SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
While I agree with most of what you said (there is one exception, which I'll get to in a minute...), that is not what the question or the intent of the question was, and it really hasn't changed in the year and a half since this thread was last active. It is specifically asking about the studio and the studio gear list:
There are, of course many more differences than the ones I originally posted, but I still think that the mics, preamps and acoustics are the differences that *sonically* will separate the men from the boys.
Where I respectfully but passionately disagree is in the use of the standard textbook definition of whether one gets paid as the bar for "pro". There are thousands of "pros" out there by that definition who phone it in all the time or who simply couldn't do a professional job to save their mother's eyes. This can even include some names and jobs done that show up on the Billboard 200 list and had budgets for the recording that surpassed the entire cost of your average studio. Then there's the clowns out there with an mBox and a few plugs who gets paid on a regular basis to "master by e-mail" but have all the ears and professional sense of a potted plant.
This isn't just true of audio engineering. Hell, my mother's primary care physician has all the degrees and experience and standing as a "professional", but by any realistic standard the guy is a hack.
"Professional" is, IMHO, an attitude and a work ethic as much as anything else.
But when it comes to gear, the professional isn't going to be the least bit interested in most of the gear found in your average HR dabbler's bedroom "studio".
G.
Nobody ever notices that more often than not, most of my "rebuttals" talk about how I actually agree with much or most of what I am allegedly "refuting". 
