Audio Workstation Suggestions??

[BenSkywalker]

OK, here's the deal-

I'm trying to help out a friend of mine build a rig to be used as an audio workstation for recording music(metal/rock). I'm all set with the basic setup(GHZ, 768-1GB RAM, Win2K or NT4 depending on when the WDM audio issue is fixed), gave him a rundown on prices for the base system minus soundcard. They are looking to keep the system price to ~$1500 or less. Currently I was planning on setting up a dual 60GB RAID IDE for disks, they are very concerned with having lots of storage capacity(SCSI is a bit on the high side for a ~$1500 system).

They would like to record each member of the band seperately but while they are playing together(mixing/editing purposes). They also want to be able to use this machine to burn CDs for the time being(as in, quantities in the 100s-1000+ range, they already have requests for several hundred CDs via word of mouth).

So, which soundcard/pre-mic setup should I be looking for and would moving to SCSI be that much better? I'm figuring with the amount of RAM(768MB minimum) in the rig that HD speed shouldn't be too terribly important(though, audio mixing software aint my thing:confused). Also, SMP? No idea yet what software they are looking at either, likely nothing too great at first, but that should change before too long.

Right now they are using a PII 300MHZ 64MB Compaq on Win98 and hooking everything up directly to the (intergrated audio) mic in. Pretty d@mn near anything is going to be big step up for them; they were in awe when I pulled one of their files over my LAN and it opened right up(a second or two tops), said it takes their machine ~ten minutes to complete the same task(just opening the .wav) and then cuts out constantly(simply playing it back).

Right now, going the Intel route I have ~$130 for a soundcard though I can definately free up more. Same with the Athlon machine though I have ~$250 free going the AMD route.

Any and all help greatly appreciated

 

[TravisBickle]

i know AMD has good fpu, but perhaps the SSE is more widespread for newer applications. $1500 is not much for a professional use. i think good memory speed is important in those big wav operations, adjust a duron for 133fsb.
yamaha (i think) does cards with several channels of inputs, which is what you really need play together but mix separately (unless you use a simple audio mixer in real time). these cards are 2x as much as the sblive. sorry, but these specialist cards aren't cheap.
don't worry about smp, because the unpleasant fact is that few audio applications are made to work in NT, and will crash in it sooner or later.
oh, and an enermax quiet psu would be appreciated.

ps, last year the terratec ews88mt was supposed to be a very good bundle

 

[BenSkywalker]

"these cards are 2x as much as the sblive. sorry, but these specialist cards aren't cheap."

Actually, the soundcard/pre-mic I was looking at was ~$700(M-Audio Omni Studio- checked out a couple that were $10,000+ but that is a bit out of their price range). I was hoping to find something a bit less pricey so I wouldn't have to cut back on too much of the base system. If it is worth it to do so, then I will of course

On the quiet PSU- These guys are using stacks that are at least 5' tall, I don't think any of them could hear a loud PS supply if they put their ear up to it anymore

All the audio applications that I have looked at so far reccomend NT or Win2K, some of them don't even claim to work under Win9X but I also don't know if I'm looking in the proper spots either. Thanks for the reply

 

[Raincity]

Cool Edit Pro, Cubase vst32 5.0 and Sonic Foundry's Vegas Pro all run flawless in Win2k. All of them run about 280 to 350$ US and all do a decent job. I prefer Cubase 5.

Rain

 

[BenSkywalker]

Raincity-

I thought CuBase was aimed more towards midi? Don't know if that makes a huge difference or not, this isn't my field by any means. I have CakeWalk 7 Studio already that I could give them(I have a habit of buying software I have no need for on the off chance that someday I might Don't think I even have it installed at the moment), is that OK for starting out with at least? Can that handle what I described above?(Not even sure what it falls under)

Also- What hardware are you using, particularly soundcard?

Thanks

 

[Raincity]

BenSkywalker Cubase 5 does have alot of Midi intergration along with the digital recording aspect. If you want to just do digital recording and editing then maybee they would want Vegas Pro then. I use a Yamaha DSP factory sound card. It run about 600$ US. If they are limated on funds they might want to consider the Lexicon Core 2 card for 350$ US. I am pretty much old school, and dont like harddisc recording that much. I just started fooling around with harddisc recording last year with a Mac G3 and Pro Tools recording software. I just started on the Pc side last Nov. For the pc side I run Win2k on a P3 700 with 512megs of ram and two 45 gig IBM 75 gxp on a Promise Fastrack 100 and the Yamaha audio card.


Rain

Edit, my spelling mistakes

 

[Hawki47]

Check out MusiciansFriend.com. They have a complete line of digital studio soundcards with full descriptions and specs.

 

[knutp]

Look at the cards atsekd. They are great, low latency, low s/n, thd many in and outputs.

As for software, one of the vegas is great, so is the sound forge for editing the wav files, and wavelab as well. You can get some card's with it's own mic preamp, and can use phantom power etc. Other good cards: or well.. can be used as one it's is kind of a strange thing, but it does actually work well! and you will get a nice mixer as well!

Echo audio card these ones are great as well

 

[BenSkywalker]

Thanks for all the suggestions guys, but now I'm a bit confused....

What exactly should I be looking for? I understand the bit rates/sampling/streams and the rest no problem, but what in particular should I look for in terms of recording?

As of right now, they have decent audio equiptment, but they are a rock band and everything is "traditional"(no digitial at all). They want to record each individual member from their equiptment, does that mean that a mic is required to be hooked up in front of their speakers and then that gets fed into one of the sound cards, or will I need a mixer first, then hook that up to the soundcard? Which soundcard or mixer?

I'm lost here, I looked over all the sites and they definately are what I'm looking for, but I'm not sure what on those sites is it

Oh yeah, I understand what midi is and how it relates to wav, but can the two be swapped back and forth without a quality loss?

Thanks again for the help

 

[bluemax]

For a low-cost, multiple-input recording card, check out the Guillemot ISIS.
Got some very nice reviews.

 

[TravisBickle]

Ben... to keep tracks truly separate with an ensemble performance you'll simply need to have them playing with their headphones on connected to their amp and use a mic jack from their amplifier to your breakout box of the card. of course it's a bit different for drums.

what was that about swapping midi to wav? i thought this was more led zep than depeche mode.

edit: oh, i think maybe you are wondering if the gear can really mix multiple tracks. yes, the breakout box accepts multiple inputs and you can mix them separate. consumer asked and consumer got!

 

[BenSkywalker]

"i thought this was more led zep than depeche mode."

Actually, a bit closer to Slayer

My question on midi mainly was the strong focus of it in most all of the products I've come across. I would think that sticking with raw wav would definately be the best, but some of the products that I'm looking at don't mention handling wav at all(I assume it is a given?) although they continually stress their midi hardware support.

Basicly what is needed is a good way to record in a decently editable format, and whatever hardware that will take. I talked it over a bit this morning with their lead guitarist(who is a good friend of mine, how I got involved) and right now they are thinking about having me gathering my rigs and hooking them all up along with the two they have(PII 300 and P166) and recording each member on an individual machine each with regular old consumer sound cards. This machine, when built, is hopefully going to do that by itself

I'm looking at the Guillemot board and from what I have seen that looks like the type of thing they are looking for. Anyone know how much it costs(I found it, $300, not too bad), or how good it is?

 

[sharkeeper]

Get as much RAM as possible. Buy the highest density chips the board will accept and fill them all! Bar none, memory is the best way to ensure performance is the highest.

Cheers!

 

[Planktune]

look here's the bad news, LATENCY. the lowest latency is in win98 first edition. and even that latency is suck. not just with the midi to audio but audio to audio if you plan on recording live to a pre-recorded track, the phase and timing is whacked. the best i have been able to do is record to the bass or drums for each instrument. and pull the track back in time several milliseconds til it sounds right. I tried to make this work but it is to frustrating. I ended up getting analog 8 track reel to reel tascam. and using the computer for editing. This works much better and you have a real tape of your music that is not subject to crashes. windows puts alot of overhead software cycles into the os and the hardware has unavoidable latency.
I recomend a dedicated analog or digital recorder for live recording.
try using a computer with a soundblaster card and see what I mean.
Soundblaster has low latency drivers. Multitrack audio cards have higher latency(generally).
Use scsi for multitracking. hope this helps, read electronic musician mag

 

[rover825lover]

do your friends a favour and buy a second hand g3 with an audiowerk 2/8 card.

marco

 

[Radboy]

More considerations:

here (sppts 24-bit, 96khz sampling, analog + digital ins/outs)

I heard good things about the Yamaha card that Rain has.

Compact mixers from Mackie
(sppts up to 192khx sampling)

Baby-size desktop monitors

Got my info from a guy who's been in the biz 20 yrs & teaches digital & editing recording at a local community college.