Setting up home studio advice needed please. Also, Protools or Cubase?

JCA2550

I've decided that it's time to assemble a decent home recording set-up that will do more than just demos and song writing ideas. Assuming a budget of up to a grand for PC, Interface, decent condenser mike and DAW software, what are my options?

Bod

You could save a huge amount of cash by taking a look at Reaper for your DAW.

ecc83

I would think a bit more than a £1000 if you want to do better than bog S demos?

The key component is the interface. How many tracks? You would also do well to study the latency figures given bay TAFKAT on the forum at www.soundonsound.com. It seems a prestigious name and a high price does not automatically mean seamless operation or very low latency.

You have missed monitors out of the budget also at least two types of headphones, open and closed back.

Room treatment!!!

Dave.

digitalscream

Bod said:

You could save a huge amount of cash by taking a look at Reaper for your DAW.

This.

For the PC, make sure you get a screen with good resolution - none of this 1366x786 crap. In fact, 1920x1080 is pretty useless too - I use a 24" 1920x1200 monitor I picked up off eBay for about £40, and the extra vertical pixels make DAW usage so much more comfortable (especially in Reaper). It's worth getting a second screen too, so you can undock stuff to keep your main monitor uncluttered (1440x900 is fine here).

In terms of the PC itself...go for an Intel processor (better performance and quieter stock fans), any quad-core i5 CPU ought to do it nicely. 16GB RAM is cheap enough, and personally I'd get a 240GB SSD for system files and a 500GB SSD for audio files - compared with spinning-rust drives SSDs are faster, keep noise down and generate less heat (thus not making any other fans in your system spin faster). Don't bother with a fancy graphics card, because the onboard GPU (built into the i5 CPU if you get one) is perfectly adequate. If you really feel the need, make sure it's a low-spec passively-cooled one.

Brand new, including monitors, that's going to set you back about £850. If you get the monitors second-hand, you can probably knock about £150 off that.

If you go completely second-hand you could get a comparable machine for about £300, plus about £100 for new SSDs (never buy second-hand drives) and another £100 for the monitors.

I'm not really able to talk about interfaces, because my favourite of all time is the TC Electronic Impact Twin...sadly it's Firewire, which you won't find on many modern motherboards or systems (I don't think). You'd expect to pay about £100-140 new for something good, though.

For a decent condenser, you can't go wrong with an SE Electronics 2200a as far as I'm concerned. The AKG C1000S is also pretty damn good.

Danny1969

For £1000 you can buy a 2nd hand Mac Pro, a Digidesign 003 which comes with Protools 8 and your have plenty of money left for  a nice condensor with shock mount like an SE 2200A

spark240

I use Mac mini, paid about £600, you can pick up a decent interface for a few hundred easy, plus a mic for same.

Monitors might be tricky, but again £200-£300 easy, I think you may be getting near £1500 total for some serious gear ?

You mention Protools / Cubase....take a look at Studio One..getting popular and there is a free version that will easily get you going.

PolarityMan

reaper

monquixote

Reaper!

equalsql

Another vote for Reaper.. It is really powerful, stable and very tightly coded. 

JCA2550

Looks like I need to take a look at Reaper then?

mrkb

JCA2550 said:

Looks like I need to take a look at Reaper then?

Yes,      Dont Fear The Reaper...... IGMC

spark240

Sorry ...I thought you said a decent studio setup.... )

Drew_TNBD

What gear do you already have, and what sort of things do you need to be able to record??

Nerine

Sorting that lot for a grand is optimistic IMO.

But,

Mac Mini
Apogee Duet
Aston Origin
Pro Tools subscription
Whatever you can find monitoring wise that fits in your budget.
I'd also consider the room. To be fair, the room is the first thing I'd probably do. Even if it's for demos etc. A treated room is so nice to work in.

xtedmanzie

You haven't mentioned monitoring or a midi keyboard. Do you have those?

Some room treatment would be nice but for £1000 you'll be struggling to get any monitors/pc/interface/mic/treatment.

As Drew_fx asked, what do you already have? And what do you want to record?

JCA2550

I've got occasional access to a mate's home studio running Cubase and some kind of powerful PC set-up, we've just completed a full band CD there, all bar mastering. I've been doodling at home on an Acer Aspire laptop and Audacity but I think I need to treat myself to something more fit for purpose? It would be good to be able to share files for song-writing and projects. 

I've got some half decent nearfield monitors and good spread of dynamic mikes already, but need to replace the laptop and an ageing Alesis USB desk.

The room is a 4m x 5m "spare room" but is acoustically pretty dead if that helps?

Winny_Pooh

Macs are underpowered for their prices.

Pro tools is overpriced too.

For the best end product spend money in this order:

Monitoring

Mic

PC

Interface

Software

For a medium budget you could look at secondhand

Monitoring - Focals, Dynaudios

Mic - SE Z5600, Blue blueberry

PC -

Interface - Audient

Software - Reaper

sweepy

I would disagree that Mac's are underpowered,

spark240

sweepy said:

I would disagree that Mac's are underpowered,

So would I...My Mac mini is very efficient,  

xtedmanzie

JCA2550 said:

I've got occasional access to a mate's home studio running Cubase and some kind of powerful PC set-up, we've just completed a full band CD there, all bar mastering. I've been doodling at home on an Acer Aspire laptop and Audacity but I think I need to treat myself to something more fit for purpose? It would be good to be able to share files for song-writing and projects. 

I've got some half decent nearfield monitors and good spread of dynamic mikes already, but need to replace the laptop and an ageing Alesis USB desk.

The room is a 4m x 5m "spare room" but is acoustically pretty dead if that helps?

In that case it would make sense to get Cubase, no point in getting reaper if your mate can't open it. No idea how much PCs can be had for. A suggestion - you might be better off demoing at your place knowing that you can open the demo files at your mate's place to re-record better takes?  Decent mic's need decent preamps to get the best out of them and if you're not in a studio to record then it might be not the best use of your money. 

xtedmanzie

Winny_Pooh said:

Macs are underpowered for their prices.

Macs are overpriced but not underpowered!