Building A Home Recording Studio

Start Recording Some Of Your Own Tunes

If building a home recording studio is something that you have been interested in doing, then the information provided below may be of some help to you.

Here you will find reviews on products that are available, and what a basic home studio should have. I'll also give you tips and tricks on recording your songs, and general advice on mixing and getting your songs sounding great. All coming from experiences with building and working in my own home studio.

mixing console guitar player guitar neck

Building A Home Recording Studio
For Under $1000 Bucks

Today you can find a multitude of brand name digital recording software and digital recording devices which are available for the average person or band who want to record their own songs.

The advance of technology and computers has helped companies develop some pretty awesome products, allowing us to do professional quality recordings at home, at a now affordable price. These days you are able to set-up a decent home studio for under a $1000 bucks or even less depending on what your needs are.

Building a home recording studio is something that anyone can do. By gaining just a little bit of knowledge about the art of digital audio recording and by doing a little research ahead of time, you will save yourself time, money, and frustration.

Where to put your studio?

Finding a good spot where you can set-up and record is important when building a home recording studio.

Try and find a spot in your house where you can work, with as little sound leaking in from the outside as possible. Microphones, especially condenser mics are really sensitive and will pick up the faintest noise which can screw up what other-wise would have been a great track.

If you are planning on going directly into your audio interface or multi-track with your instrument instead of using a microphone, you won't have to worry about the problem of noise leaking onto your track.

Just try and find a quite place that's not going to disturb your family that has to live with you, as well as your family not disturbing you while you are busy laying down tracks.

Make a list and a budget

When building a home recording studio, budget your money wisely and get the best hardware and gear that you can afford.

Now, I'm not saying that you need to go out and spend thousands of dollars on gear, but a good idea is to allot so much money for each item and get the best quality that your budget will allow for. Staying within your budget will make sure you get everything on your list as well.

When I started building my home studio 4 years ago, it took a long time to go through and check out the many products available.

As I was new to the world of digital recording, I had a lot of questions for the sales people, and did a lot of research about digital recording before I finally came to a decision.

It was somewhat time consuming, but it's something I had to do to ensure I was getting the best quality products, for the best price I could find.

What gear do I need?

Think about what you are trying to accomplish.

Are you recording your band where you are going to need lots of inputs for all the mics and instruments that you will be tracking, or is it just you who's laying down one track at a time. Having the answers to these questions will help you figure out what you need to buy.

A computer running software or a workstation?

When it comes to building a home recording studio, you have two really good choices in my opinion...

Buy an audio interface and digital recording software for your computer, assuming you have a computer already.
Buy a multi-track digital workstation.

Both are good choices and should be considered.

Going with a computer based set-up will let you easily upgrade in the future, and will give you more options like using plug-in effects and other programs along with your digital recording software.

Most of the multi-track digital workstations are not as upgradeable, except for things like RAM (memory). Most do come loaded with their own effects which you can apply to tracks and mixes, and can produce CD quality professional 16 bit recordings. A few models can also be hooked up to your computer to do further editing of your audio files.

Using A Computer Based Home Studio

One thing when putting together a computer based studio is make sure that the gear and hardware you're buying will be compatible with future studio add-ons that you may do.

A few essential things you will need for your computer based home recording studio are....

digital recording software (Protools, Cubase, etc.)
audio interface (piece of hardware which your guitar plugs into)
pair of monitors (speakers)
microphone
microphone stand
a few good quality cables
head phones
keyboard (optional)

picture of studio

When building a home recording studio, a computer based studio may be a little more money when compared to a multi-track digital workstation. It comes down to whether you already have a fast enough computer to handle the job or not.

Using A Multi-Track Digital Workstation

For those of you out there considering going with a multi-track digital workstation, you will still may want to purchase a decent microphone, cables, and a pair of headphones.

Some workstations have a built in microphone, but you won't get as good a results than if you were to use a good quality mic instead. You can also go directly into the workstation with your instrument and bypass the mic altogether.

When building a home recording studio with a multi-track digital workstation, there are a few less things you will have to purchase compared to a computer based studio. It may save you a few extra dollars. They're also portable and can be lugged around to gigs or jams more easily.

It's basically depends on what your purpose is and what you are trying to accomplish that's going to help you decide on whether to choose a computer based recording set-up or a workstation.