my new studio

[gabriel g.]

hi everybody, i need your help.

I´m building my own studio and now I´m in the buying phase.

I´m using cubase sx3 so I think the universal audio would be a great plugin
card. I think about the Uaudio flexi pak.

But what about mics?

I think sennheiser e602 for kick. I know alot of enginers who said its the best for kick.

Then beyerdynamic opus 87 for snare top, tom 1, tom 2, stand tom.

I don´t want to spent to much money so I will try sennheiser e606 for snare bottom and for guitar.

Rode Nt2 or something like that for vocals?

I got a modificatet mackie 1640 firewire . The Eq can be used on the inputs.
By using firewire.

what do you think,

p.s.: sorry my english sucks but i´m from germany and the last time I visit great briten was about 3 years

 

[chadsxe]

This is a very very open ended question.

 

[gabriel g.]

my question is, do you think I should change some of the mics or the psp card???


this is what my question is about

 

[moose209]

budget for cables first - boring I know but you could get the best gear in the world and it'll sound like shit unless you have transparent cabling at the right operating levels.

Cables first and whatevers left is a good guideline for what you should get.

Good cabling

Good preamp

The rest dont matter all that much.

win the lottery!

 

[egan.]

my question is, do you think I should change some of the mics or the psp card???


this is what my question is about

I'd skip the opus and either get something a bit more flexible like 57's or some e604's or a mixture of both. If you can swing 3 421's all the better.

 

[006]

Cables are one of the most overlooked peices for a studio when it comes to having quality ones. They are so important it's not even funny...the saying "you get what you pay for" has never been more true in this case. Like Moose said, you can have some killer gear, but if your cables suck, you basically wasted your money because you won't have a killer sound (at least not as good as it can be anyway). And because good cables aren't really cheap you have to budget for them. For a small studio $400 isn't even a "cheap" set of cables. For my setup I'm spending about $600 on cables, and I'm only getting 16 XLR, 6 TRS, 4 TS, and 16 TRS-2*TS y-cables for inserts. I remember at the studio I worked at we spent well over $1,400 on cables so that every single one of them was top quality when we redid all the cables and wiring there.

On the subject of the UAD-1 card, it's very useful if you have a computer than cannot handle all the tracks you will be doing and plug-ins for +/- each one. If your computer can...don't worry too much, there are plenty of quality freeware plug-ins available for Mac and PC (digitalfishphones, and others) that work fine and tons of users rave about them. If you have the cash after getting some decent cables I would say get the UAD-1 anyway just so that you have more options...or if your comp can't handle the tracks+plugs.

I was thinking about getting the Beyerdynamic Opus mic set for drums, but after reading countless reviews and talking to some people that use them, the consensus is that eventually you will get to a point where you want something else *or* the mics just won't work for the style of music/kit you are recording. One of those will happen eventually and you'll need a solid set of dynamic mics. So just be prepared for that now, or get the solid set of dynamics now and you'll be able to cover any style of music/kit that comes your way. Basically what I'm saying is these guys were telling me that certain styles of the heavier genre's require the dynamics...the condensor mics just don't have the sound you need, something is lacking from it. For my setup I'm getting Sennheiser e604's for all the toms (5 total), an Audix D-6 for the kick, an Audix i5 for snare, and two matched pairs of RODE NT5 pencil condensors (2 for L/R OH's, 1 for the ride and 1 for the hats)...about $1,700 for mics alone. But they are all great mics that I have worked with before (except the D6 and i5) and I know I'll get great results with them. To get the results, some things you just have to spend the cash. It sucks, I know, but thats just how it is.

Make sure to get good monitors, good preamps, good cables, and be ready for lots of work. Good luck!

~e.a

 

[gabriel g.]

yeah I know about the opus.

I think I will take the opus 53 for ride and hats, then I take 2 for OH

at least I take my rode mic for ambience.

Then I will take sennheiser e 602 for kick, man this is the mic andy and tue madsen is using for the kick. And when you put a trigger to the kick you have the andy sneap kick drum sound

I´m not a huge fan of snare bottom so I think the e606 will do it, because its my favorite for guitar amps.

Whats about the shure sm57 for toms and snare.

For DFH or the other one they used sm57 for recording the snare top.

Toms and snare are frequently in the middle between 100-5000 hz so I think the 57 will do it. And I have an option for guitar.

So I will buy

Kick Drum: Sennheiser e602 144euro
Snare top: Sm57 89euro
Snare bo.: sennheiser e606 110euro
Tom1 : sennheiser e604 115euro
Tom2 : sennheiser e604
tom3 : sennheiser e604
ride : opus 53 79euro
hats : opus 53
oh le : opus 53
oh ri : opus 53

total price for drum mics 1004 euro

i think thats ok

 

[Jackal_Strain]

It's kind of a golden rule where I come from; You can't have too many sm57s!

 

[JBroll]

This is true - if Beta 57s are in your range, they're very useful, but if you just get a few 57s, keep transformers in some and yank them out of others, and put them here and there to see how they sound, you'll still be impressed. Also, don't be afraid to look around and see what kind of easy mods you can do to gear (like removing SM57 transformers), you'll get even more variety out of the same stuff. It's easy to go off too long on this subject, but long story short - 57s are your friend.

Jeff

 

[gabriel g.]

so what do you think of my list for drums?

I will use a trigger for the kick, perhaps a little for snare and toms. That depents on the music I´m recording

This gonna cost alost of money but I think it will be a right investigation.


Do any of you have some real nice gog files to share with me.

I only have the andy ones and some nice metallic snare.

I need more kicks, more snare, and toms.

Multi samples are the best

 

[006]

Gabrial, if you shop around, Sennheiser sells the e604's in 3-packs, and you save $60US getting it rather than buying three seperate 604's. Check it out here. And I think SW ships internationally.

~e.a

 

[Jackal_Strain]

Hey EA! Have you compared the e604's to the e904's?

 

[006]

No I haven't, but I was using 421's for about 3 years straight for toms and this guy came in with his own set of e604's. I was skeptical as hell, and at first my intention was to purposefully make them sound like shit so that I could just use the 421's, but we got them on the drums and when I went to the board to get tones I was amazed. I like them a lot more than 421's and it really made me think about the 421 price tag. The e904's (according to user's I've talked to that have both) isn't worth the extra cash. The 604's just seem to be a better deal, and sounding good doesn't hurt either

~e.a

 

[Jackal_Strain]

I tried the e604's on one session ad had the same reaction as you described. The sheer size of them makes you think that they have to be crap. It wasn't the best tom sound I've produced, but I was very pleasently surprised. And I didn't have too time to get them right either. I hate those projects where you have to "make-do" all the time because the clock keeps breathing you down the neck.
But some of my best work has been made under a lot of pressure.

 

[006]

Tru dat. I guess it depends on the setup you have (with the time constraints). At the studio it was easy to get going real fast because we had the ability to track an entire band at once. Though there were still times when it was like "fuck I wish I had more time"...hehe.

~e.a

 

[gumplunger]

Make sure your monitors, converters, and your monitoring room are the best they can be first. All the nice gear in the world won't help you much if you can't hear what you're doing. For all you know, you could be dialing in shitty sounding settings into your $3000 vocal chain, but you'd never know if you have crappy monitors.

 

[gabriel g.]

don´t worry about it,

do you ever heard something about fostex???

I recorded with my band our debut in Leer somewhere between the netherlands and germany.

The dude (our ingenier) was very cool and he makes bands like DEW SENTENCED.

He is using so nice 3500 euro active monitors and this one are great.

I´m using 300 euro fostex monitors and this one are great too.

There is no real differnence between them. Without the volume perhaps.

So dudes try the fostex. I know alot of people how sweer on them.

And if you wona check my band out.

go to

www.myspace.com/boametal

and leave a message

this year I´m gonna record a german britt pop band with german vocals.

If you want I put something online

 

[Ronnie_Rocker]

i can recommend the new sennheiser series. i have Sennhesier 902, 904 and the new MD421 II mics. 902 has a natural click sound. perfect to metal.