Your Pro Tools Studio

The Home Recording Studio

I thought I would address the idea of having your own professional sounding home recording studio in your house.

I have one and enjoy the idea of producing my own material without the expense if I was to record at a studio in the city. I live in Midland, Texas and this is a small town with a couple of home recording studios that charge money. I like to record in my home recording studio when I want to and produce the music the way I like it . Its not what someone else may like or enjoy, because honestly who really gives a hoot how good you sound but yourselves, and then possibly trying to sell your sound on someone. That is always an option in having a home recording studio also , you have options, you can bask in the glitter of saying ,”Hey I just made this song with 12 different instruments, you want to take a listen to it”, and yes most of your friends will, and they will be honest with you , so be careful, if they do not care for it, so what, some of us like different artist and some do not, so take it as it comes. In My Home Recording studio the main goal in a home type setup is to get the equipment right from the beginning. I will talk a little about what I found new, meaning January 2011, that seems to help out with the home recording studio artist.

The first thing is not what type of guitar you are using in your home recording studio, it’s the CPU, and what kind of PC is it that will not bog down from all the files from your artistic desires. I researched a bit on this and I use a Quad Core Processor with 1 tetra byte of Hard drive and I have two external hard drives off that one, because in reality you want, in your home recording studio, to keep your musical files on an external drive, they can add up a lot of megabytes very shortly. I recommend an external as does the software I use which is Pro Tools 8.04cs and this is a wise idea, I have found out the hard way when I have had a crash on my hard drive, the internal. The Ram is important in a Home Recording Studio, also I have 8 gigs of ram no slow down at all, you can get by with a lot less, yet 2 gig of ram I would think would run the program, just very slowly, it’s better to put your money out for a new Pcfor your home recording studio possibly, and they are being built to specifications just for music software. Macintosh has been the prize category in making music and this is because the Mac OS X , this is what I am told, I am not touching a Macintosh till I know more and I can’t afford to experiment with that operating system right now, But if you have the money, You may look into this option. There is a website called Digital Audio Workstations , that has some desktop units that are just specifically made for PC and Home Recording Studio projects, that I highly would like you to explore, the website is http://www endpcnoise.com , The Machines are called ,”Music Maker” a brand name, with all the bells and whistles you need to really get your Home Recording Studio Up, now this is an expensive option, yet still below the 3 thousand dollar mark, and it will outlast anything you can buy elsewhere at a store as far a music recording goes.

The Second most important part of any Home Recording Studio is the software you will use, to mix the instruments together with, there are so many and so many different brands and resources, that for the Home Recording needs, you will have to select these on your own. I use M-Audio Pro Tools soft ware and there are some basic reasons I use this company. The number one is I had this jack for my electric guitar, and it was made by m-audio, well at the time I had no system that could run it, and I had two new computers, well three years later and we all know computers change I hooked it up to an old PC and I was amazed at the sound quality and, I really rocked. I looked into the company further for drivers, and they had them still available, so I played with it for a while, built up some money and bought the M-Audio Fast Track at about 100.00USD at a local electronics store and wow, what a sound, I was so impressed with this box that hooks from your usb to your pc and then you can hook up a guitar and a microphone, this also came for the Home Recording Artist ,Software that was amazing , for one hundred dollars I was flabbergasted, So time went on and I still use this box and upgraded to pro Tools 8.0 for about 500.00USD , Now by the way they have Pro Tools 9.0 , yet I have fun and Studio Digital recordings from this system as is right now and access to thousands of synthesizer sounds, and drum sounds, it’s quite unbelievable what you get for that cost. I make Mp3’s all the time and have sold some on sound click, which is a good place to start out at to see if your any good with the world, I didn’t much care about money making, yet I have made some, and I am on the charts, I am no rock star, granted I am musically inclined, so they say. I will not direct you in any way on the software I do think Pro tools is in the lead, yet there are others and they come with a stiffer price for the regular home Musician, so check these out if you can afford to.

The third subject I want to talk about in little detail because I have not really had an issue with this, and that is sound proofing your room for the Home Recording Artist studio, I have not done a thing, and had no problems except with mix downs, .I have ti use headphones, and I highly recommend a good pair of ear woofer blowers that will rock your head off, but have a crisp sound. I have found it difficult to get the mix right with these though. There are some expensive panels you can buy from top dealers for sound proofing your home recording studio, and if you live in an Apartment or even a house , it may be needed to spend the extra bucks to get the room more stable . I am not touching soundproofing until I have used it, So far as a low end Home Recording Studio operator and not pursuing my musical task , I have not found a need for it in my work, Headphones will just have to do . There are Bed Cushions you can buy at the stores for your back, if you know what I mean egg carton things, and they are about all I could afford for now, and not really sure if they would help, just an idea, for you sonic boom players.

The basics I have just explained in the last couple of paragraphs and my own feelings and thoughts into getting started with your home recording studio setup, there is money involved with anything when we walk out the door, yet if you have about a thousand dollars’ including instruments , you can make yourself sound like the artist on a high definition sound system with surround sound. Rock On and enjoy your home recording atmosphere.

Christopher Hyer2.15.2011