[Jsb515]

I've been saving up for home studio equipment and trying to decide what I will need to accomplish this goal and how much I actually need to save up to.

Here is the gear I've been looking at getting.

Buy Studio RTA Mix Station | Desks, Tables & Workstations | Musician's Friend

Buy Line 6 POD X3 Pro Guitar Multi Effects Processor | Desktop & Rack Guitar Effects | Musician's Friend

I'm not sure if I need studio monitors? I plan on hooking up to a windows xp system for the recording with lots of ram and dual core processing.

My next question is how does all this hook up? I know the pod will probably plug into the studio monitors but what about the pc? do I need a different sound card in the pc to plug into the monitors?

 

[Shikaru]

If you're PC is powerful enough, you could probably save a lot of money going with one of the Toneport models over the X3 Pro. It acts as an interface with your computer (so you'd plug your guitar into the toneport and speakers/headphones as well). I believe some of them come with POD Farm (platinum?) which has all the stuff in the X3 but is run on your computer rather than in a big hardware box.

Monitors are certainly an interesting topic and you'll find opinions all over the spectrum. For me personally, I'm holding off on buying decent monitors until I'm in a room where I can treat it acoustically. Just not practical for me at the moment, but I make do mixing the majority on headphones and checking on some logitech 2.1 speakers at the moment.

As for the desk I'm not sure. I'd be more inclined to get stands for the monitors if you're going that route, and the screen is up awfully high. I can't imagine that'd be comfortable for extended periods. Without seeing it in person though I can't really judge how high it is.

 

[zepp]

Ben, what headphones do you use? You manage to get a terrific mix that way.

 

[1]

As for the desk I'm not sure. I'd be more inclined to get stands for the monitors if you're going that route, and the screen is up awfully high. I can't imagine that'd be comfortable for extended periods. Without seeing it in person though I can't really judge how high it is.

Drew just got the step up from that one, the Creation Station, and I've asked him about 50 times about the monitor height and how he gets on with it. I was going to pick one up, but the stand is just way too high for my tastes, and even a 5-minute stint sitting in the display model at guitar center makes my neck ache.

 

[Shikaru]

Ben, what headphones do you use? You manage to get a terrific mix that way.

Beyerdynamic DT770 Pros. I'm not sure how flat response they are, but they don't seem too hyped or lacking in any areas apart from the bass (but that's what I check on my 2.1 speakers for). It probably helps that I've been mixing on them for about 4 years, so I have a pretty good idea of how things translate to other systems from mixing on them.

Best thing though is they're comfy as hell to wear for extended periods of time :yesway:

 

[Guitarius]

I like building my own stuff, so the desks and stuff lol would be scavenged from any offices discarded junk, and modified to suit, or I'd build what I could from whatever stuff I could find. (My studio's in the basement, so I have a lot of freedom to modify and organize as I wish. Make the most of your 'junk' lol/

Although the x3's a great unit, I'd personally pick up a small interface, as per Presonus, Edirol, etc and a good recording software (Macs come with Garageband, every plugin you'd need for a very long time! Yes, I'm a Mac guy, sorry...)

Monitors, well as mentioned above, that's kind of a tough one. Mackie makes some ok entry level guys to get you started.

A Sure 57 and your existing amp, as well as the above-mentioned headphones gets you going with a bang... Hope I could help with my opinions, good luck.