I started building a home studio about 2 years ago but got sidetracked <insert Ran out of money /insert> I've got a tiny bit of money now and I want to finish up.......would like some advice on things such as upgrading or building new DAW, audio interface, software upgrade, studio design, etc......
Total budget is just $3000 so please keep that in mind....
Here's my present setup:
Studio- built in the not-really-build "bonus room" above my garage.....house is 2 story, one of the upstairs bedrooms is right next to the studio but both my daughters are older and have moved out. Here are a few old pics:
Rough design:
There is insulation in all the walls and ceiling now
Just an example of the interior walls....also now has insulation in it
I need to finish framing the interior new wall.......then put 2 layers of 1/2" sheetrock on all walls/ceiling....tape and bed, texture, finish hooking up electrical (most of it is done), put in new floor, put in track lights.....the HVAC has already been tied in......
Studio questions: Should I build a separate control room or not? Space is pretty limited. Also, will 2 layers of sheetrock help that much?
Software is Sonar....right now I have Sonar 5 but am considering upgrading to Sonar 8. My present DAW was put together about 3 years ago:
XP Professional
P2 2.4 single processor
Gigabyte P4P800
NVidia GeForce2 MX400 64MB
2 Maxtor IDE 120GB each
1 GB RAM
Audigy2 SB Card
One of the bad limits here is a max of 2GB of memory that the board will support....which would then pretty much rule out any purpose for 64-bit OS. Second, the video card memory is low. I believe the board will suport 100MB SATA drives. I would also like to drive 2 monitors which I'm not sure how I could do that.....
Question: go to Sonar 8 or stay at Sonar 5? Build a new DAW (I could use the power supply, case, DVD/CD drives, and Audigy SB Card from the old DAW). I already have a 2nd monitor
Audio interface.......I just bought a Digitech GNX4 mostly for guitar effects but it does have an audio interface.....since I haven't tried it yet I don't know whether it would be sufficient......
I have an old CME UF70 76-Key Controller for MIDI so I would be probably using alot of Sonar's soft synths
Plenty of guitars
A few mics.
Marshall ValveState 50W amp
Event PS5 monitors
How would my $3000 best be utilized here? Sorry for all the questions but I'm just trying to get the most bang-for-the-buck.....the studio use would mainly be just for me and more in a songwriting/composing mode.
Thanks!!!!!
Total budget is just $3000 so please keep that in mind....
Here's my present setup:
Studio- built in the not-really-build "bonus room" above my garage.....house is 2 story, one of the upstairs bedrooms is right next to the studio but both my daughters are older and have moved out. Here are a few old pics:
Rough design:
There is insulation in all the walls and ceiling now
Just an example of the interior walls....also now has insulation in it
I need to finish framing the interior new wall.......then put 2 layers of 1/2" sheetrock on all walls/ceiling....tape and bed, texture, finish hooking up electrical (most of it is done), put in new floor, put in track lights.....the HVAC has already been tied in......
Studio questions: Should I build a separate control room or not? Space is pretty limited. Also, will 2 layers of sheetrock help that much?
Software is Sonar....right now I have Sonar 5 but am considering upgrading to Sonar 8. My present DAW was put together about 3 years ago:
XP Professional
P2 2.4 single processor
Gigabyte P4P800
NVidia GeForce2 MX400 64MB
2 Maxtor IDE 120GB each
1 GB RAM
Audigy2 SB Card
One of the bad limits here is a max of 2GB of memory that the board will support....which would then pretty much rule out any purpose for 64-bit OS. Second, the video card memory is low. I believe the board will suport 100MB SATA drives. I would also like to drive 2 monitors which I'm not sure how I could do that.....
Question: go to Sonar 8 or stay at Sonar 5? Build a new DAW (I could use the power supply, case, DVD/CD drives, and Audigy SB Card from the old DAW). I already have a 2nd monitor
Audio interface.......I just bought a Digitech GNX4 mostly for guitar effects but it does have an audio interface.....since I haven't tried it yet I don't know whether it would be sufficient......
I have an old CME UF70 76-Key Controller for MIDI so I would be probably using alot of Sonar's soft synths
Plenty of guitars
A few mics.
Marshall ValveState 50W amp
Event PS5 monitors
How would my $3000 best be utilized here? Sorry for all the questions but I'm just trying to get the most bang-for-the-buck.....the studio use would mainly be just for me and more in a songwriting/composing mode.
Thanks!!!!!
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