1. A Brief History of Pro Tools
(Category/Recording Studio Software)

...  The story starts in 1983 with the release of E-mu's Drumulator drum machine. A companion to the Emulator sampling keyboard and antecedent to the equally legendary SP-12 and SP-1200 samplers, the Drumulator ...

2. Digital Audio File Formats
(Category/Recording Advices)

... Code Modulation), which is typically stored as WAY files on PC and AIFF files on Mac, although both systems can play back either format. PCM holds samples taken at uniform intervals, and can be used to ...

3. Effects and Plugins - Delay, Reverb, Chorus, Phaser, Flanger
(Category/Recording Utilities)

... loops. You've got all of the instruments: samplers, synths, drum machines abound. You've got the songwriting and performance chops. Yet there’s something missing. The tracks lack a sense of space. They ...

4. Free Plugins
(Category/Recording Utilities)

Plug-ins come in all shapes and sizes these days. Among the mind-boggling array of instruments available for free online, you'll find synthesisers, drum machines, samplers, sound modules and step sequencers. ...

5. How To Record, Mix And Master An Acoustic Band
(Category/Recording Advices)

... controller and headphone monitoring system all in one. Many of today's mixers - eg, Mackie's Onyx series have built In A/D converters and connect directly to your DAW via Fire Wire, making them attractive ...

6. Vintage Synthesizers - Digital Audio Workstation Integration
(Category/Recording Advices)

... connect it to my Mac or PC?" To sequence and record a hardware synth with a computer, you need two things: the synth has to be told what notes to play by the computer, and the computer needs to be able ...

7. The History of Sequencers
(Category/Recording Studio Equipment)

These days, the sequencer is almost synonymous with the digital audio workstation (DAW), but its history goes back way beyond the computer era. From modular synths to '70s drum machines and '80s home computers, ...

8. Limiters
(Category/Recording Advices)

... of us, the envelope-shaping effect of a compressor on a drum track is an invaluable tool - one of the characteristic sounds of Electronic music is the effect of a drum machine being pushed through heavy ...

9. Timecodes
(Category/Recording Advices)

... caught on as a synchronization method for multi-track tape machines in recording studios. The last track on the tape was typically recorded ('striped') with timecode as a matter of course, and the SMPTE ...

10. Apple iPad
(Category/Recording Studio Equipment)

... size and bass response easily on a par with a MacBook. The one flaw is that Apple have made the strange decision to position the iPad’s two speakers adjacent to each other by the dock connector, meaning ...

11. Sampling Techniques
(Category/Recording Advices)

... From the first samplers of the 1970s and '80s, filters have been included as a basic part of the sound-shaping arsenal. Many of the earliest machines included analogue circuits but the market later moved ...

12. Quantization
(Category/Recording Advices)

... machines with internal sequencers use a basic form of quantization during recording to align notes to a grid. Although you often don't know it's going on, any drum machine which tidies up your timing ...

13. PreSonus Studio One Pro
(Category/Recording Studio Software)

... pointing out that the software runs on both Windows and Mac systems, and the bundled installation DVDs cater for both platforms. Running Studio One for the first time allows the software to scan for ...

14. Home Audio Mastering
(Category/Recording Advices)

...  To simplify matters a bit, let's think for a moment about effects in a production context rather than mastering. Consider a situation where a sound source (say, a drum machine) is being run through an ...

15. A History of Sampling
(Category/Recording Advices)

... but in the pre-digital era it was an altogether more time-consuming prospect, involving creating physical loops from tape and running them round and round in a tape machine to repeat the recorded section. ...

16. Mastering
(Category/Recording Advices)

... quality signal, as is AID conversion to print the finished master back to digital. Some mastering engineers still choose to print the finished master to a top quality track tape machine, although tape's ...

17. Drum Synthesis
(Category/Recording Advices)

... to synthesize percussive sounds, we'll also try to cram in a few crucial lessons about the history of drum machine technology and give you some pointers 0n how to start creating drum sounds from scratch ...

18. The Science of Stereo - Mixing
(Category/Recording Advices)

... true of placing sounds smack bang in the center of the stereo field. Ask yourself whether you're placing something in the center because it sounds best or just because that's the easy choice. Stereo ...

19. Steinberg CI1 and CI2+
(Category/Recording Studio Equipment)

... chosen computer, be it a PC or a Mac. The fact that it was bundled with Cubase AI5 (a reduced feature-set version of Cubase 5) clearly indicated that Steinberg saw the need for a complete good-value studio-in-a-box ...

20. Recording Software Plugins
(Category/Recording Utilities)

... 'VST' is sometimes erroneously used as a generic term for a plugin of any format. Although VSTs are available for both Mac and PC it should be noted that the plugin files are system-specific . Windows ...