SettingUp

32-bit vs. 64-bit Operating Systems

As of this writing, there is yet another factor to further complicate things when setting up a
computer-recording rig. Not only do we now have to contend with chipset compatibility for our
audio interface (and in the case of Dice II certain software applications), but now we must
make sure that both our audio interface and recording software are compatible with either 32-
bit or 64-bit operating systems.
There isn't a whole lot to tell here. To put it simply, do not purchase recording software, an
audio interface, or an operating system until you are positive that all three are compatible.
Often these types of requirements are hidden deep down within the manufactures website.
Save yourself hours of headaches, shipping costs, and desperate research!

Where To Get Your Recording Computer

If you are in a position to get your hands on a computer that is dedicated for audio recording,
you certainly have an advantage. The tricky part is finding where to purchase your computer.
There are several possibilities.
You can purchase your computer from the kind of company that has Super Bowl
commercials. You can buy your computer from a shop specializing in recording computers.
You can build one yourself. Your options are fairly wide open on this one, and it can get a
little tricky.

Major Brand Computers

The big corporation computers are not a terrible way to go. They are usually reasonably
priced and have a warranty. There are usually little hurdles that can make these computers a
little more difficult to work on, but this factor certainly isn't the end of the world. You can be
certain that all the individual components within the computer match up with one another, but
it's generally a guess as to whether the chipsets within these computers will work with a given
audio interface.

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A major problem with the major brand computers is they always seem to feature the latest
operating system. It takes time for those writing audio interface drivers to accommodate
changes in operating systems; it's very common for this “up to date” operating system to be
well ahead, and therefore problematic. There is a tendency to release Windows versions that
aren't compatible with many forms of hardware. There was essentially an industry wide “No
Support for Windows Media Center Edition” policy, for example.

By installing an already optimized operating system, such as this version of Windows XP, a
person can have all the benefits of a big brand computer while avoiding most of the
drawbacks.

Build Your Own Computer

Putting your own computer together does take a little more knowledge, but there can be great
benefits, too. When you put your own computer together you know what components you
have used, and you can control the quality of those components. I think it's safe to say that
most major brand computers have gone with relatively humble components to keep costs
down. This doesn't always translate into extreme performance losses, but it can. When you
build your own computer, you can ensure that all chipset requirements line up, you know
exactly what operating system you've used and how you've optimized it, and you can decide
how much you want to spend.

It's possible to make huge savings. I recently put together a Quad Core computer for $400.
The cheapest equivalent name brand computers were over $600 and many were well over
$1,000.

Specialized Recording Computer Companies

There are quite a few companies out there who build computers that are ready to rock for
audio recording. All components have been selected to be quiet and ideal for recording. They
often come with a warranty and are completely optimized. The cost of such computers is
very, very high however. You certainly pay a premium for having someone else do all the
optimization and component selection. Typically, for the price of a high-end major brand
computer you will only get a fraction of the performance with specialized recording

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computers. You've got to shell out serious bucks to get the latest performance. I doubt if my
$400 Quad Core computer could be purchased for less than $2,000 from such a company.
Then again, it's nice to have a guy on the phone you can contact when things go wrong.

Open Source Recording Computers

I'm playing with this new idea where Recording Review builds custom recording computers
just like the specialized companies above, but cuts out the support in exchange for saving
you $500-1,000 on a full blown mega-powerhouse recording computer. If you require
support, you could call our 1-900 number. If you don't, keep the cash and go on a mini-
vacation. If you are interested, check it out.

Incompatible Audio Interfaces

Q: I found a great deal on an old audio interface that isn't compatible.
Should I get it?

Yes, I've actually been asked if it's a good idea to jump on a good deal for an old audio
interface that makes absolutely no mention of compatibility and then simply work out the bugs
to get it to work on the newer, higher bit operating system. My answer to that is an
overwhelming no! Do not do it! Unless you write drivers for fun it's definitely not worth saving
a few bucks on an audio interface to get one that is not compatible with your operating
systems. Force the manufactures to do that! There are plenty of audio interfaces in the
under $200 range. Some exist in the $100 range. Do not put yourself through this much hell
just to save $50!

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Cables

There isn't that much to cables in the home recording world, but I figured that since we are
starting with the absolute basics, we should cover the topic.

Different Types Of Cables

XLR Cables

An XLR cable is the standard for plugging into

microphones, but can be used throughout the

recording chain. My high-end preamps have only XLR

outputs, but my mid-grade preamps have both XLR

and 1/4” outputs. My high-end converters only have

XLR inputs. So, I guess it's fairly safe to say that most

high-end gear will interconnect with XLR cables. XLR

XLR Cables cables are what we call “balanced” which means that

they have a noise canceling feature built into their design. Don't get too excited by this. It's

not like XLR cables eliminate all hiss and hum. They are simply designed so that the cable

itself doesn't add any additional noise.

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1/4” Cables You will mostly see 1/4” cables associated with guitar
gear, but the 1/4” jack is certainly prevalent in the home
1/4” Cables recording world. Most mid-grade gear will interconnect
with 1/4” cables. 1/4” cables are not balanced and
therefore have no hum and noise reducing qualities.
These are often known as “instrument cables”.

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TRS Cables TRS cables (also known as Tip-Ring-Sleeve) look like
standard 1/4” cables but they have a third wire run
TRS Cables within the cable to make the cable balanced just like an
XLR cable. It's always recommended to use TRS
connections between recording gear.

S/PDIF S/PDIF cables are used to send digital signals. I use
S/PDIF cables to send signal from my Mytek AD
S/PDIF Cables converters to my audio interface. S/PDIF cables look
just like the standard RCA cables you use to connect
your DVD player to your DVD. In fact, there really isn't
any difference. I have used standard RCA cables and
haven't noticed any change in quality.

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Wordclock BNC When sending Wordclock to all devices that require a
clock, a fancy connector that can be twisted to lock
BNC Cables securely in place is used. Most home recorders will
never have any need for this kind of connector.

Optical Cables ADAT Lightpipe connections use a cable that passes
light through it. The connector is a small rectangular
BNC Cables figure that reminds me of what a cereal-box equivalent
of a Star Wars spacecraft may look like. Okay, that
may not be that helpful, but you'll know it when you see
it. These are the same optical cables that are often
utilized in home theater setups to pass Dolby Digital
5.1 signals. They are often referred to as Toslink
cables.

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Should I Pay Top Dollar For High End Cables?

Some people make a huge deal about the quality of cables. I have a buddy who spent $500
on the cables for his car stereo. Of course, he is ignorant of the fact that the acoustics of his
car are a disaster resembling Earthquake tragedy footage, but he swears he can hear a
difference. Perception is reality with the audio stuff (and that's part of the solution and the
problem!).

I have no doubt that super expensive cables can make a difference, but this difference is
rarely what the user expected to get for the investment. The difference between cheap
cables and expensive cables is most audible in areas where impedances are not optimized.
In English, this means that electric guitar cables will make the most obvious difference. (If
you are interested in the technical explanation, do a search on “capacitive reactance” and
“inductive reactance”). How obvious? Let's put it this way. You have to work really hard to
hear the difference and switching from a cheap guitar cable and an expensive guitar cable,
and no expensive cable has ever turned a crappy guitar sound into a great guitar sound.
Then again, if you can get an extra 1% for a minimal price upgrade, why not?

The difference in cables for XLR cables is a little less profound, simply because the
impedances are a little better optimized than you would find with electric guitar. Some people
swear by using high-end cables for their microphones. I read about one producer who was
using a $400 mic cable. He was having problems with the vocals sounding too bright. He
wasn't happy with the tone. He got the idea to replace the $400 mic cable with a standard
grade cable, which was nothing special. That fixed it. He actually preferred the sound of the
typical $20 cable. The high-end cable sounded too aggressive and harsh. Granted, I would
expect the difference in high end to be quite subtle. I'm guessing that a producer in this
position is going to be extremely picky about capturing exactly what he wants.

You'll find that as you get up to line-level, the difference in cables is very subtle, because the

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mathematical possibilities of inductive and capacitive reactance have been significantly
reduced. So any source that is line level, I don't bother with anything fancy. I stick with my
good ol' reliable cables that I've had for years.

Any standard length cable (10'-30') that costs more than $100 is a total waste of money, in
my opinion, for anyone recording in anything less than a zillion dollar studio. With that said,
purchasing ultra-cheap cables is expensive too. I usually don't have any problems with the
sound of my normal cables. The only problem is that most of my cheap cables no longer
work! My middle of the road XLR cables ($25-40 for a 30' cable) have lasted me for years
and years.

I bought some Spectraflex guitar cables back in 1996. They still work perfectly to this day. I
think they were about $20 in 1996 dollars. So, buying good cables is a great idea. Buying
the step or two up from the bargain bin is a smart idea. However, I don't really consider it an
issue of fidelity. It's more of an issue of reliability.

Really, Really Bad Cables

I don't mean to imply that bad cables can't ruin tone. Try using yarn instead of copper and it'll
be obvious that sweater material doesn't not have the conductive properties that copper does.
So with that said, there are definitely totally substandard cables out there that can totally
wreck your tone. However, I'm not even sure where a person could buy these. I've
encountered cables like this only a few times in my life.

I did have an “eye opening” experience with my KVM switcher. A KVM is a switch that allows
you to use the same keyboard, computer monitor, and mouse for multiple computers. I
bought a low budget KVM that included cables. When I fired up my second computer with
these included cables, the screen was so blurry it was hard to read. I switched out the
included cables with my own and the screen was instantly clear. The included cables must
have been made out of yarn!

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So, cables can make a difference in fidelity. Really, really bad cables can wreck whatever
signal they are passing. So make sure you go with good, name brand cables and you will be
safe. With most cables, it's fairly safe to assume $1 per foot. A 20' mic cable should cost in
the ballpark of $20. The same goes for instrument cables and such. Shorter cables tend to
cost a little more per foot.

Short vs. Long Cables XLR

When I first got started, I read some article that scared the living daylights out of me. It said
that if my cables were too long, my audio fidelity would plummet. This guy is what we refer to
in the specific field of audio recording as a “jerk”. While theoretically, if you ran a mic cable
from New York to LA, you would hear some fidelity problems. In fact, I bet a mile long cable
would have noticeably poor effects on audio performance. However, I've yet to hear a
noticeable difference between 10' cables I run straight into my preamp versus 30' cables I run
into a 100' snake before going into my preamp. Maybe I could A/B the two and scrunch up
my nose and force myself to hear a difference, but I definitely wouldn't put money on it.

So, definitely do not purchase cables that are too short! There is zero audible difference
between a 10' cable and a 30' cable for all practical purposes. Keep in mind that a mic stand
for a vocal is 6' off the ground. Your audio interface may be 4' off the ground. This means
your singer must essentially stand on the audio interface. Unless you know you require very
short runs, I recommend 30' cables.

Q: Should I Use Balanced (TRS or XLR) Cables Via
Unbalanced Connections?

A: My general view is to use balanced cables whenever possible. (A part of me says I need
to look into converting my guitar, amp, and pedals over to balanced.) However, it won't do
you any good to plug balanced cables into an unbalanced connection. The third wire will just
be hanging there and won't be connected to anything, no noise cancellation will occur, and
you will have wasted the extra cash required for TRS.

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So if you just happen to be using gear that uses RCA ins/outs or 1/4” (instrument....not TRS)
ins/outs, don't bother with the extra expensive of balanced cables.

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Beginner Studio Construction

Q: Do I Need A Vocal Booth?

A: Why do you need a vocal booth? Is it because you saw pictures of vocal booths in
recording magazines? Is it because you require the isolation of recording vocals in their own
separate little room? I've recorded quite a few vocals (some with a vocal booth way back in
the day) and I have to say that I greatly prefer having the singer recording in the control room
with me. Is this a sign of amateurishness? No! This is what Bono from U2 does. He's so
professional they make South Park episodes about him. Recording vocals in the control
room is popular with many, many pro engineers, producers, and singers even when they have
access to well designed, great sounding vocal booths.

This whole music creation process has nothing to do with doing things the way you are
“supposed” to. There is no “supposed to”. This is something that people who are not yet
confident about their music creation make up. Each and every decision that is made along
the way is to make the music more effective. It has nothing to do with how the other guy does
it. It has to do with finding a way that works for you, the clients you work with, and most of all,
the music being made. There are going to be certain situations that are unique. Maybe your
computer is noisy or the cat meows all the time. Maybe your control room is super small (I'd
be making a trip to Lowes and acquiring a large sledgehammer as soon as possible.)

So much of producing (and engineering) is getting the singer comfortable so that they can
open up. I need to be there to coach them, excite them, lead them, and push them to perform
better than ever before.

Recently, a singer I worked with was accused of “studio magic” because this singer sounded
quite a bit better on the recording than they typically do live. It turns out that I barely used any
Auto-tune or any other tool that is considered to be of supernatural origin on the entire
project. I simply pushed this singer until they got to a place where they could hit the song
with maximum intensity. I think I'm better at doing this when I'm just a few feet from this
person. I don't want to feel like I'm on the phone with the person when I'm working with them.

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I want to look them in the eye and I want to be able to throw stuff at them. Seriously! Ballistics
is my number one reason for not using a vocal booth.

There are more issues with vocal booths that I don't like. Vocal booths require special
acoustical treatment. Take a condenser mic into an untreated empty closet. It's sounds like
it’s on boxy overload. YUCK! This sound is totally unusable for anything I'd ever do. The tiny
nature of vocal booths makes them prime targets for this terrible boxy sound. It's
unacceptable! The only option to getting rid of this boxiness is to make the room totally dead.
However, you have to be smart about this because it's possible that you will absorb all the
high end and upper midrange reflections but end up with a room where you can still clearly
hear the muddy low end and low midrange reflections. Yell in a vocal booth. You shouldn't
hear any boominess. If you do, take the Lowe’s sledgehammer and knock it down. Either
that or figure out how to get that low-mid junk out of there. (Don't ask me how to do it. I'm no
acoustical engineer!) Most people dramatically underestimate the acoustical treatment side
of vocal booths. Most people do not realize that a bigger room often has less severe standing
waves and other acoustical anomalies that get in the way of great-sounding vocals. I've had
better luck with larger rooms.

One thing you seldom see in big boy studios is the ceiling of the vocal booth. The vocal
booth isn't usually huge, but the ceiling is usually dramatically taller than you may expect. It's
fairly common to see vocal booths with 15 foot ceilings or higher. This is all done in an effort
to keep the low mix boxiness out of the room (and probably to have somewhere for the heat
to go!). Granted, there are small vocal booths, but they are always heavily treated.

A few big reasons I don't like vocal booths are:

A) I like to feel like I'm working together with the singer I'm dealing with and not in some
distant land.

B) Vocal booths that are not well-designed sound like someone's nightmare. They are
horrible! If you get the vocal booth right, you have the benefit of isolation, but seldom is that
an issue for me or anyone overdubbing vocals.

C) The cost. Why should I bother spending my time and money on something that may affect
the way I work in a negative way and at the same time sound worse? That makes no sense

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to me nor to my way of working. For some studios, a vocal booth has the “Wow!” factor and
can actually bring in clients. Why on Earth a client would pay simply because a person has a
6 x 6 prison cell is beyond me, but I know that this happens frequently. In situations where
bands are tracking live and we want to cut vocals at the same time without thinking about
isolation (dramatically opening up our microphone options) I can definitely see the benefit of
the vocal booth. For the beginner just getting started in home recording, don't blow your
money on construction of things like vocal booths. In time, you'll figure out if you really need
a vocal booth or not. For now, get your basic needs covered.

Q: Should I Begin Studio Construction?

In the Accurate Studio Monitoring Chapter of Killer Home Recording: Audio Engineering I say
this:

“Note: I always feel a little bit uneasy when I see pics where a person who has built up their
first studio has this 4,000 pound oak desk that will hold their gear and what not. I always
wonder how this person is going to find the sweet spot in the room when they need a crane to
move their studio monitors.”

I see many people who start putting up their first wall before they record their first track. To
me this is a total mistake. It's crazy for a beginner with no real clear understanding of what
they need (and don't need) to begin massive construction on a home studio. Even if “light”
construction is intended, it always has a way of becoming heavy construction, in one way or
another.

I started in my bedroom. For months, this was a great way to get familiar with recording
software, work out bugs with the audio interface, get my computer set up, and conquer many
of the remedial tasks that must be dealt with before any serious music-making can actually
begin. (Most of the stuff this book focuses on, actually.)

I was given access to an 8'x12'x8' room which I ran a snake to from my bedroom. My
bedroom served as my “control room” (which is a hell of a stretch of the definition of the
word). I threw out a bunch of junk from my bedroom and converted a fairly large closet into a
vocal booth by stapling scraps of carpet onto the walls (avoid carpet like the plague!). I

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quickly found out two things.

A) Drums sound like crap in a 8x12x8 room.
B) Vocal booths in closets sound boxy and boomy unless the acoustic treatment is done
properly. Even worse, a vocal booth will get extremely hot without a custom air conditioning
solution.
This article is not a rant on small drum rooms and it is not a rant against vocal booths (I'm
generally against both). This rant is about the fact that I put so much time in the construction
end of the my little drum room and vocal booth and it was all a complete waste of time. I was
an idiot! Correction. I AM an idiot!

Let me explain. I read online (not a great source when it comes to quality recording
information) that no walls should be parallel in rooms in which you are tracking. This one
happens to be true more or less. The online article went on to say that if two walls happen to
be parallel, absorbers should be used on one of the walls and it is better to distribute the
absorption throughout the room than to just cover one wall in insulation. All this is true.
Based on this tiny fraction of the required information I went to work building little absorbers.
Of course, I wasn't aware of absorption coefficients of egg crate foam!

I'm sure I never even bothered to learn what absorption coefficients were until I hated the
sound of my recordings. I went to work building absorbers that I thought of myself (don't do
this!). I glued sleeping pad style egg crate foam onto pieces of Styrofoam and covered them
in fabric. They didn't look half bad. In fact they looked better than what I use now. Then I
covered my entire room in a checkerboard style with these egg crate absorbers. That didn't
look half bad, either. I used fragments of carpet padding on the ceiling and covered those
with fabric. You get the idea. I took a 4'x8' sheet of plywood and curved it to break up
reflections on one wall and I built this stud frame thing above it to house a fancy mount for my
snake and diffusers (which didn't really work either).

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There was a big problem with all of this. I did all this fancy work and didn't take into account
THE ROOM WAS UNACCEPTABLY SMALL (8' x 12' x 8')!!!! I could barely fit a drum set into
the stupid thing. Drummers had trouble getting behind their kit. From an acoustics
standpoint this was a total nightmare. Even though I had built all these “absorbers” I still had
a problem of this low frequencies ringing. I'm guessing it was at 150Hz, give or take. You
could hear the low end reverb just swirling around the entire room completely out of control
At the time, I didn't know what it was.

This is my entire point for this section! Unless you're aware of the problems your construction
will cause, don't build! If you don't know what a standing wave is, do not building anything! If
you've not read at least two books on acoustics, do not build anything!

When taking on a construction gig, you end up buying things you didn't ever considering
buying. When I said I wanted a drum room, I didn't think about the purchase of Liquid Nails
for the acoustic absorbers, real metal nails for the my stud frame thing, paintbrushes or
staples for the carpet. I just thought I was going to have a drum room. The End.

While I learned a considerable amount about construction from this little project, I learned
something else. I don't want to learn construction! I want to be a recording guy! I wasted
away hour after hour after hour building a room that was barely suitable as a vocal booth,
much less a drum room. Actually, from my standards today, it was not suitable as a vocal
booth. Even with all the absorption, it was way too live of a room in the low mids and low end
for me to get the kind of vocals I need. I would have to use blankets aggressively (even more
than when tracking vocals in my larger control room).

The sad part is I could have learned all of these recording lessons with 1/100th work and with
1/500th the bucks. If I could go back, I would have started recording in those rooms without
doing a single thing in terms of construction. Nothing! Any place I thought would be a
problem for reflections I would have stapled a blanket to the wall and moved on. You may be

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asking “Do blankets absorb low frequencies?”. No, they don't. Neither did my pretty
absorbers which are now resting in that grand landfill in the sky. (Neither does studio foam.) I
would have learned the same lessons in about two hours of stapling that I learned in 200+
hours of sanding, sweating, sawing, stapling, panting, painting, etc.

I'm not trying to make you aware of every single pitfall in the way of building a recording
studio room. That would be an entire book in itself and really I don't think I'm qualified to write
that particular book. I've only screwed up a few rooms. We would want someone who had
screwed up a few hundred rooms to write that book. However, it is my goal to make you
aware of the fact that this construction business is a bigger deal than you might think and
designing a recording studio is a bigger deal than you think. Even if you are a great
carpenter, you are probably going to build a bad place to record in unless you are extremely
lucky, have incredible insight for predicting workflow requirements, and have a solid
understanding of constructing rooms with even room modes and minimal standing waves.

It just doesn't make sense to build, learn your lesson, rebuild, learn your lesson, rebuild.
There are ultra cheap, ultra fast ways of achieving practically the same exact thing that allow
you to jump right into recording even if they are not as shiny as you had originally envisioned.
From there you can build up a knowledge bank of things you wish you had in a room and
things you wish you didn't. This “knowledge bank” only comes from real world experience of
hanging microphones in the room and hitting the red button. Major issues that come up are
inadequate control rooms causing poor acoustics causing a poor studio monitoring system
which leads to mixes that rock on your studio monitors but suck everywhere else. Another
major problem is drum rooms that are too small or too dead. Of course, a person could solve
both problems (small drum room and small control room) by using one big control room /
drum room. This is not something you see often in big boy land, but we aren't in big boy land.
We have limited supplies of cash and resources. (YOU still have some kind of grounding in
reality.) It's not a bad solution if you understand the problem.

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Hold Off On Construction

If you are absolutely dying to put together a pretty little recording room with all the
stereotypical decorations (egg crate studio foam, lava lamps, blah blah blah) I really can't do
much to stop you. I'm not an interior decorator. I'm an audio engineer. I will always take
sound and function over form. However, if you can muster up the will power, force yourself to
record X number of albums or X number of bands before you do any major overhauling.
You'll be able to incorporate all the lessons you've learned into these improvements and come
out with better sounding recordings for less money without making all the big mistakes I have
made.

The Robo Basics of Soundproofing

Introduction

I want to make it clear that this book is not a studio construction book and I'm certainly not an
expert on this topic. The goal is to get you going with the basic concepts and if you desire
you can pursue soundproofing in greater depth later from the experts. More importantly, I just
don't want you to waste $2,500 on something stupid!

Acoustic Treatment vs. Soundproofing

We go through great lengths to get our instruments to sound great and get the room to sound
great. Soundproofing has nothing to do with “sounding great”. Soundproofing is a way we
knock the sound down after we have used it so that we don't tick off parents, neighbors, etc.
While we certainly can't ignore the real-world issues of what to do with all this loud noise we
are making while recording, there are no direct benefits to soundproofing that we will hear in
our recordings. That's not what soundproofing does. With all things being equal, our
instruments will not sound any different before or after soundproofing.

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People like to look at studio foam and the various tactics we use to control the reflections in
the room as methods to keep the neighbors happy. Bass traps, studio foam, floating floors,
etc are all things we use to control the quantity and tonality of the sound bouncing around
within the room, but those things make no appreciable effect on how much sound gets out of
the room.

Make sure you clarify between acoustic treatment and soundproofing.

How Soundproofing Works

We measure audio volume (SPL) in decibels. This number actually indicates the pressure of
sound waves in the room. We could compare sound pressure in our live room to the air
inside a balloon. When we blow up a balloon, the air inside the balloon has nowhere to go,
the pressure increases, and the balloon begins to expand. The same exact thing occurs
when we hit a snare drum. The sound waves pressurize the room. Since the room can't
increase in size, the pressure in that room increases. Of course, we aren't really too worried
about the loudness in the room so much. We are more concerned with the loudness that gets
out of the room and into our neighbors' ears. So, just like a balloon, we need to make sure
our room has no leaks.

I like this simple philosophy: If your room is nuclear-safe, it's probably sound-proofed too.
No, I don't mean that the commies could drop a nuclear weapon on your house and you'd
survive. That's pretty much impossible. I mean that if you could survive the nuclear radiation
that followed, you'd be in good shape in regard to soundproofing. Sound energy and nuclear
radiation energy have a way of traveling in similar ways. This means that you want no quick
and easy leaks from the outside world to your recording room (and vice versa). Stuff like air
conditioning / heating vents, leaky windows, etc are all prime spots where sound could exit
your studio or nuclear radiation could get in.

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Just like radiation particles, you want sound waves to have to go through as much mass as
possible. Enough inches of solid concrete will pretty much stop gamma radiation dead in its
tracks. It's safe to say that sound waves are similar. It would take several feet of dirt to
accomplish the same task. The idea is to surround your fortress with enough material so that
any sound waves that are exiting the building will be absorbed by the material around it. After
taking the tour of Blackbird Studios, which is the biggest studio in Nashville, I remember the
studio manager saying their concrete walls were essentially thick enough to survive radiation,
so there you go!

I'm speaking in robo-ideal terms. But just in case you haven't gotten the drift, the most ideal
place to put a recording studio room that must be totally sound-proofed is in Bugs Bunny's
house. If you could place your live room underground with about five feet of dirt on top of the
studio with just a little ladder to climb in and out, it's a safe bet that the cops would never be
beating on your hatch.

For those of us who don't have nuclear-safe capabilities and don't know Bugs Bunny home
construction techniques, we may have to find more realistic ways to keep sound from
escaping our places. In the end, the concepts are the same. It's difficult to keep extremely
loud sounds in the standard American home. They are not designed to be perfectly sound-
proofed. However; stopping leaks, controlling sound transfer, and adding mass are common
ways of knocking the amount of sound leaving your studio down to realistic levels.

Sound Transfer

If you were to leave the tip of a metal poker in a fire long enough, grabbing the handle will
burn you. The heat energy from that tip will make its way up to the handle and make it hot
enough to roast the flesh right off your little hand. Sound energy works the same exact way
and it can do it in more varied materials than you may realize.

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I remember going to a home construction site with a friend. There was a long, metal I-beam
that ran the length of the entire house. I was on one end and my buddy was on the other
end. When he tapped the metal beam, it sounded like he was just an inch away. In fact, he
was about 50 feet way. The energy of striking the metal transferred easily through the metal
I-beam. You can witness the same effects while swimming underwater. Acoustical energy
can travel through distances that seem crazy under water compared to the way that sound
travels through air.

It's no big deal at all for the sound of a pounded drum kit to shake a drywall sheet which is
connected to 2x4 studs. Once a single stud is excited by this acoustical energy the entire
house will resonate and can actually make the drum sound louder! This means the entire
house is essentially resonating to the sound of those drums and little is being done to stop
this transfer of energy into the air and into your neighbor's ears.

You need to really understand this concept of energy being able to change forms like some
kind of X-Men mutant. The best way to control such a mutant is isolation. You may have
heard of a “room within a room” concept. It's simple. You build a room like you more or less
normally would. Then you build another room inside it with as much isolation (in regard to
sound transfer) as possible. The little room should not touch the bigger room in any way
including the floor.

This is the equivalent of taking the I-beam mentioned above and cutting it in half and moving
the two pieces three inches apart. When my friend taps the I-beam, the energy travels down
the length of the I-beam and then comes to an abrupt halt at the cut. When the tapping used
to travel all the way down to my ears, it was easy to hear the tapping. Now that the I-beam is
cut, that energy would have to “transform” to “air energy” (I told you I wasn't an expert on this
stuff!) to travel the three inches and then convert back into “metal energy” to make it to my
ears. Obviously, this is going to drastically reduce the ability of that metal I-beam to transfer
sound.

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This concept is similar to hiring the government to take care of a specific need. Money goes
out of your pocket and into the government bank account. The money is converted to
government power. Then a tiny portion of the money goes to what was actually supposed to
be built.

With our room within a room idea, it's best to think of it as a cube within a cube. This means
that all 6 walls need to be isolated from the larger room. Yes, this means the floor, too. This
is achieved with a process called “floor floating”. This has other benefits in addition to
soundproofing, but the idea is to keep the kick drum or bass cabinet on the floor from shaking
the main level floor (under our floated floor). Floor floating is a subject I know little about, but
I've seen people use rubber to isolate the floated floor from the actual floor. I'm sure some
energy gets through with this setup, but I'm sure there are gigantic gains when converting the
“wood energy” to “rubber energy” (a very inefficient transferring medium) and then back to
“wood energy” of the bottom floor before it converts to “concrete energy” and shakes the
entire floor of the building (when applicable).

You should do more research on this “room within a room” concept because it can provide
huge soundproofing benefits. Obviously, a room costs more to construct and the final room
will be smaller, but the end result is fairly economical especially if you must choose between
recording tonight or spending the night in jail.

Most people who employ the room within a room method effectively are very happy with the
level of isolation they achieve. Some people will take it a step further and actually mount
double layers of drywall on their studs. This additional mass requires more sound pressure to
excite the room.

Another trick is to use staggered studs. Basically, you want to use a wider frame than you
normally would when building your stud wall. So if you would normally use a 2x4 on the

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bottom and top, you now use a 2x6. Then you build your stud wall the way you normally
would except that the first, third, fifth, etc stud should be placed so that they are touching the
drywall on the inside wall and the second, fourth, sixth, etc studs are touching the drywall on
the outside wall. The idea is to make it more difficult for the studs to transfer energy from one
room to another.

Alternative Construction Materials and Methods

I remember reading about Steve Albini using an adobe-like material to build the inside of his
studio. According to Steve, this adobe-like material had the rare quality of being beneficial
both to the room acoustics inside the room and soundproofing to keep sound from escaping
the room. I don't remember much about it, he gave an endorsement for the otherwise secret
material. Steve Albini is located near Chicago, so apparently this material isn't limited to
desert use. Check out his Electrical Audio site for details.

I'm sure there are many more creative ways to construct a soundproofed facility if you have
the inclination and knowledge to do so.

Soundproofing Realities

As you can see, soundproofing is expensive. It can be a fortune if your standards are high.
Before jumping in with any plan, you must realize that soundproofing must be comprehensive.
You can't soundproof one wall at a time. Either sound can't get out of the room or it can.
Low-end sound waves could escape through a single electric outlet and annoy neighbors in
all directions. Because of this and the nature of construction costs, soundproofing is out of
reach for most people recording at home.

It may be better for you to go with the cheapest form of soundproofing known to man.. none!
Being responsible and turning your amps down will do wonders. Arranging specific noisy

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times with the neighbors is one of the best ways to get around soundproofing costs. The
difference between a guitar amp on 3 vs. 4 is quite a bit in dB but usually very subtle in terms
of recorded tone. (Actually, we did a Interrogation on this one in Killer Home Recording:
Electric Guitar.) Drums is a different story. If soundproofing is a major issue, it may be time
to look at the modern e-drum or sample options out there. I use them from time to time with
enormous success and none of the annoyances of the real thing. The modern way of using
drum samples and guitar emulators may not be as sexy as doing it the old fashioned way, but
there is no mistaking how infinitely more practical these modern tools can be.

Avoiding Electrical Noise

Some facilities have noise in their electric outlets. For those of us who are lucky enough not
to have problems with hum, whine and ground loops, we should consider ourselves lucky. I
am definitely no expert on studio construction and because I've never really dealt with the
problem of electrical noise first hand, my advice on the subject won't be as comprehensive as
I'd like.

Star Grounding

The number one cause of noise is ground loops and the number one cause of ground loops is
using multiple grounds. It's important that all of your recording gear utilize the same ground.
When possible I run all powered musical instruments to this same ground as well. This is
achieved by simply using the same electrical outlet for everything.
If you are wiring your studio from the ground up, it’s a simple matter to wire a grounding grid
discretely to the outlets. This cuts out some nastiness that can come from outside appliances
that they’d otherwise be sharing a ground with.
If you had 14 100 watt Marshall heads running, you may run into a problem with pulling too
much electricity for a single breaker. However, I've never had a problem running my
recording rig and a few amplifiers off the same breaker. If you are running a large console
and lots of outboard gear, you may pull too much for a stock breaker. In that case, it may be

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time to consult an electrician about your options.

Ground Lifts

If excessive noise is a problem, using a ground lift within the equipment itself can reduce the
noise. While it's generally not recommended for safety reasons, using a 2-prong to 3-prong
adapter will lift the ground for the entire circuit. In a pinch I have done this before on remote
gigs and lived to tell about it. I'm not sure you'll be so lucky.

Isolation Transformers

While not cheap, isolation transformers can dramatically reduce the noise in an electric
system. Isolation transformers work in a way that isn't too far removed from using balanced
cables.

Noise Troubleshooting

If these methods for dealing with electrical noise don't reduce the noise to acceptable levels, I
immediately recommend you take an evening, pack up your rig, and head to a buddy's house.
This is a method of troubleshooting to ensure that the problem is indeed your wall outlet and
not something else. As with all troubleshooting, take careful note of anything that may have
changed between your buddy's house and your house to ensure you have isolated the
problem to being an electrical issue. If your rig works great at your friend's house, it's fairly
safe to say that the problem is indeed electrical.

Potential Causes of Electrical Noise In Audio

In order to save you from tearing your hair out the next time you encounter noise, here are a
few typical causes of noise and buzz.

• Space heaters
• CRT computer monitors
• Fluorescent lighting
• Light Dimmers

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• Cellphones
• Poor Electrical Wiring, poor grounding
• Excessively Long Wiring (from outlet to breaker)
• Lighting wiring and Outlet Wiring run too close together
• AC Adapters (especially with guitar pedals)
• Cables run to close to AC Adapters
• Ground loops
• Lack of Shielding
• Crackly pots (knobs) on preamps
• Poor wiring on electric guitars and basses
• Instrument cables run across electric cables
• Battery Chargers
• Electric Motors
• Radar/Radio Transmitters, CB radios

Alternatives To Light Dimmers

In the event that you require the ability to dim the lights in your studio, there are alternatives
to conventional light dimmers; which we've already established as being obvious causes of
noise.

Variable Autotransformer (aka VARIAC)

There are essentially two types of dimmers. There are the noisy dimmers which essentially
shorten the amount of time the lighting gets its voltage. Remember, that a standard light build
in a home in the United States is flickering 60 times per second. By making these flickers
shorter, the light doesn't shine as bright. This causes noise. A variable autotransfomer style
dimmer does not play with the amount of time the light receives it's voltage. It simply reduces
the amount of voltage going to the light. They are considered to be noise free and perfectly
acceptable for recording studio use.

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Don't Dim

Do you really need continuously variable lighting adjustment? What if you had just had a few
steps of lighting. In other words, what if you could turn off the main lights and simply use a
small lamp or may be an array of softer lighting? In other words, why not have five different
lights connected to five different switches. You can then control the amount of light in your
room by simply flipping the desired switches.

I personally like to leave Christmas lights hung up all year long in the studio room. Is it cheap
and tacky? Definitely! Do I like it? Definitely!

How Pretty Should My Studio Be?

How pretty does my studio need to be? This is a question that we all ask ourselves when we
jump into this recording thing. A studio is as much a room and a facility as a collection of gear
and it's hard to deny that aesthetics have an impact on our moods and therefore our music, at
least to a certain degree.

With that said, I think there is this implication that, in order to be a “real” studio, you must
have some kind of elite interior decorator design some kind of post-modern, new age
whatever. (I'm so out of my element in describing fancy architecture and interior design that I
have no idea how to describe what I'm talking about.) I'm talking about the kind of studios
that make the cover of Mix Magazine. These studios have no grounding in reality. If your dad
owns Halliburton, maybe you can afford something like this. If you so desire, knock yourself
out. However, don't feel for even half a second that you absolutely require a robo fancy
facility in order to make killer music or to work with killer musicians.

Real studios are ugly. They have problems. Real studios get banged up. Coffee gets spilled.
Controlled substances become uncontrolled. You get the idea.

You don't have to be a subscriber of Tape Op for very long to see some very impressive
engineers working in facilities that aren't so aesthetically impressive when compared to the
Mix Magazine covers. I can't count the times I've read articles of engineers who did solo
albums for Keith Richards or maybe did a few records with Elton John and did them in what

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are essentially dumps or garages. It does happen!

I'll come out and say it. My studio looks terrible. Like most engineers who are in this for the
right reasons, each and every improvement I have made was done so with sound in mind. I
have to turn down clients because I can't handle the load. While a part of me certainly wants
to move up in the world, if my potential clients need a picture or tour of my studio before they
will work with me, I immediately tell them no. Too bad. Go somewhere else. Not everyone
will have this attitude, but it's working for me.

In the end you are going to go where your budget and desires take you. However, not
everyone wants to record an album in a place that feels more like a modern museum exhibit.
Some guys will take the pickup truck over the Rolls-Royce any day. People have certainly
walked into my facility and said “Really?.....okay”. Later on, after the recording goes well they
tell me they love the fact that they don't feel intimidated at my place. They feel comfortable.
They aren't worried about spilling their beer or breaking some kind of rare antique. I don't
have any rare antiques.

Make your studio as fancy as you want to, but it had better sound good. Real musicians (the
kind of people you really want to record) love a place with character. Gigging musicians are
used to playing shows in sweaty, smoky bars with urine and beer all over the floor every
Saturday. So if you are insecure about having a not-so-pretty place, forget about it! Have
fun. If you really want to make your place fancy, go for it. Just make sure you don't rule out
the people with more humble tastes.

Form Is Function

I asked Michael Wagener why he had so many damn lava lamps in his studio. I wondered
why he had the TV on with no sound. He basically said to your average musician, the studio
can be the most boring place on Earth at times and if the room is dynamic, you can work
longer. It was a new concept to me, but it made total sense.

While my studio is certainly not going to win any design awards, I always struggle for
maximum function. I've found that I like to cover the walls in stuff and it does increase a
band's attention span. What kind of stuff? Anything interesting! I have all the cds I've done

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that were printed up on the walls. I have Darth Tater, Indian Jones Tater, Spinning Kicking
Leonardo Ninja Turtle, posts, signs, political propaganda, etc. I basically try to emulate the
restaurants that cover their walls in crap only my stuff is actually good. (If you haven't seen
Mr. Potatohead dressed like Darth Vader, you haven't lived!)

Regardless of the design you decide to go with, make sure the walls aren't boring. Put stuff
there that is dynamic or put so much junk on the walls that a person wouldn't be able to look
at all of it one session. By keeping your clients from getting bored while you are doing the
boring stuff, both you and your clients will be much happier, more alert, it will be less likely for
mistakes to slip through, and have more fun.

Gobo Construction

There are many times when it's desirable to increase isolation between all the instruments.
While I always try to record live bands with zero isolation, it's hard to find a band that won't
want to punch in a note here or make an edit there. This is where isolation comes in. In the
home recording environment (and even in many big studios) it's not practical or musically
beneficial to put each person in their own isolation booth. Sometimes you've just got to place
gobos around the various instruments and hope for the best.

On the RecordingReview.com forum, there were plans for gobo construction. I was
immediately skeptical. Why do you need special info for gobo construction? It's a fairly
straightforward concept. You put stuff in between the instruments to reduce the amount of
bleed. In this particular case, the gobo plans were actually plans for Helmholtz resonators (a
form of bass traps) that offered no real advantage in terms of soundproofing. So, it looks like I
need to set the record straight on what a gobo is, what it is trying to achieve, and give you
some insight to create your own.

A typical application for a gobo is to separate two electric guitar amps. Let's say we have two
4x12 cabinets. While we could just set them 3' apart and accept the bleed, we are going to
assume that the band has ruled out this kind of production. We need to isolate them.

If 100% isolation is required, it's pretty obvious what we need to do. We need to place one
cabinet in China and one cabinet in Florida and hit record. If we don't have distance, we want

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to build the Berlin Wall between these two cabinets as a gigantic fortress is going to isolate
the sound more effectively than placing a 1” square in front of each microphone. In reality, we
don't need to get nearly that crazy with it. The idea behind gobos is not necessarily to
achieve 100% isolation. Other than the distance mentioned above the only real way to do
that is to construct separate rooms that have been designed to be isolated. So gobos are
more there to reduce the bleed between instruments. They aren't trying to work miracles.
With that said, you'd be amazed at how effective a relatively crude solution can be for
reducing bleed.

With our gobos we are looking for a few things. We want them to be inexpensive. We want
them to be dense enough to a block a “good” amount of sound but probably not as much as
the Berlin Wall. We need them to be portable (within the studio at least). We need them to
be fairly wide and fairly tall so that the sound has to go all away around the gobo to get into
the other guy's mic. We don't want them to be overly reflective because we don't want super
fast reflections getting back into our mic causing comb filtering.

Rockwool

My favorite solution for this is fabric wrapped 2' x 4' x 4” Rockwool pieces. The wrapping part
isn't fun, but the amount of absorption is unparalleled. Instead of using all out density like a
concrete wall would use to reflect sound, it absorbs it. This rules out any problems with comb
filtering with the sound of the instrument reflecting off a reflective gobo and back into the
microphone. Rockwool is fairy dense. Best of all, Rockwool absorbs down to very low
frequencies so the possibility of bass shooting through your gobo is fairly small. Because of
their dimensions, it's easy to stack Rockwool gobos or built little mini forts around guitar amps
and such.

Plywood

The most popular method I see in big studios is to use a piece of relatively thick plywood on
wheels. The plywood usually has some kind of absorbing material attached to it to reduce
reflections. These don't necessarily have to be overkill. A little absorption goes a long way.
While maybe not ideal for small rooms, unwanted sound must travel well out of it's way to get

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around the 4'x8' dimensions of a typical piece of plywood. Even relatively thin plywood is
dense enough to significantly reduce the amplitude of any sound waves attempting to go
through it. You'll have to come up with a creative way to stack your plywood gobos as it's not
always immediately obvious how you would want to break them up into smaller sections. I've
had great luck with a simple 4'x8' sheet of plywood with blanket tossed over the top. This is
my go-to method for finger picked acoustic guitar.

Blankets

I wouldn't go so far as to call a blanket a gobo. However, lets just say we are recording two
acoustic guitar players simultaneously and we want to reduce the bleed between them.
Simply tossing a blanket on a mic stand and setting it in between the two players is going to
go a long way towards minimizing the crosstalk. Granted, we may define “long” differently. I
don't come from a school of thought that says that everything needs to be 100% isolated.
Sometimes minimizing the amount of junk in the other guy's mic by 20% is all that is needed.
I'll save the pro-bleed discussion for a later time. Just be advised that blankets certainly have
their place.

Misc Stuff

In the end, you can reduce bleed between two instruments with just about anything. A couch
cushion works well if you can get it in the right spot. A table on its side is excellent. In a bind,
even clothes on a hangar can be useful. None of these are perfect solutions, but after seeing
some of the crude makeshift contraptions created in some of the big time studios I've been in,
it's obvious that whatever gets you through the sessions is fine. No one will know you used a
Taco Bell wrapper around that Neumann when the record is done.

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Ideas For The Ultra-Broke Recorder

This section is meant for people attempting to record on a shoestring budget. This section is
about stretching the dollar as far as possible in situations where our cash quantity may not be
ideal. I'm not necessarily recommending that you don't purchase an audio interface or a
condenser mic as I'd be totally lost without either of these. I'm simply trying to help those who
aren't in a position to follow my “ideal situation” advice.

It's important to jump in and start recording now. If you are the kind of person who truly
enjoys recording, you'll have almost as much fun doing it with a boombox and a karaoke
microphone as you would in a gigantic SSL studio. You may even have more fun with the
boombox!

So for the financially challenged, this section is about what you can do. You may be
surprised.

Q: Do I really need a condenser mic?

A: The answer is no. While condenser mics are extremely useful for many tasks, there are
no situations where a condenser is absolutely required. Dynamic mics are very useful. In
more cases than you probably realize, they are preferred. Mics like the Shure SM57, Shure
SM7B, Sennheiser MD-421 and AKG D112 are classics regardless of their comparatively low
price tag.
Dynamic mics are are useful on a ton of sources. On a tight budget, feel confident that you
can make a great sounding record with nothing but dynamics. While ideally speaking it would
be nice to have some nice condensers for certain things, even I'm surprised by how good an
album made entirely with dynamic mics can sound.
You would be surprised by the sound of some of the $30-40 condensers on the market. I'm
confident that in a blind test, enough RecordingReview.com members would choose a $30
Behringer over my $2,600 Soundelux U99 in any given situation that it may shock you.

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Real Mics

You definitely need “real” microphones. Imaginary microphones don't really pick up sound!
The semi-imaginary microphones like you see in headsets or that come bundled with
computers are generally unacceptable. In some cases, you'd be better off recording into your
cell phone than recording with some of these mic. Take a hard look at some of the mega-
budget, yet real microphones designed for home recording.

Q: Can I use my stock soundcard?

A: Sure. You'll need a mixer capable of sending separate signals to a headphone mix and a
separate signal to an audio interface. Just about any mixer with RCA ins/outs and decent
routing will work. The standard jack size for stock soundcards is 1/8” and they are very
notorious for being terribly unreliable jacks, but this is more of a pet peeve of mine than the
consensus. You'll have to do all of your monitoring through the mixer. This means that
latency will be a true 0ms, but it also means you can't take advantage of compression, reverb,
or delay within your recording software during tracking for headphone mixes. You won't be
able to take advantage of the various guitar emulators out there either and if you plan to use
synths/samples within the computer you can count on big latency. This alone is worth the
price of a real, low-latency audio interface in my opinion.
It's safe to say that the typical AD converters in a stock soundcard are lacking and there will
probably be an improvement in sound quality with an audio interface.
If you are on a micro-budget and you have a capable mixer collecting dust, this is a great way
to jump in. Again, it's not ideal or even recommended, but it's a first step. If a pro engineer
had to use a stock soundcard, you would be floored by the results. So don't feel held back by
your budget gear!
There is a driver that often helps stock soundcards perform dramatically better. It's called
ASIO4All. Make sure to check it out.

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Q: Do I really need studio monitors?

An accurate studio monitoring system that you are robo familiar with is required if you
absolutely need your tracks to sound great on as many audio systems as possible. If you are
just getting started or really record music for the fun of making and not because it'll sound
great in you buddy's truck, it really doesn't matter if you record on consumer grade
headphones, a boom box, or $5,000 ADAM studio monitors.

I've made my views of the importance of studio monitoring quite clear in the Accurate Studio
Monitoring chapter of Killer Home Recording: Audio Engineering. If the cash isn't there, I
understand. When you win the lottery, make it a priority!

Note: The current crop of studio monitor headphones are very impressive.

Q: Do I really need a pop filter?

A: If you are recording vocals, Yes! Pop filters do so much more than simply block the
plosives from getting into the mic (as if that wasn't enough). Pop filters are a great way to
keep your singers at the desired distance from the mic. The proximity effects plays a huge
part in how sound is captured and a pop filter is a necessity for keeping the proximity effect
working in your favor.

There are various options and models out there. The conventional nylon pop filter works well.
The fancier Stedman costs quite a bit more and you'll be surprised by how simple it is when
you pay the big bucks for it. I figured I could build it for $3 at Lowe’s, but that may be pushing
it. Considering this is about 1/14th of what I paid for it, it would have been worth attempting to
build it yourself.

For people on a tiny budget, the pantyhose over the coat hanger does work. I wouldn't call it
ideal, but it will effectively block plosives. I've seen people who used those circle hoop
thingies used in cross stitching very effectively as an alternative to a bent up coat hanger. As
for the mounting system, I greatly prefer keeping the pop filter on it's own mic stand (if you
have an extra when doing vocals). So I would consider maybe buying a clip for an SM57 and
attempt to glue the pop filter onto it somehow so that the pop filter can be removed when the
stand is in use for something else but no fancy goose neck device is necessary.

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I once loaned out my pop filters and I was impressed by how effectively a pencil held onto the
microphone via rubber band worked in a pinch. It did nothing for the proximity effect, but it
definitely did block plosives.

Maxing Out An Old Computer

In the event that you don't have the latest cutting edge beast of a computer, don't fret. It's
very possible to make killer recordings with an old PC by todays standards. People have
been doing multi-track recordings with computers since the late 1990s. Fortunately for the
mega broke, computers from just a few years ago can be acquired for basement prices. For
about $100 on the used market, you can get a computer that would smoke the computer I
was using to make a living on in my recording studio back in 2004.
Regardless of whether a computer is brand new or 10 years old, I always recommend
following all the steps in Computer Performance Optimization.

Computer Performance Hogs

There are some performance hogs you'll want to be leery of if you are using an old computer.
You can probably get away with any of these individually, but as you use more and more of
them you will dramatically increase the likelihood that your computer is going to bog down.

Super low latency

I've made it clear that I greatly prefer to monitor within my recording software. I love giving
singers compression and reverb in their headphones. I love being able to hear exactly what
they are hearing, etc. If I was using an old computer, I may have to ditch this notion and
monitor via hardware or make sure that I'm using practically zero CPU power on my rough
mixes during tracking. I did it this way for years so it wouldn't exactly be the end of the world.

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Synths In The Box

I love using synths in the box. They sound great and I don't have to deal with routing them
back into the computer like I do when using hardware synthesizers. In order to play synths
real time via a MIDI controller, the latency must be set very low. This adds to the computer's
load. Synths themselves can range from being light to extreme heavy on CPU load
themselves. If computer power is at an absolute minimum, you may be better off using a
hardware synth.

Software Samplers

Software samplers have revolutionized the world of home recording on many levels and have
greatly expanded musical possibilities. For that, they are great. However, they tend to be
heavy on computer performance (particularly RAM). Extravagant products using zillions of
samples are going to bog down an old slow computer.

Plugins

Plugins are another potential hog of CPU power. The more plugins you use, the greater your
chance of overworking your CPU.

Buy Used Gear When Possible

I recently watched a documentary about the possibility of going to Mars – If you are into this
sort of thing check out The Mars Underground. (For the record, we should absolutely go!)
They were worried sick about radiation from solar flares killing the astronauts due to
mechanical failures in the space shuttle. They were discussing ways of neutralizing or at
least minimizing the exposure of this radiation to astronauts and ensuring they don't turn into
roasted marshmallows. We home recorders, on the other hand, make noise. We then push a
button in order to capture this noise so that it can be repeated.
I could see where a no-compromise attitude towards 100% reliability would be a good idea
when hitching a ride to Mars. I'm not so sure that any government employee has ever had to
deliver an American flag and “the telegram” to the family of a home recorder because his

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condenser mic wasn't detecting phantom power.

My point? My point is this home recording business is just a damn hobby. Even if you make
money (even serious money) there is never a crisis. You will never pull out an AKG
microphone, charge it up, and then slam on it on some child's chest to get their heart to start
beating again. Don't make this recording business out to be more important than it really is!
If a microphone stops working, big deal! Get it fixed. Sessions usually don't stop because of
one little piece of gear fails. Even if they do, someone gets a Saturday night to relax instead
of slaving over micro-details in bass tracks locking up with drums.

So, why not extend the quantity and quality of gear you can acquire by purchasing your gear
used? In all reality I can't say I've had too much problem with my used gear. In fact, my used
gear is often more reliable than the stuff I have purchased new. For people who make the
claim that brand new gear is reliable, I could always counter that used gear has had to stand
the test of time. Who's right? Who cares! I've had great luck with used gear and it's very
rare for me to even bother looking for anything new. Why? I don't want to pay extra to be the
guy that has to unwrap it from all the silly packaging! I'm guaranteed to at least be aware of
the resell value because I'm the guy that did the buying. Off hand, I can't think of a single item
in my control room that I wouldn't consider buying used instead of new. Maybe tissue paper.
Maybe!

So save a few bucks and max out your buying power.

Never Pay Interest Unless It's Profitable To Do So

While it's not really a secret that I maxed out a few credit cards when I jumped face first into
home recording back when I was 21, I can't say that I recommend this course of action to
anyone unless they are serious about making music recording a career. Good luck with that.

The big boys have every link in their chain so strong that they are bored. They develop
fetishes and over-exaggerate the relatively minute differences in the way not-so-expensive
piece of gear #1 sounds versus how mega-expensive piece of gear #2 sounds. Many
frustrated home recorders shell out the cash on a credit card to buy this high end gear without

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the necessary skills and experience to really get their money's worth out of that piece of gear
anyway.

Few things sicken me worse than hearing about people who record for fun and have made a
gigantic investment with their credit cards to make the most subtle of improvements in their
recordings. I think it is a huge mistake for any person to go into debt for preamps, converters,
and other pieces of high end recording gear upgrades. In fact, it's often a mistake for a
person in the recording business to upgrade to the high end gear at all. Simply put, there are
a lot of bad mixes being made with high end gear. The clients know what they want to sound
like and so far I haven't found a client who would give a damn whether I used my Vintech
1272, Trident S20, or my stock Presonus Firestudio preamps. I'm not saying you shouldn't go
for nice gear. However, I am saying that I haven't been able to charge more for my services
because of any single gear upgrade I have ever made! Maybe you'll have better luck than I
have.

Regardless of the effectiveness of the high end stuff, there is no denying that destructiveness
of the credit card companies owning your soul. If you decide that you need X high end gear,
buy it with cash. When you run into enough clients who are willing to pay quite a bit more to
say they used a Neve, maybe you are losing money if you don't upgrade. Until then, be
careful with your money. Quit paying interest!!!!

Always Have A Plan When Buying Gear

Putting together a home recording studio can get fairly complex. Everyone has different
needs and those needs often change over time. It's very possible to put together a rig that is
scalable to your demands. It's also very possible that you will buy one piece of gear and then
turn around and need to replace that piece of gear when your needs change.

A great example of this is with the number of simultaneous inputs on an audio interface. It's
very common for people to buy a two channel audio interface when they get started. Before
too long, they want to record drums or use elaborate miking schemes that use more than two
microphones. Of course, this requires the purchase of a new audio interface while the old
two channel audio interface spends its time on a dust collecting mission.

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So, do your best to plan ahead for the foreseeable future. It's impossible to predict what the
future will hold, but putting a few units of noggin power into the decision could save you a
migraine.

Be Skeptical Of Outsider Advice

With this home recording gear business, you must be very careful of who you are taking
advice from. Just because another person happens to enjoy the notion of ruckus-capturing
doesn't mean they know what is best for you. In fact, what works for them may be flat out
wrong for you. So anytime a person says you really need this or that, take it with a grain of
salt unless that person is well-trusted and understands your specific needs.

The situation is compounded when you factor in that even robo pro engineers seldom agree
on their favorite mics, preamps, and converters. If one guy happens to be disappointed with
a piece of gear, take note. Maybe that guy is an idiot. Maybe that guy is expecting too much
out of a volume knob. Maybe that guy expects some serious benefit when he shells out
$2,000. Maybe the guy is a genius and his advice is dead on.

You Will Never Be Satisfied

When have you ever been entirely satisfied with anything? I don't know one single person
involved with music recording who says “I'm 100% satisfied with my gear”. It simply does not
happen. I'm not sure if this is some kind of naturally occurring phenomenon or some kind of
marketing mind control, but you will always have a list of recording gear you want. It's a
given.

Because you will never be satisfied, don't ever expect a piece of gear to fulfill you. It won't! It
may solve a problem you have been having or it may improve one aspect of the recording
process, but don't expect to feel complete. My chosen words here are important. What are
you really looking for by purchasing X new product? Are you looking to solve a specific
problem? Or are you simply looking for some random kind of fulfillment? If your life isn't
complete, don't expect the inside of a UPS box to do the completing for you. I'd give this a
0% chance.

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If you are looking to compensate for some kind of psychological shortcomings with the green
stuff, I recommend you stop reading this stupid book right now, write a song, record it and
toss it on Bash This Recording at RecordingReview.com. If that doesn't work, Tony Robbins
or equivalent may be able to help.

Get A Used Standalone Recorder

If you are in the market for a standalone recorder, I'd recommend going used. Why? I'll tell
you why! Farrah Fawcett! Sure, I was born in 1980 and my only real experience with the
chick were reruns on TBS back when I was a young lad. Jump on Google Images and
search for Farrah. You'll find all the old pics where she was debatably the hottest chick on
planet. (I know some dudes prefer that other Charlie's Angels chick.) Keep looking. You'll
find pics of her where it looks like someone had an accident with the combination of an
excessively acidic chemical and a land mine.

I've got another example. Britney Spears.

I've got another example. BETA tapes. I'm talking about the loser of the VHS vs BETA
struggle for dominance in the home viewing entertainment industry back in a day when if you
said DVD people thought you had misspelled the name of a brand of underwear.

Alright: enough fun Let's get down to the chase. With standalone recorders it's really easy to
get sucked in by the glamor that was Farrah, Britney, and BETA in their peak. However,
sometimes the fall from that peak isn't so glamorous. By snagging a standalone recorder
after its heyday, you have a clear idea of what is going to happen when this standalone
recorder isn't the hottest thing.

When all the magic around this standalone recorder is gone, will you be able to get support?
What happens when musiciansfriend.com quits selling the unit? With a used standalone
recorder, you will definitely know if you can actually get support for it because you can do a
search right now. You know if the recorder will last by the communities online that use them.

My point is that some relatively old technology will still be great years down the road. Other
technology will turn into a Britney Spears nut case. Do yourself a favor and go with a unit that
has already proven itself in the test against time. Oh yeah, in the process you'll save a small

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fortune.

Pirated Recording Software: Why I Don't Use It

Illegal downloading is a popular activity these days. Off the top of my head, there are a few
reasons (outside of the fact that it’s against the law and effectively stealing) to buy the real
stuff and not just download it. I'm not preaching here. I'm giving semi-objective advice on
some reasons that I think downloaded software is more expensive than just buying it.

#1 Reliability

In order to get software to function without a dongle or other security measures, they have to
hack it. I've heard so many horror stories of people getting unreliable, glitchy hacked versions
that I couldn't imagine further complicating a sometimes already complicated process.
Getting a recording rig to run at maximum performance is a huge undertaking for some. Why
in the world would you want to push the issue even further using software that is wounded
right from the start?

#2 No Updates

Few software manufacturers get it right the first time. It's very common to release updates,
bug fixes, improved driver implementation, etc. Cubase SX3's update fixed practically
everything for me. Without these updates, you will probably be dealing with more issues of
reliability than you ever intended. This doesn't sound that bad, but just wait until you are in
the middle of battle. Wait until you are in the heat of the moment in the middle of a big mix
and the computer locks up.

#3 Support

You will have problems. You will need help with something eventually. I know that the
Cubase.net forum requires you to enter your serial # / dongle key thingy immediately after
registration. I'd assume they are not the only manufacturer of audio recording software to
require you to register before receiving support.

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#4 Self-Motivation

No human ever appreciates a freebie.

There is too much effort that goes into setting up a computer rig. When things go wrong, it's
just human nature to scrap it and take an easier path. However, if a person has shelled out
$X for their rig, they will have no other choice but to work it out or they risk losing their money.
Tapping into this "survival mode" that all humans have is worth the price of the software,
alone. It's just easier to go watch a movie or play a video game than it is to setup a recording
rig. So, you had better be motivated to get it going. If you are unwilling to make the initial
investment of a few hundred bucks, forget about the investment of thousands of hours of
time, work, frustration, and more work. You simply aren't cut out for this kind of thing.

#5 Research

There is a big tendency for people who are getting a freebie not to do the research required
when buying high-end software. There are certain features and traits that may or may not
work with what you are doing. When all you have to do is double click on a file and have
software in a day or two, it takes this part out of the equation. The last thing you want to do is
take the time to install, possibly troubleshoot, and learn recording software that doesn't meet
your needs.

#6 The Engineering Commitment

Like some kind of “Oath of the Brotherhood”, I made a commitment back in 2001 that I would
fight for the cause of better sounding recordings. In many ways I've succeeded, but at the
same time I still fight each and every day to get better. I've recorded over 1,000 songs. I've
spent tens of thousands of hours recording bands or myself. This is a lifelong process. Even
though I'm still not nearly as good as I want to be, I could probably make a better recording
with a tennis ball than the average guy who decided he'd just download $2,000 of software. If
you have similar goals of recording great-sounding music, you must be committed. Audio
engineering is not an easy hobby or profession. While I don't mean to scare anyone off, I do
want to point out that there is serious work required.

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Start With Free Software

There are quite a few open source recording applications out there that don't cost a dime.
There is a big list at Recording Review here. If you don't have the cash to invest in a full
blown rig, that's okay. No harm done. Instead use what you have. Use one of the free
software applications. You can always upgrade down the road.

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Troubleshooting

Signal Flow

Audio In

• Sound
• A microphone to capture the sound and convert it into a tiny amount of electricity.
• A cable that can reliably send this tiny amount of electricity to our preamp.
• A preamp to boost this tiny amount of electricity up to levels that our recording gear

can use.
• We need to convert this electrical signal (which is currently analog) into a digital signal

that the computer can use. (This is taken care of by the audio interface in most home
recording situations)
• We need to send this digital signal into the computer via the audio interface and into
the operating system. (Which is handled by the drivers of the audio interface).
• We then need to send the signal to the recording software.
• We need to send the signal within the recording software to the specific track we are
recording on.
• We hit the record button.

This is the entire path that audio takes to make its way onto a track in your recording rig.
While this may look quite complicated, don't be alarmed. Most of these things are something
you only have to setup a single time.

Audio Out

To get audio out of your computer (so that you can actually hear it) a similar path is taken only
in reverse.

• The audio track must flow through the recording software (usually through the stereo

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bus / 2-bus).
• The stereo bus must then be routed to stereo outputs in the audio interface.
• This digital signal must be converted to an analog signal (usually handled within the

audio interface).
• The analog signal is then sent to a playback device such as studio monitors or

headphones.

Computer Troubleshooting

No matter what the problem, there are a series of troubleshooting steps that seem to pop up
each and every time. All of this was covered in the Computer Performance Optimization
chapter previously, but this is a nice overview when you are experiencing difficulties.

Is the operating system clean?

 After restarting, press Control + Alt + Delete and take a look at your CPU and RAM
usage. Both them should be near zero.

 Does the computer feel slow?
 Are there unnecessary programs that have been installed?
 Is the computer frequently used for internet?
 Has the computer been fully optimized for audio recording?

Is Your Gear Compatible?

 Yup, the good ol' chipset problem pops up again.
 Specific recording software doesn't play well with certain audio interfaces. (This is

fairly rare, but the DICE II problem has made the problem more widespread. The 32-
bit vs 64-bit issue has made it even worse.)

Issues With Drivers?

 Are you using the very latest driver? (One may have come out today!)
 If the latest driver doesn't work, what about the driver before that and the driver before

that? You'd be surprised how often a previous driver works best.

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 Did you follow the the driver installation instructions to the letter? Drivers often require
goofy steps. I've goofed this up numerous times.

 Did you uninstall the previous drivers correctly before installing the new ones?
 Make sure to take a look at firmware upgrades as well for your audio interface.

Issues With Software?

· Are you using the latest version? Practically every manufacturer posts improved
versions of their software on their website.

· Are you using it correctly? The most common of all problems is not setting up
the internal routing properly. This should always be covered on page 2 of the manual
(give or take). Refusing to read the manual will waste a dramatic amount of time in the
long run. Give in!

· Are you using hacked software? As I've already said, I believe that hacked
software costs more in time than the real software costs in $. Life is too short.

Issues With The Buffer?

· If you set your audio interface's latency to an extremely fast level, it will cause
clicks and pops even if your CPU isn't working hard. This tells us that we are overworking
some other component in the computer in most cases.

· If your CPU is getting pushed clicks and pops are inevitable. You must increase
you buffer / latency.

· Sometimes setting a buffer that is too big can cause latency.

Q: It seems that all seven tracks are recording the
same thing? Why?

If you have multiple tracks fired up in your recording software, presumable to record a source
like drums, you must route each individual signal to each individual track. Let's keep it simple
and say we have this:
Input #1 – Hihat Side Overhead

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Input #2 – Ride side Overhead
Input #3 – Kick
Input #4 – Snare

When we create four tracks in your recording software, we must grab track #1 and say “Hey
you! You are getting signal from input #1”. We do this with all of our tracks whether we are
recording 2 tracks or recording 40 racks. If left at their default setting, all tracks would be
getting that same signal from #1. You simply need to make sure that your recording software
has all four inputs activated and then you need to select each track and choose the
corresponding input.

The process is different for every piece of recording software, but this should be explained in
a getting started guide in the manual.

Q: I Can't Hear Any Audio On Playback? Why?

A typical output chain goes like this:
· Audio Track
· Routing To 2-Bus (stereo bus)
· Stereo output routing to audio interface output
· Audio interface routing to playback system

Possible Solutions

Audio Track

The audio track itself obviously must have signal to play back. It can't be muted and the fader
can't be pulled down too low.

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Audio Track Routing

It's common for me to route audio tracks to busses. For example, all my drum tracks are
routed to a drum bus so that I can process the drums as a whole. The signal from this drum
bus must eventually make its way to the stereo bus in my recording software to be audible.
By default, recording software should route the audio track to the 2-bus, but this can often be
changed.

2-bus Routing

Within the recording software, you must specify where to send the 2-bus signal. In most
cases, it will be to outputs one and two (left and right) of your audio interface, but it could vary
depending on what you are up to.

Audio Interface Routing

In the event that your audio interface has DSP routing, you will have the option to route any
signal just about anywhere. As nice of luxury as this is, it can dramatically complicate things
until you have a firm grasp of how the routing works. Generally speaking you simply want
signal to flow from the output of the recording software to outputs at ½ power .

Playback System

When signal is coming out of your audio interface, it needs to be amplified and pushed out of
your studio monitors, headphones, or regular speakers.

Q: No Audio Recording At All! Why?

It's clear a link in the chain is broken. Let's discuss it.

A input typical chain goes like this:
· Source
· Mic
· Mic Cable

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· Preamp
· Converter
· Audio Interface (The preamp, converter, and audio interface may be bundled
together. If not, they will have cables between each of them.)
· Recording software input
· Track input (as in the track you create in your recording software).

Possible Solutions

Source

When recording an acoustic instrument, it is easy to tell if the thing is making noise.
However, if recording an instrument direct such as a keyboard, bass, or electric guitar you
really don't know if any signal is coming out of until you get some sort of visual indicator
further down the line. (The preamp level meter is often a good one).

Mic

While fairly rare, mics do die. If one mic isn't working, temporarily toss in another mic to see if
it works. In the case of condenser microphones, make sure you have phantom power turned
on.

Mic Cable

Mic cables go bad. Some mic cables start out bad. Try swapping out your mic cable with
another mic cable and see if that solves the problem. The same holds true with line-level
signals from direct instruments.

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Preamp

Obviously, make sure the preamp is plugged in and the gain is cranked up to a reasonable
level. If channel #1 is having problems, try using a different channel.

Converter

Converters don't have problems too often as there really aren't any movable parts. If you are
using an external converter (most people are not), check to make sure that it's getting
wordclock and is in sync with the rest of the system. My Mytek converters blink when they
aren't getting a clock signal. Of course, make sure the digital output of the converter is
properly connected to the audio interface.

Audio Interface

If you are using external preamps and/or converters make sure to double check all of your
routing. It's very common - for me anyway - to route preamp #7 to input #5. I'm an idiot!
Those of you using the modern era of audio interfaces with preamps built in won't have the
pleasure of tracking down bugs like this.

Recording Software Routing

99% of the time, this is the problem. It comes from people not reading their manuals and just
hoping they can figure it out on the fly. In most recording programs, there are two potential
routing problems.
For example, in my current recording software, Cubase SX3, you have to first create an input
bus where you route the signal from the audio interface into the recording software. This is
done “behind the scenes” under a menu. Then, you must route these busses to the proper
track. If we want input #7 for our bass track, we need to select input #7.

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