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JayP
Posts: 8
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 Posted - Sat Jun 28, 2003 9:48 am
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Greetings! I respectfully ask all the knowledeable folks on this forum to help me upgrade my home studio. I have about $1000 earmarked for an audio upgrade.
What should I buy or upgrade to improve my sound quality? I will list
the items I own and use now that I am happy with.
Rode NTK
Aardvark Q-10
Cool Edit Pro (of course)
Red Rover
Izotope Ozone
Antares Autotune
BBE Sonic Maximizer Plug-In
Alesis M1 Active monitors
P4 1.7 Ghz Computer to run it all.
Any and all opinions appreciated. I mostly record vocals and
occasionally acoustic guitar with the mike. Everything else goes
direct (or through external process ie Line 6 Pod etc.
Thanks,
Jay
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post78
Location: USA
Posts: 2887
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Posted - Sat Jun 28, 2003 10:20 am
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From an acoustics point of view, how's your monitoring situation? Do you have any odd reflections you could take care of? To a further extent, with some handy friends you could probably move some walls around for that kind of money, if needed.
If it's strictly gear you're interested in, look into a matched pair of small-diaphragm condensers for the guitar. Perhaps another guitar? $1000 will get you a whole lot of strings.
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SteveG
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 6695
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Posted - Sat Jun 28, 2003 10:38 am
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I was going to suggest a small mixer until I checked the number of inputs on the Q-10... and I'd definitely go along with the 1/2" mic suggestion - AKG do some rather nice ones. Check out the reissued C451, for instance.
Do you have a LCD screen? They are rather good. And you could buy a twin-head video card and use two monitors - that would be cool, but wouldn't really upgrade the sound. But post's suggestion about the acoustics is probably a good one - in my experience, very few people have this as good as it could be got, and it certainly could make a sonic improvement.
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VoodooRadio
Location: USA
Posts: 3971
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Posted - Sat Jun 28, 2003 11:09 am
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| ...and occasionally acoustic guitar with the mike. |
Post and Steve both have given good advise in addressing the acoustics of your recoring environment. I also agree with the idea of having various mics on hand to capture different timbres. I would also be tempted to venture off into preamp land. Monitors? Spending others money is fun!! 
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Voodoo
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JayP
Posts: 8
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Posted - Sat Jun 28, 2003 2:29 pm
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Thanks guys!
The small diaphram mike is a good suggestion!
The accoustics seem
pretty good in the room I use to monitor mixes. Lots of deep carpet
and sound absorbing furnishings, so I think I am OK there.
Anyone feel there is much to gain by upgrading plug-ins? For example the ones that come with Cool Edit Pro seem pretty complete, especially after you add in Izotope Ozone. Would I notice a big difference with Waves Gold Bundle plug-ins? (50 year old ears, but the rest of
me feels younger!)
Does a $1000 microphone sound better than a $500 one? If so how much? (ok, I don't really expect an anwser to that one) Hmmm these decisions torture me....:D
Jay
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SteveG
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 6695
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Posted - Sat Jun 28, 2003 3:12 pm
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| JayP wrote: |
Does a $1000 microphone sound better than a $500 one? If so how much? (ok, I don't really expect an anwser to that one) Hmmm these decisions torture me.... |
That is an interesting question. If I told you that the answer was possibly in some cases that it didn't, what would you think?
I could also suggest the obvious follow-up question, which is 'So what are you paying for?', and this is actually easier to answer. Most of the time, you are paying for consistency, although you have to consider your manufacturer as well, obviously. Let's put it like this; if you buy 2 AKG C414s a couple of years apart, and try to use them as a stereo pair, there's a pretty good chance that you will get an acceptable, (but not absolutely perfect, admittedly) result. The capsule consistency is pretty damn good. And so it should be - it takes AKG about seven years to get the capsule makers to be that consistent, and for them, it is a lifetime career. I can mix and match my C451s pretty much with impunity. (Okay, they were all bought at the same time!)
And Neumanns are pretty consistent, as well. And you pay for it. You don't neccessarily get the absolutely best mic that money could buy, but if they did make that, then you could bet your life that you could buy half a dozen of them, and they'd all sound the same. Which is more than could be said for any six Cino mics...
One of the reasons that the BBC likes AKGs and Neumanns is because of this consistency - Studio Managers can go into any studio, and get a result easily and quickly, because they know what the mics are going to behave like.
And I'd say that this was a pretty considerable virtue.
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| Would I notice a big difference with Waves Gold Bundle plug-ins? |
I don't know - I don't have any recent Waves plugins at all. But a big difference? I doubt it. I have nothing against Waves plugins, but from all the comments I've heard, I'd say that from a mastering point of view, the results are on a par with Ozone2, which I do have.
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