{"id":11866,"date":"2016-06-26T10:35:37","date_gmt":"2016-06-26T15:35:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.com\/?p=11866"},"modified":"2016-06-26T10:35:37","modified_gmt":"2016-06-26T15:35:37","slug":"easy-home-recording-basics-the-pc-home-recording-studio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.co\/wp\/2016\/06\/26\/easy-home-recording-basics-the-pc-home-recording-studio\/","title":{"rendered":"Easy Home Recording Basics \u2013 The PC Home Recording Studio"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-11869\" title=\"basic-home-recording-studio\" src=\"https:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/basic-home-recording-studio.png\" alt=\"Pretty woman teaching home recording\" width=\"250\" height=\"333\" \/>Home recording can be an easy, entertaining and rewarding pursuit. You can\u00a0create professional audio for your music, podcasts, videos, voice-overs, etc. Only a few\u00a0years back, studio quality recordings were only possible in expensive\u00a0studios with thousands of clams worth of equipment.<br \/>\nBut now, anyone can do it right on your home computer. There are some basics to be absorbed, though. First what do you need? You can spend a ton of cash on gear that you don\u2019t really need. I recommend that if you\u2019re just starting out, you don\u2019t buy any of it. The least expensive and easiest way to get studio-quality recordings is with a computer that was made in the past\u2026say\u202610 years (this being 2010). This will be your PC recording studio.<br \/>\nYou\u2019ll also need a microphone (or \u201cmic\u201d for short). If you\u2019re just starting out, you can learn all the techniques for creating pro-audio with just a plastic PC mic. I poo you not! Pretty soon you\u2019ll want better sound, and a usb mic for about 49 bucks (like the <a href=\"http:\/\/select.homerecording.click\/samson-q1u\">Samson Q1U<\/a>) will be a huge jump in quality. Over time, you can upgrade incrementally\u2026if you need to.<br \/>\nThen you want to take a look at software. I like to use multi-track recording program (sometimes called a digital audio workstation or DAW) and a sound editing program. But most DAWs will allow you to do everything you need without having additional software just for editing (an on-going topic of debate;)). Anyway, you\u2019ll be able to find software for free that compares well in quality with the big and dear brand names. I recommend trying <a href=\"http:\/\/audacity.sourceforge.net\/\"><em>Audacity<\/em><\/a>, which coincidentally, is BOTH a multi-track recorder and sound editor in one. It\u2019s absolutely free and can be downloaded from the open source playground Sourceforge. Personally, I use <a href=\"http:\/\/reaper.fm\">Reaper<\/a>.<br \/>\nAfter you have your software, do some recording save it as mp3 or wav format, then put your earphones on and turn the volume up. Listen for hisses and clicks in the final version, and notice how far you have got to turn it to get it loud. If there are plenty of hisses and clicks, this is sometimes known as a \u2018dirty\u2019 or \u2018noisy\u2019 recording. Hear me now and believe me later\u2026NOISE IS PUBLIC ENEMY #1! And it is always with us. Many programs will edit out the noise, but when they do they can also adversely affect the over-all quality. Why? Because in editing out the noise, it also filters out part of the signal\u2026the stuff you WANT! The less noise you have to deal with, the better noise-reduction programs work. I know that sounds obvious, but look at it this way. Noise reduction can completely eliminate soft, low-volume noise without leaving any audible yuckiness. But as the percentage of noise in the audio goes up, the yuckiness that is left behind gets worse and worse.<br \/>\nThat is the reason why it is so vital to try and get as clean a recording as possible the 1st time around! Prevention is the key. See my article on fighting noise (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.com\/fastest-way-to-improve-audio-on-pc-recording-studio\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.com\/fastest-way-to-improve-audio-on-pc-recording-studio<\/a>)for more information on that. One reason I recommend starting out with a $5.00 PC mic is that by learning to get the least amount of noise from that thing, you\u2019ll know how to get the best out of every mic you ever use after that. For now, you can help yourself out by getting the mic as close to the sound source as possible, and trying to record in as quiet a space as possible.<br \/>\nOnce you have recorded your audio, listen to it in head phones, ear-buds, or on speakers. Actually, do all 3 and notice the difference. After that just save the audio as either an mp3 or wav file (there are lots of sound formats, but those 2 are just the most common). Use the mp3 for audio you want to put on the web. Use the wav for burning CDs on your computer, or for adding audio to video, etc.<br \/>\nLearn much, much more in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.com\/blog\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">articles<\/a> and<a href=\"https:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.com\/tutorials\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> tutorials<\/a> here at Home Brew Audio. Teaching audio recording in a way that makes sense to everyone is our goal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Home recording can be an easy, entertaining and rewarding pursuit. You can\u00a0create professional audio for your music, podcasts, videos, voice-overs, etc. Only a few\u00a0years back, studio quality recordings were only possible in expensive\u00a0studios with thousands of clams worth of equipment. But now, anyone can do it right on your home computer. There are some basics [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11869,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[11,12],"tags":[54],"class_list":{"0":"post-11866","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-recording-software","8":"category-recording-tips-and-techniques","9":"tag-microphones","10":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.6.1 (Yoast SEO v26.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Easy Home Recording Basics \u2013 The PC Home Recording Studio - Home Brew Audio<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/www.homebrewaudio.co\/wp\/2016\/06\/26\/easy-home-recording-basics-the-pc-home-recording-studio\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Easy Home Recording Basics \u2013 The PC Home Recording Studio - Home Brew Audio\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Home recording can be an easy, entertaining and rewarding pursuit. You can\u00a0create professional audio for your music, podcasts, videos, voice-overs, etc. Only a few\u00a0years back, studio quality recordings were only possible in expensive\u00a0studios with thousands of clams worth of equipment. But now, anyone can do it right on your home computer. 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