How to Choose the Right Equipment for a Home Studio
Among the most common questions I get is: How to Choose the Right Equipment for a Home Studio, because it’s really hard to the select a suitable equipment for your home recording studio. Most folks have not been able to read about the large number of available home studio products so it’s really hard to choose which is best suited to their needs. If you don’t have enough experience in this field, it could be difficult to distinguish between various mics, audio interfaces, cables, monitors.
Microphones
What if you want to test a series of microphones? Problems occur: few stores offer this option, and none of them have proper acoustic treatment and noise level required for such tests. The difference between a condenser and a dynamic microphone is obvious, but if you want to see the differences between condensed mics, the odds are low enough to appreciate the strengths and weaknesses in a shop.
There are so many good condenser microphones, is really hard to choose one that’s perfect. I love MXL V87 Low-Noise Condenser Microphone (click the image for more info), it has great features and performances, it looks great and it features a pop filter. It’s rich in response for vocals and acoustic guitar
Audio Interfaces and Mixers
Most folks today use laptops, so using an external audio interface is a good choice. I really like Focusrite Saffire 6 USB Audio Interface, it’s not that expensive and it brings great quality to your recordings. This audio interface uses the same award-winning Focusrite mic preamps as the rest of the Saffire range (click the image for more info and reviews).
Ableton Live Lite 8, Novation’s Bass Station synthesizer, Focusrite FX Suite and more than a gigabyte of samples comes with this package. The Focusrite FX Suite includes a compressor, gate, reverb and EQ.
Click here to see Amazon’s mixer collection
Studio Monitors
Many folks don’t know that monitors are really important in a recording studio. They will not affect the way you capture sounds, but they have huge influence on the final song. You need to hear your recordings as clear as possible when you mix and master your song. M-Audio Studiophile AV40 Powered Monitor Speakers is the perfect equipment if you are on a tight budget.
Other stuff you should consider: mic stand, cables, headphones, acoustic foam
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