Entry into digital audio/music production build

[kiriumrun]

Hi. I'm preparing for entering into the world of digital audio/music production. I will begin by setting up equipment in a single 10'x10' room that I live in and potentialy expand later on. I begin with little to no music or audio production background, but with experience and knowledge using computers. I am considering to use a linux operating system environment for all audio software and thus I likely will use al open source software.

As I delve into this experience without an as of yet defined goal or objective, I am not entirely certain of some hardware components to consider purchasing as I prepare for setting up a studio in the tiny studio room.

The computer I'd like to build will have an amd opteron 6376 16-core cpu and equipped with 64gb ram. Talking to a local music shop a couple days ago and mentioning it, immediately the salesperson suggested that I should not buy any AMD cpus because, as he insisted, Pro Tols does not work with anything except Intel hardware. Though, it is not a concern for me as I intend to use linux anyway. Included with the computer I would like to attach an RME HDSP 9632 pci sound card. And for hard drives, initially I was considering getting some 1tb Western Digital VelociRaptors, but I suppose they may be too loud and noisy causing interference more inconvenient than the speed performance gain for reading/writing data. So, perhaps sticking entirely with WD Black 1tb or 2tb (but not 4tb) drives will be sufficient for o/s drive, loops drive and remaining drives for music/audio storage. And perhaps a Corsair HX850 psu shall be sufficient to handle everything including several hard drives that I would place inside of an Obsidian Series Black 800D full tower case.

Other than the computer hardware, I already purchased and set up four ASUS 232h monitors attached to a doublesight quad flex 424ta stand, which I initially was considering to use all for the single computer, but I also consider to use them, one for the daw, and the remaining for others computers such as laptop, or even mobile phones/tablets if anyone else wants to connect their devices to work on stuff as well as with my own other devices. But otherwise the Supermicro MBD-H8SGL-F-O ATX motherboard I was looking at has only a Matrox video chipset with vga out and I was considering that I could pick up another inexpensive pci-e amd radeon 6x or 7x series gpu to support three more monitors if it may be useful. I'm still not certain. I also am awaiting for some Behringer Truth 3031a studio monitors to arrive. And I also have two mics, both from monoprice, one is a dynamic vocal microphone, which may be not so useful, but the other is a large diaphram condensor microphone that should be sufficient to begin with.

Other equipment I am still looking at to purchase and I am not entirely certain of yet and could use some feedback on is:
For a preamp, would an Art TubeOpto 8 preamp seem adequate or useful? One salesperson suggested connecting that thing to my RME sound card was like comparing a honda (preamp) to a ferrari (sound card). Though, I felt he was a bit unfair, at least with consideration to youtube.com/watch?v=HQr-TXIh8pg Also, seventhcircleaudio.com looks interesting, but I'm not sure I am capable of building my own preamp at this time.

Another thing I am not entirely certain of is wiring and cabling, connecting everything together, including if I get a compressor box or a converter box. Even considering XLR cables, I am not entirely certain how many I will need. What I know is I will need two to connect behringer monitors to a box, perhaps preamp, two more to connect each of the mics (though the dynamic vocal mic will probably be useless), and i'm uncertain if I would need anymore than that for additional wiring/cabling. Would it be wise to pick up a few ADAT cables also?

Also, I'm interested to set up proper room treatment for the purpose of recording with the large diaphragm condensor mic. I'm still not certain what treatment would be sufficient other than that I should stay away from foam products.

Update: Re room treatment, realtraps.com/p_guilford.htm and also hometheatershack.com/roomeq/ seem interesting

 

[kiriumrun]

With consideration to using a single small room and with the intention to keep things in place and to not be concerned with mobility, but with concern of latency issues (e.g. ardour.org/manual/system_design), would it be wiser to get a pci sound card such as rme hdsp 9632 and an external preamp (and converter box?) or would a single rme fireface ufx usb2 be comparable in regards to audio latency, audio quality throughput, etc? I tend to think that a usb2 device may not be as efficient as a pci or pci-e card.

Basically, is an internal sound card more efficient, better quality than an external device? Or are they practically the same or negligible difference?

 

[Bobbsy]

I think that, with your computer background, you may be coming at this backwards.

I imagine that if somebody approached you asking to set up a company wide data base and intranet, you'd want a detailed spec of what they need to achieve, sort out the software then specify the hardware needed to run everything. You need a similar exercise to do with music.

Things to consider:

How many simultaneous channels will you wish to record, now and in the future. If it's just you and an electric guitar, maybe a two channel system will do. If you might want to have a vocalist and somebody playing a keyboard with a stereo output, suddenly you need at least 3 inputs (1 for vocal and 2 for the stereo keyboard) and so on.

Will you need MIDI at any point?

How are you going to handle headphone monitoring while recording?

A big one: what software do you wish to use for recording and mixing. Protools is far from the only choice. I used it for years at work and, despite my familiarity, chose something else when I set up my home studio. Some software will just feel right, others will seem to fight you even once you learn them.

...and so on.

As for some of your specific queries:

Be careful about you Linux ambitions. Much/most DAW software won't run directly under Linux. Yes, you can run an emulator like VMware but it just adds an unnecessary layer to go wrong. You're likely better off with windoze or, cough cough, a Mac OS.

The local shop may be slightly right about AMD processors. A number of DAW software versions say things like "optimised for Intel" or whatever. That said, my main studio machine for many years ran AMD with not a single hiccup. You pays your money and takes your chances.

Before spending money on a 16 core processor, make sure your selected DAW can use them. Audio hardware is often a few versions back in terms of what it can use at the processor.

Your instincts on HDD are good. Make sure they run quietly. A spin speed of at least 7200rpm is good, faster better--but not if noisy.

Two disks are perfect. One for the OS and DAW software, a second for the actual music.

In terms of audio interface, PCI ones are becoming quite scarce and, with the advent of things like USB 3 and Thunderbolt this will continue to accelerate. You're going to find a lot more choice (and quality range) in USB methinks.

You may be overthinking the video side of things. DAWs don't need particularly elaborate video facilities and, indeed, I've heard of some top end game cards actually interfering with the operation of the DAW.

Going for totally top end computer gear then talking about Behringer Truth monitors is a bit like ordering a Rolls Royce then gaffer taping a 1960s transistor radio to the Window to provide music. Same with un-named dynamic mics and "any old" condenser mic. Cut back on the computer spec and get good audio gear.

Buy a decent audio interface and forget a separate pre amp until you have monitors and mics good enough for them to make a difference.

Forget ADAT cables unless you have ADAT gear.

XLRs etc. are easy...let's talk about that when your final equipment list is sorted out.

Hmmm...just a thought...if I tot up my investment in microphones, monitors, headphones, stands, headphone amps, etc. etc. that probably works out to be about ten times my investment in a computer, HDDs and monitors. The audio stuff was purchased over many years, but still....

Anyhow, hope my ramblings help a bit.

 

[Armistice]

For what it's worth I have a Fireface UCX into a 16GB RAM / Xeon 3.5 processor PC running Win 7 Pro and I have no idea what latency is... So far, my biggest project, with VSTs all over the joint and MIDI samples for drums maxes out the processor, according to Task Manager at a crazy 1%...

So, like Bobbsy says... less $ on PC build, more on microphones, interface, monitor speakers and other things to get quality sound in the first place...