Home Recording Studio: Getting Started

[articles]

*Lately, we've had many new home recording forum members ask how they can start their own home recording studio. This article will be an overview of all the things you need to record music. This article is intended for beginners who are basically starting with little or no home recording gear.

More...

[Myti Mouse]

What's good wit it man? I'm an aspiring hip-hop artist and I wanna start my own studio in my house. I need to know what equipment I need to get and what programs and software you recommend

[brandondrury]

Check out the member's only guides in my signature.

Brandon

[bluesbaby]

i have a little recording gear.i have a mackie 1604 pro mixing board,tascam da-38 8 track recorder.i also have a tascam cd burner.and lexicon reverb,nady compressor limiter.i have computer recording software.

[andyrockband]

Hey guys, I'm finally getting a home recording setup going on here.
This site is wonderful by the way, great work, boss.

I have an old version of Cubase SX version 1, an EMU 0404 USB analog to digital converter with 4 inputs(150 bucks) and a few mics. The condenser mic is an AKG perception 200(159bucks with a 20buck rebate at Musiciansfriend.com no shipping no tax), hopefully that will sound good. And no I have no connection with musicians friend but I love them.

Ok, I couldn't resist buying ....are you ready?...... 3 dynamic mics from nady for 20 dollars, no , 19.95 to be a jerk about it..... I can't wait to see how these suckers work. Some even say they sound just as nice as a shure SM57,
we'll see what we see when the recording starts.

Also bought EZdrummer for the drums. Looks like cool software if you don't have a drummer.

I can digitize the music with the EMU 0404 at 24bit at a sampling rate of
192Khz . Sounds amazing, but guess what? I read many scientific articles on sound sampling rates and it basically says that there really is no difference to the human ear after about 20khz or so. So even cd level 44.1khz is beyond the human ear so why sample so high just to use hard drive space or make your manhood feel bigger? Sorry, can i say manhood?

Anyway, I'm trying no to buy too much crap, but I may have to buy the newer version of Cubase to be able to use it with EZdrummer. Anyone know about this?


Here's the budget so far with what I've bought and maybe it will help you get a ballpark of where prices and tech are at.... this is a business after all right?


EMU 0404 USB Digital to Analog "breakout box" or "audio interface" 150 bucks
Includes a bunch of software for recording like Cubase LE and
Sonar LE, Effects software, etc..

AKG perception 200 condenser mic (with rebate of 20) 139 bucks
Two mic stands 30 bucks
3 dynamic mics 20 bucks
500 GB External Hard Drive (20 buck rebate) 99 bucks

Grand Total 438 bucks


(there are variables, you may or may not need more drive space, you may need cables which I have, and stuff like that, but at least this is a ball park
number plus you can add 150 more bucks for EZdrummer but you don't have to buy that anyway)


(like mike meyers on Coffee Talk SNL)

Ok, home recording, discuss......

[brandondrury]

You have an excellent rig to get started with.

Anyway, I'm trying no to buy too much crap, but I may have to buy the newer version of Cubase to be able to use it with EZdrummer. Anyone know about this?

I haven't heard this yet, but it could be true.

I can digitize the music with the EMU 0404 at 24bit at a sampling rate of
192Khz . Sounds amazing, but guess what? I read many scientific articles on sound sampling rates and it basically says that there really is no difference to the human ear after about 20khz or so. So even cd level 44.1khz is beyond the human ear so why sample so high just to use hard drive space or make your manhood feel bigger? Sorry, can i say manhood?

You are pretty much right about this one. A lot of big boys have heard a difference at various sample rates, but that stuff doesn't matter until you are a robo bad ass. (Yes, you can say "manhood". Say whatever you want.)

Brandon

[andyrockband]

So would anyone have a suggestion what sampling rate might be appropriate?

I would think 96khz would be plenty, but are there any issues with going back down to 16bit 44.1k cd? things like fidelity loss, etc?

We will probably have it mastered by giving the engineera data cd with the 24bit files then have someone like discmakers duplicate some copies.

anyone have any comments?

[brandondrury]

If you are mixing in the box, I would go with 44.1 without question. This is what I record at. If the sample rate is the weakest link in your recording chain, you are one badass mixer. You can use your Grammy money to test out other options.

Brandon

[djkirkland]

Thank goodness there are still people out there who won't treat me like an idiot because I'm new. I need to record some demo-type CD's. Want them good quality. May not sound like a $400 an hour studio session, but it must be good enough to showcase a killer voice. I am reading your articles and they are very helpful. Question: My Dell has a Integrated High Definition Audio 2.0. Is that good enough for a sound card?

[brandondrury]

Thank goodness there are still people out there who won't treat me like an idiot because I'm new.

Well, I treat A LOT of people like idiots, but that's because they are idiots....not because they are new.

Question: My Dell has a Integrated High Definition Audio 2.0. Is that good enough for a sound card?

Well, that "high definition" stuff is marketing buzz words that has little meaning. "Good enough" would need to be defined. With that said, there are some serious issues with stock audio interfaces in that they are almost always incapable of low latency recording. They usually aren't the highest in audio quality (even if they say otherwise). They usually make no concessions for preamps.

Unless on a robo-extreme budget, I pretty much always recommend a real audio interface for recording. There are a billion out there with a zillion different features. I recommend you check out my Home Recording Soundcard Wizard in my signature. Go through the beginner's guide and that'll get you up to speed.

Brandon