Device for recording music? - Lounge - Forums : Best Ever Albums

Kiki

Does anyone have any advice on device that can record music? Record music as in has a microphone? Would a dicatphone that can record mp3 files be sufficient or would I be better off getting something better?

albummaster

Janitor

Gender: Male

Site Admin

I think a lot depends on what the audio source is you are recording from, what quality you need, & where you are recording it e.g. indoors/outdoors. A dictophone would work, but I expect the quality would be poor for music.

Applerill

Autistic Princess <3

Gender: Female

Age: 32

Location: Chicago

Get a Mac.

I've made six albums (four for myself, and two with other people), and for the most part, Garageband was all I needed. It makes the mixing super-easy.
😁 [/u]

purple

Applerill wrote:

Get a Mac.

for musicians, I actually imagine Macs are easier, unless you have ProTools. As a scientist, I need a PC to run my programs, because running them through VMWare/Boot Camp slows them down too much.

Hayden

Location: Vietnam

purple wrote:

for musicians, I actually imagine Macs are easier, unless you have ProTools.

...I don't understand this statement 🤔

Anyway. Ya. Get a Mac. Get a PreAmp and a Digirack. Hook it all up. Buy a decent mic, get some speakers, find a decent recording program (ProTools being ideal), and if you can budget it, get a MIDI keyboard.

And poof. You have a studio.

I could give you more exact details if you gave me a budget though.... 😕
_________________
Doubles & Conch

Last edited by Hayden on 12/08/2012 17:09; edited 1 time in total

Kiki

Can I have suggestions that are not "Macs" please. That's far too much to spend right now. I'm looking for a much cheaper way to record music.

Kiki

Hayden wrote:

...I don't understand this statement 🤔

Anyway. Ya. Get a Mac. Get a PreAmp and a Digirack. Hook it all up. Buy a decent mic, get some speakers, find a decent recording program (ProTool being ideal), and if you can budget it, get a MIDI keyboard.

And poof. You have a studio.

I could give you more exact details if you gave me a budget though.... :?

What do recording programs do?

Hayden

Location: Vietnam

an_outlaw wrote:

What do recording programs do?

Well, everything really. Unless you want to use an analog system. Or a 4-track or something.

And if you don't want to use a Mac, then I'll ignore ProTools completely. The most recent version is about $700 anyway.

Once you have recorded a single .wav file with a mic, what would you expect to do with it? Edit it probably. Or add a few more tracks on top of it. That's what you'd use a recording program for.

This is what I use as a recording program (ProTools 10) ($700 + about $1500 of plug-ins)

Thumbnail. Click to enlarge.

And this is the mic I use. A Neumann u87. ($2500)

Thumbnail. Click to enlarge.

On a Mac ($4000)
😁

So a budget really isn't too great when it comes to this stuff...

BUT, if you're on a budget, with a PC. I would recommend a program called MIXCRAFT, which has proven very efficient in the past for me. And it's cheap (less that $100). A $50 Shure Mic would be your best bet too. They're pretty decent.
_________________
Doubles & Conch

Defago

Your Most Favorite User

Gender: Male

Age: 33

Location: Lima

Being the cheap bastard I am, I got my home studio set up for less than 1000$, not including instruments.

PC's are alright. I'm using Cubase 5 on mine along with a Tascam Interface and a couple of mics. The interface cost me about 100$, and you can get an acceptable mic for about the same. I'm using Komplete along with a couple of old keyboards I had lying around, but a small MIDI keyboard can cost you around 100$.

The programs themselves are kinda expensive, but you can get them for free if you know where to look, along with the plugins and everything. PM me if you want more info 😉

What exactly are you trying to record?

Puncture Repair

Hayden wrote:

Well, everything really. Unless you want to use an analog system. Or a 4-track or something.

And if you don't want to use a Mac, then I'll ignore ProTools completely. The most recent version is about $700 anyway.

Once you have recorded a single .wav file with a mic, what would you expect to do with it? Edit it probably. Or add a few more tracks on top of it. That's what you'd use a recording program for.

This is what I use as a recording program (ProTools 10) ($700 + about $1500 of plug-ins)

Thumbnail. Click to enlarge.

And this is the mic I use. A Neumann u87. ($2500)

Thumbnail. Click to enlarge.

On a Mac ($4000)
😁

So a budget really isn't too great when it comes to this stuff...

BUT, if you're on a budget, with a PC. I would recommend a program called MIXCRAFT, which has proven very efficient in the past for me. And it's cheap (less that $100). A $50 Shure Mic would be your best bet too. They're pretty decent.

Holy smokes how do you afford stuff like that?

Mixcraft has always done me fine when recording some of my own stuff. At the end of the day it slides audio tracks around and you can add reverb and stuff - what more do you really want?