# my home studio



## Roidster (Aug 5, 2007)

the last little while been buying pieces i need to build my home studio
well its not really in my home,but back at the practice spot
pix were done on a camera phone,so there not the greatest
and you will notice our keeper of the studio 

older 16 channel soundcraft mixer









the 8 in and 8 tape outs









the echo layla 20 8 ins and 8 outs









dont get to close to this guy he may throw toxic waste at you


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## Telenator (Aug 9, 2007)

Enjoy your new board.
Is that an echo layla audio interface in the picture?


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## Roidster (Aug 5, 2007)

it is a digital audio interface,plugs into a PCI slot in the P.C.
i bought it used,when it was released,it was released for windows 95
thats how old it is,it works fine with XP,and has giving us no troubles yet
im using Cakewalk Sonar Producer 6


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## darreneedens (Nov 13, 2007)

no offense, but these are the worst studio pictures I have ever seen.


I like checking out other peoples home recording setups... but when it is a close up of knobs with a skull head in the shot how is anyone supposed to appreciate your gear?

lets see a shot of the room, so we can see the whole mixer with your computer... see how much space youve got, and possibly get a general idea of how the acoustics would be in the room. Then people can say that they like your setup... or give you constructive criticism.

my 2 cents. 

cheers.


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## Roidster (Aug 5, 2007)

the room is crap nothing to see there,like i said its at our practice spot
which is my drummers living room,and ive just recently purchased the layla
we've had the mixer for a few years now

the reason i used those pix was because they were smaller
the mixer








the pc








the crappy room








right now all were recording is all our practices


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## Telenator (Aug 9, 2007)

darreneedens said:


> no offense, but these are the worst studio pictures I have ever seen.
> 
> 
> I like checking out other peoples home recording setups... but when it is a close up of knobs with a skull head in the shot how is anyone supposed to appreciate your gear?
> ...


Come on now. His marine from hell sure made me listen to his myspace page. Do we have to be clinical and serious all the time. Sure takes the fun out of life.

I want one of those marine from hell in my studio now.


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## Hamm Guitars (Jan 12, 2007)

Ah the Studio Master.... I remember those. They were a nice sounding board, but not very road worthy as the chasis had quite a bit of flex to them and the internal busses are hard wired with solid stock.

If it starts to give you trouble, replace the bus with flexible wire or perminantly mount the whole thing on a piece of 3/4 inch plywood to get the flex out. 

Whatever you do, don't trade it in on a mackie or any of the newer 'plastic' boards until it dies.


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## Roidster (Aug 5, 2007)

Hamm Guitars said:


> Ah the Studio Master.... I remember those. They were a nice sounding board, but not very road worthy as the chasis had quite a bit of flex to them and the internal busses are hard wired with solid stock.
> 
> If it starts to give you trouble, replace the bus with flexible wire or perminantly mount the whole thing on a piece of 3/4 inch plywood to get the flex out.
> 
> Whatever you do, don't trade it in on a mackie or any of the newer 'plastic' boards until it dies.


ya it doesn't move from the table,even if it dies i'll get it fixed
i do need a road mixer though

the Marine from Hell is our mascot,sure hes spinal tap size,he still rocks


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## Kapo_Polenton (Jun 20, 2007)

I like the look and feel of those big analog mixers.. how would you track all the mics into your computer? Do you condense the tracks down and send them out? I have to admit that with a presonus firepod I can't help but think some of the analog magic is missing when I record..


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## Roidster (Aug 5, 2007)

Kapo_Polenton said:


> I like the look and feel of those big analog mixers.. how would you track all the mics into your computer? Do you condense the tracks down and send them out? I have to admit that with a presonus firepod I can't help but think some of the analog magic is missing when I record..


if you look at the little pix with the Marine from hell in them,you will see
some multi colored TRS outs,those are tape outs that we send to our digital 
audio interface,if you look at the big pic of the mixer you will see we were using the inserts,for tape out,mind you this was the same day we set this up,so we were going through a learning curve,we dont use the inserts now for tape out
each input can be sub grouped to the tape outs,as it is right now the only thing thats grouped together are the vocals and backing vocals,the guitars and drums have there own input/output strip to the computer


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## Guest (Jan 18, 2008)

Roidster said:


> if you look at the little pix with the Marine from hell in them,you will see
> some multi colored TRS outs,those are tape outs that we send to our digital
> audio interface,if you look at the big pic of the mixer you will see we were using the inserts,for tape out,mind you this was the same day we set this up,so we were going through a learning curve,we dont use the inserts now for tape out
> each input can be sub grouped to the tape outs,as it is right now the only thing thats grouped together are the vocals and backing vocals,the guitars and drums have there own input/output strip to the computer


The whole connecting of mixing desks to soundcards is fascinating and (I find) somewhat confusing. I started a new thread on it: http://www.guitarscanada.com/Board/showthread.php?p=88984


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## Telenator (Aug 9, 2007)

Kapo_Polenton said:


> I have to admit that with a presonus firepod I can't help but think some of the analog magic is missing when I record..


I have constructed my ultimate studio in my head so many times. Would love to have really good quality analog channel strips and analog rack based effects processors but it's just too expensive a propostion. The thing with the Presonus pre's are they are reasonable flat, and relatively noise free, but your right they don't add any magical color to the sound. There's two things I've done to bring some life to my DAW based recordings through a class a pre. Record at 24 bit as opposed to 16 bit. There is a huge difference in sound especially in transients like reverb tails and you get more headroom so your not bring in as much noise when you add makeup gain. Also have a real good look at the plugins you are using especially your eq's, compressors, limiters and reverbs. Do an internet search and look for plugins that cost $150 or more per plugin that are modelled after analog gear and try a demo. Id start with an eq or channel strip on your input channel and I bet you your tracks will come to life. A B it against a duplicate track with a similar plugin that you own. Maybe won't sound as good as a Neve channel strip but will probably be better than some budget analog one. If your happy with the results don't be afraid to chuck $400 or more on a suite of common mixing plugins from the company that impresses you or mix and match buying singles which will probably cost more.

There's a reason why some of the Waves suites cost $1000 plus. Nomad Factory have some good stuff for around $300 to $500.


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## Guest (Jan 19, 2008)

Telenator said:


> Id start with an eq or channel strip on your input channel and I bet you your tracks will come to life. A B it against a duplicate track with a similar plugin that you own. Maybe won't sound as good as a Neve channel strip but will probably be better than some budget analog one. If your happy with the results don't be afraid to chuck $400 or more on a suite of common mixing plugins from the company that impresses you or mix and match buying singles which will probably cost more.


I've been contemplating buying a Universal Audio plugin pack. One of the ones with the DSP card. Anyone used any of their channel strip plugins? The CS-1 and the Nigel look very nice. Samples I've heard sound fantastic.


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## Telenator (Aug 9, 2007)

iaresee said:


> I've been contemplating buying a Universal Audio plugin pack. One of the ones with the DSP card. Anyone used any of their channel strip plugins? The CS-1 and the Nigel look very nice. Samples I've heard sound fantastic.


I haven't but would definitely ask on your host softawre forum. My brother runs on Cubase and recommended I install two UAD dsp cards but too many guys on the Sonar forums were having difficulty with them running early versions of Sonar 6. 

At that time I was having horse power issues and opted to upgrade my computer instead. Going from Athlon 64 to 64 x 2, and a pci video card instead of the integrated video chip on the mobo. I'm getting huge track counts now running several instances of some major cpu hogging plugins


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## Guest (Jan 20, 2008)

Telenator said:


> I haven't but would definitely ask on your host softawre forum. My brother runs on Cubase and recommended I install two UAD dsp cards but too many guys on the Sonar forums were having difficulty with them running early versions of Sonar 6.
> 
> At that time I was having horse power issues and opted to upgrade my computer instead. Going from Athlon 64 to 64 x 2, and a pci video card instead of the integrated video chip on the mobo. I'm getting huge track counts now running several instances of some major cpu hogging plugins


I do well enough for my needs with my aging Athlon that's dedicated to just running my DAW software. I'll check with the Cubase forums. I'm about 4 weeks from making the leap into Mac-dom so I may just move everything over to the Mac, but a new firewire interface, etc. We'll see.


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