** Already picked mics for home studio...NOW WHAT ABOUT ...**

  • Thread starter Thread starter shAkEz_gk
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Beezoboy said:
Better A/D conversion and pres can come later down the road.
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A chain is only as strong as it's weakest link... A/D-D/A conversion are very often the weakest links in most signal chains... if addressed from the 'get go', then you'll be able to realize the best possible audio from the other links in the chain...

More often than not it's best to get better quality hardware... but less of it. It gives you time to learn the tools at your disposal [rather than being in a situation where you now have to learn a plethora of tools... limiting the quantity of variables is generally preferable when starting out], and if you get quality tools, you won't have to purchase the same tools over and over and over again.

I humbly submit that you can make a far more detailed and varied recording with 4 good channels of mic amp and a pack of Shure 57's with a good A/D-D/A conversion than you can with great mics, shit pre's and and shit conversion.

As always, it'll come down to the skill and desire of the operator... but investing in tools that will last you a career is always less expensive than investing in disposable crap you'll end up outgrowing in a year or two.
 
Hi Fletcher,

What would those 4 channels of good pre and the good AD/DA converters be and how much would they cost?

Thanks,
Tom
 
Fletcher I quite agree with you. My original goal was to give him some fuctionality around what he already wanted.

I actually use a Q10 and it gives astonishingly good results. Neve pres, no, but usable IMO. Better than Mackie and Behringer with more gain and cleaner, not that that is saying all that much I guess. Enough about that, we all have our opinions and believe me I trust yours, Fletcher.

Also, I basically have that setup above. I have the computer, Q10, and the same type of mics. U87 and Gefell UMT800 for multipattern, Beyer m260 and Shure 330's for ribbon, a 441 and M88 + many more. I get some good recordings out of my humble setup.

I was simply trying to provide advice on a setup that would yield quality recordings and lots of options including the option to record a drumset if he needed to. Rev E was certainly right on, when he said that we are all speaking prematurely, as we don't even know what this person is wanting.

I also have the *opinion* that the microphone makes the biggest difference in the chain. I will probably be singing a different tune when I get better pres and A/D myself but, considering my humble chain, mics have made the biggest difference for me thus far. Of course I am looking to get a PM1000 or PM2000 in the near future for better pres, its just that I needed *something* I could record on until then.

With all that out of the way, I agree that he'll be happier in the future that he got better Pres and A/D now. Unfortunately, 11k just isn't a lot of money when you are trying to get a good chain and have monitors that will let you hear ho good that chain sounds, and have some good microphones too. Maybe I'll try a revised list according to those criteria. Wow what a small list that will be though. :)

Beez
 
I guess the next question is 'what are your goals'? You could pop the $11k there without batting an eye...

Are you talking 2 or 8 channels of A/D-D/A... are we talking about 4 channels of "good/servicable" pre's or are we talking 4 channels of "top shelf"... are you doing music that calls for seriously "Hi-Fi" hardware or writing demos of 'industrial' songs?

We could be talkin a couple Manley "SLAM!" units here or an Apogee 'Mini-ME'... or some RNP's and Luicid 8824 or AD/DA9624.... it's all good... but it's all relative.
 
I'd have to agree with giganova about a couple things. A dual hardrive is invaluable. If one drive is solely dedicated to system software, the conflict and crash potential is so much less. You buy a computer because of its functionality and because it can do more in less time. Time is money. Time is opportunity. Buy the computer proportionate to the value of your time and your opportunity to do other things with that time. If an extra drive and a P4 will save enough time, go on and buy that big bad motha!
 
I am so surprised that no one has mentioned Studio Moniter's.
Am I missing something? Do you allready have them or you planned to track and mix on headphones.
Do you even have good headphones?

Your music is only as good as its mix.
You can have all those fancy expensive microphones and preamps listed above, but if your mix sounds muddy and lacking bass, or vocals and harmonies, etc are not gelling together, all your fancy expensive equipment goes to waste when you go to mix on a cheap moniter's or cheap headphones.

"Other's will clearify this further."

If I were you I would start getting great moniters first, cause you need to learn your moniters and hear how well they transfer from stereo systems to other stero systems.

The better your moniters, the better they will sound on others systems and in return make you sound much better.

Looking at your budget, The Mackie HR-824 would be a good start, or look at the new Event ASP-8 which are very accuarte moniters. They would run you about $1,300 and its money well spent.

For headphones I recomend the Extreme Isolations. They are great for tracking vocals. When recording vocals they block the headphone music from being recorded and in return giving a very clean vocal track without background headphone noise.

Use Extreme Isolations for tracking and use great moniters for mixing, ang great results will follow.

Then buy all that fancy expensive gear.

Any opinions?

BTW, don't forget this is only my opinion.

Best of luck deciding
Mikey Ace
 
I'd get the Digi 002r (the new rack version) and get the computer below with Windows XP pro. I'm running the older version of protools with a slower computer but I can still get 32 tracks + 3 auxiliary tracks and 160 plugins all recording at the same time... You can do even more with this system.

The Allenstein Machine (Digi approved)


Enermax CS-3051L-B3A (Black)Aluminum Case with 350W PSU 58.00

Zalman CNPS6000-Cu Pure Copper Heatsink/Fan 29.99

A7V8X-X Motherboard 69.99

AMD XP3000+ Barton FSB333 242.00

Micron 512 MB PC2700 DDR SDRAM 66.00

ATI Radeon 9000 64Mb DDR 4x Dual Video Card 54.00

HITACHI/IBM 120GB 7200RPM 8MB CACHE Hard Drives 110.00 x 2 = 220.00

MITSUMI FDD 1.44MB 3.5INCH 8.00

Lite On 52x24x52 CDRW Model LTR-52246 Retail 45.99

Total = $793.97 (not including shipping)

Enermax EG365P-VE (FMA) 350W PSU (optional but highly recommended for low noise) 54.00

***Prices taken from www.newegg.com and www.pricewatch.com

Seriously you should check this out...It records up to 96k at 24 bit.

Jeremy
Matt 6:33
 
good choice! The Digi comes with ProTools LE so you can save big buxx on the recording software.
 
Mikey Ace said:
If I were you I would start getting great moniters first, cause you need to learn your moniters and hear how well they transfer from stereo systems to other stero systems.
Click to expand...

With 'great monitors' you don't have to learn them... you may have to learn to trust them... but you don't have to "learn" them.
 
mjhigg said:
Electronic Musician did a couple of articles on this. May give you some ideas:


http://emusician.com/ar/emusic_build_personal_studio/index.htm

http://emusician.com/ar/emusic_studio_without_computerten/index.htm
Click to expand...

Reading those articles reminded me why I spent as much time and energy on getting rid of my free subscriptions to those rags as I did... and my world is much better for it...

They're cute articles... realize that the people that write those articles are paid around $500... sometimes as much as $750 for that kind of thing... and they're "1099" gigs which means that the 'author' will net only about 2/3rds... which balances out to 'chump change' at the end...

My point... those kind of articles are generally worth less than a lot of the posts you'll see on forums like this. Do not forget the age olld addage... "ya pays peanuts... ya gets monkeys"

Peace.
 
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