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pro tools is amazing thats why lots of studios use it
its works like a studio would

bussing, patching, cables everywhere yada yada

logics neat too for composers or composition its alot friendlier

Latency boils down to how small or big your buffer size is. You want a low buffer when recoding (less latency) and then you can jack it up to a higher buffer when mixing, etc..

As far as audio interfaces go definitely get an external one and don't rely on a computer's sound card. As far as PC or Mac I fall in the Mac camp and love mine to death but I won't start a debate about my opinion and why I think it's better.

USB 3 or Thunderbolt (Mac) are currently what's the fastest out there (to the best of my knowledge). If you plan on recording multiple instruments and mics at once go with either of those versus the older Firewire 400 / 800 and USB 2.

tuffteef wrote:pro tools is amazing thats why lots of studios use it
its works like a studio would

pro tools WAS amazing until competitors showed it up. it's still a nice recording app, or at least was when i bailed on them for hardware & software compatibility that made more inputs far more accessible and affordable.

i think they got the message its a tad bit more friendlier these days for hardware less of a ball and chain
its still amazing though lol

I'm just going to throw in my 2c - I previously ran Cubase, windows XP and a firewire soundcard. It was awesome. Except for the fact that my soundcard uninstalled itself everynow and again, my midi randomly got remapped, and the drum input thing I bought produced sound (through eZ drummer) but none while recording. No latency issues, good set up except for the buggy shit.

Bought a mac, with Logic, same soundcard, same midi stuff. After 1 year I haven't had a problem. Nor have I had to install a single driver, or more importantly, nor have I had to reinstall a single driver.

Make of it what you will.

I reckon you should get any USB3 or Firewire card from the major players - I think they're all pretty good. Make sure you got some ram free and don't run heaps of other shit at the same time and you can do some pretty awesome stuff on some old hardware.

Another random comment: if you want to do drum stuff for your recordings, I found Addictive Drums to be waaaay better than EZ drummer sound wise.

surprised no one has mentioned IPAD IPAD IPAD.....

also my (admittedly limited) experience w/ Pro Tools was not great.....PRO FOOOOOLS. lol
maybe its changed since 5 years ago, but I didn't like it one bit....too clunky and had some weird features that i couldnt understand why anyone would want it that way.

but alas, DAW's come down mostly to comfort and experience...hell if u use cool edit pro still but u are super comfortable with it and enjoy it....keep using it, who cares exactly what u use.
a program in name only will not make your shit sound any better.

Uhm, I have used for a while a Zoom R16 and it's a great interface. It works as a stand-alone unit, and also as a interface with the computer, being able to assign each channel to an isolated track. It can record up to 8 channels at the same time, or you have an R8 with just 2.

I record as a stand alone, then copy the tracks into Logic. The most you depend on the computer for the actual recording the more ram and power you will need, that's why interfaces that record to SD cards are neat. It can even work on batteries!.

In terms of DAWs, my band's always used Digital Performer, and I'm pretty blown away by what we can do with it. Or rather, what my bandmate can do with it, since he's the recording gearhead of the two of us!

For my personal stuff, I use an M-Audio FastTrack Pro into GarageBand, and then buy my bandmate beer so he can master it on his computer.

It's going to be Windows 7 64 bits.
No Mac or iPad stuff please.

Thanks for all the recommendations.

I use xp and The Computer cost 150 EUR New half a Year ago. My FireWire soundcard costs a lot more though...

I hate the shit out of pro tools....actually no I don't, I actually love it. Seriously, i just hate how unstable it can be. But the mix window is easily my favorite mixing, bussing, patching, auxing, EVERYTHING of any daw

If ableton had protools mix window I'd never need another daw

A few words on external interface connections, because it was brought up.

If you're going PC, which it sounds like you are, OP, then I'll recommend USB 3.0.

Thunderbolt would be, hands down, the most powerful and would easily squash the latency issue, but you'll be hard pressed to find it on a Windows PC. It's not proprietary to Apple, although it was designed in conjunction with Intel and is therefore capable of being put on a Windows PC. The downside is this: it won't be on many PCs. You can definitely buy a good Windows PC, or build your own tower if you're so inclined, with USB 3.0 with great ease. Furthermore, Thunderbolt Audio Interfaces are still really expensive. In a few years we'll see the price dip, I'm sure, so long as Apple doesn't ruin Logic like it did Final Cut. But even then the lifespan of Thunderbolt on the Windows platform was pretty much stillborn.

I think FireWire 800 (IEEE 1394) would be fine (I've used FireWire 400 for my minimal at home demo stuff and I've also used USB 2.0 with the Apogee Jam which works with iOS devices as well as USB equipped computers). That being said, you probably won't find it on most PCs. My old Compaq/HP tower had it back in the day.

To make this long story short, USB 3.0 is the fastest you'll likely find available so make sure whatever computer you buy comes equipped with it, which it should. Doing a little further research it doesn't look like M-Audio is offering anything with USB at all (at least what I saw on their website). MOTU seems to be USB2/FireWire.

Fuck it -- typed up this great response for a first post and spiraled downward into the USB/FireWire/Thunderbolt debates all over the goddamned internet.

I guess a fair bit of all of this will depend on how many tracks you plan on doing at once, etc. Your should probably get a desktop. Then you can equip it with a motherboard that has a myriad of ports so you can just pick whatever audio interface you want to use.

And...
First post.

^this guy...I think I'm gonna like this guy

Nice first post.

I havent heard of any USB 3.0 recording interfaces yet. Anyone have a link or info when they hit the market?

Ive been using a focusrite scarlett usb 2.0 interface at home with cheap recording software, and learning protools 10 at school on professional equipment.

You should be fine with a 2.0 interface with appropriate amount of inputs/outputs and decent software.

I use windows 7 at home and mac at school. As long as you keep your windows machine clean, you wont have very many issues. Mac OS seems stable enough, still not convinced I need to make the switch.