 for a basic system. if you scrimp a bit you may find yourself wanting more 6months down the line.

that said, once you have the gear and you know how to use it, there is a high chance you can make that money back by recording other bands, and then buy more gear woot!!

hope that helps

edit - sorry that all sounds a bit intense, you could budget for less if you just want to get a good demo together, but a bit extra spent now will save money later if you are serious about it!

[Stumpy]

Originally Posted by ThumbFreak

Hey guys, I need some recommendation. I'm a noob at these things and I really want to learn and get as much experience with recording as possible.

The band I'm in wants to record some of our songs and the guitarist and I have been talking about getting our own home studio going.

What gear would I need? Recommend a recording software? If someone would be nice enough to just list off the gear in a list that would get us started and whats needed to get this plan going.


Thanks, Ben

I don't see a $$$ range...what would your comfort zone be?

[ThumbFreak]

Wow, thanks!

[Charling]

hehe, yeah i went off on one a bit there hope it helps, its a great subject to get into! I bought a setup like the one I detailed a while back and now i'm co running an awesome studio out in the country, which is great as all the bands I work with have a free recording place with an engineer sympathetic to the band (ie me ) and I get to produce other awesome artists to for good money, so I say go for it!

[ThumbFreak]

Originally Posted by Stumpy

I don't see a $$$ range...what would your comfort zone be?

I wasn't worrying about that as of now, I'm just more worried about figuring out what I will need.

I'm one to try and get the best quality equipment but I don't want to spend an outrageous amount of money.

[ThumbFreak]

Originally Posted by Charling

hehe, yeah i went off on one a bit there hope it helps, its a great subject to get into! I bought a setup like the one I detailed a while back and now i'm co running an awesome studio out in the country, which is great as all the bands I work with have a free recording place with an engineer sympathetic to the band (ie me ) and I get to produce other awesome artists to for good money, so I say go for it!

Yeah, my plans are to go to SCAD for Recording Arts so I'm really in to learning about this subject.

[Charling]

Originally Posted by ThumbFreak

Yeah, my plans are to go to SCAD for Recording Arts so I'm really in to learning about this subject.

ah, nice, good job. well feel free to ask me anything you want to know and i'll try to help, as will the rest of the gang no doubt

Are you focusing on just the recording or the mixing side too at SCAD?

also, if you really want good results, your mix will sound better if done in an acoustically treated room, so you may want to add a bit to the budget to get some wall pads and bass traps for your studio! this is the number one thing forgotten when putting together a setup, and you end up with mixes which have been recorded great and mixed well too, apart from a big dip at 300hz where there room was resonating during the mixdown (or some similar scenario! )

o

[ThumbFreak]

Originally Posted by Charling

ah, nice, good job. well feel free to ask me anything you want to know and i'll try to help, as will the rest of the gang no doubt

Are you focusing on just the recording or the mixing side too at SCAD?

also, if you really want good results, your mix will sound better if done in an acoustically treated room, so you may want to add a bit to the budget to get some wall pads and bass traps for your studio! this is the number one thing forgotten when putting together a setup, and you end up with mixes which have been recorded great and mixed well too, apart from a big dip at 300hz where there room was resonating during the mixdown (or some similar scenario! )

o

Well see I'm just very interested in the produceing and composeing of music. I want to basicly learn how to do it all. hah.

About the sound proofing, we are moveing soon and we may turn the garage into a recording/bandroom and thats one of the main things I was thinking about.

[Stumpy]

Originally Posted by ThumbFreak

I wasn't worrying about that as of now, I'm just more worried about figuring out what I will need.

I'm one to try and get the best quality equipment but I don't want to spend an outrageous amount of money.

Computer - if you have a 1.5ghz pc w/1gb ram, 100gb drive great. If you have at least a 733mhz G4 w/1gb of ram and 80gb of drive space...great.

The software and the i/o device would be the question...
Digital Performer, ProTools, Cakewalk, etc. are all at different price points.

Digital Performer is about 500$ us on musicians friend's web site. http://www.motu.com/products/software/dp/ and it doesn't care about your sound card/audio i/o as much as protools. You can use a variety of sound cards and even digidesign's audio/io's for Digital Performer.

ProTools is about 500.00 +/- for the Mbox2 w/protools le. You can not use someone else's audio i/0 for this software. Period. If you are upgrading you might have to upgrade the hardware along with the software. We had to at the school. What a pain.
If you are using M-Powered ProTools there are a wider variety of options for you. The M-Audio cards are clean and reliable. If you must go to ProTools I would suggest this option. The costs of changing the software and your operating system are less than the completely digidesign option, imho.

Cubase SX - Good program high learning curve. 800.00 us. Also uses many different audio i/o's.

Apple Logic Pro - Incredible learning curve...still working on it... 1000$ us. Can use a multiple of choices for audio i/o. Hard to work with, imho.

Sonor CakeWalk - 500$ us. Strong program. My guitar player swears by it. But it is quirky. Multitude of audio i/o's you can use.

The standard in the industry is ProTools. Nearly every studio and mastering house has it. Digital Performer files can be opened in ProTools (I have done it). ProTools audio files can be opened in Digital Performer.

Sound Cards...

M-Audio works the best, imho, amongst those that you can afford. The customer services is 2nd to none. There are others and you can spend a bazillion hours going over specs etc. But what it comes down to is, can I afford it-will it work every time-can I get help when I need it.

So I have an entry level system for sale. It consists of a G3 300mhz mac with @380+/- mb ram and a 6 gig drive. Not much more than enough to learn on. It has DP3.11 and ProTools Free on it. For a student that needs to learn this is great.

My G4 733 has 1gb of ram and nearly 300gb of drive space. I am running the M-Audio 1010LT in the system. I have Digital Performer 5.01 on it and ProTools LE. When I borrow the Digi002 from school I can run the ProTools setup. (only do it for mixes that are for school) I have the Motu Micro Express on it for midi. (connects to my Roland String Ensemble, Korg 01R/W, and Alesis DMPro - as well as my keyboard). I have about 30gb of samples and am currently saving for a good soft sampler. I have a pc that only has gigsamples and gigaLE on it.

The system at work (my school) has a G5 Duo core 2.xghz, 4 gb ram and 3/4 terabyte drive space. It has ProTools LE on it with the Digi002 rack. It also now has the MOTU 2408 and 24i and we will be upgrading to Digital Performer 5.x this next year.

In my opinion...You should go with the system that works best for you.

If money is really not an issue...then go with the protools system. You will be able to take anything you do to any larger studio and get the mix done right and have it mastered for you directly from your DVD data disc. Any of them will work. How many ins/outs do you need? Are you going to run all of the band in simultaneously and get a live recording feel? Are you going to put everyone in and get the scratch tracks down and then replace them one at a time, drums excepted.???

If you are going to put everyone in and then replace them one at a time maybe an 8 in/out interface would work. Dunno. In my case I have 12 voices plus the rhythm section that needs to go in at the same time and then replace the parts in 3's or by instrument. (vocal jazz/combo). I needed to be able to put in 16 parts simultaneously. What do you need?

My M-audio card at home handles 8 in/out just fine. I have done rock bands that way....

My friend's ProTools TDM system takes in 24 at a time and can push out the same number...that was 25k to purchase though.

am I long winded or what?

My advice is to decide where you want to go with the studio. How many tracks going in/out is enough for now and possibly the near future. Are you thinking of practicing on others? Making money on the side? etc.

Here is my thought process, and that of others I know...

I need a system that will handle a rock band of five pieces. The drums require at least 8 ins, the bass 1 in, the guitar 2 ins (stereo from time to time), keyboards 1 to 4 ins, Vox 1 ins and up to 4 of them.

So... I need to have at least 8 ins (largest number required by any one instrument).

I need a system that will give me a stereo out so I can mix in the stereo field ... but I might like to have a 5.1 mix for DVD A stuff. I will need 6 outs just in case of the 5.1 mix.

So...I need 8 ins and at least 6 outs.

I need a system that will allow me to put in midi information...either from a controller (keyboard) or to/from external samplers/sound devices. Hmmm

So ... I need 8 ins/6 outs and midi of at least 16 ins/outs

I need to be able to record, edit, mix, add effects, run midi, and possibly do the pre mastering thing...as well as be able to send my stuff to a mastering house.

So I need a computer that will handle the software and the hardware listed above. It will need to be above the required minimums for the software and be able to handle the hardware. And I want the industry standard because the files can be put on any machine that I might need to take it to.

Industry Standards...Mac, ProTools/MOTU/M-Audio (hardware), ProTools/Digital Performer/Cubase (Software).

You decide.



Long winded...but...if you are going to do this the right way the first time, then you need to consider where you are going and what you are going to do...IMHO