Recording console designs

[mate stubb]

I am finally going to build or buy a console for my DAW home studio. I'm looking for designs you like that successfully juggle desk real estate.

 

- How do you position keyboard, control surface and transport controls, computer keyboard so that they are all ergonomically reachable?

- Racks in the desk, under the desk, or to the side? (I don't have a lot of rack gear, but the main interface/mixer (Presonus StudioLive 24R) I would like up top next to a patchbay where all the instruments come in.)

 

- How do you deal with recording instruments set up away from the desk when you need remote transport controls?

[KuruPrionz]

- How do you deal with recording instruments set up away from the desk when you need remote transport controls?

 

I haven't gotten it up and running yet but I am going to try a Presonus Faderport One for running the DAW from a (fairly short) distance. My studio is small, a 10' USB cord should give me more than enough reach.

I'll want to be able to use the "Abort and Restart" function, that is super handy. I think it can be programmed to do that.

 

[Dave Bryce]

I've used stuff from Omnirax and Argosy. Currently using an Argosy 70 series with my TASCAM DM 3200

 

I don't really keep a (music) keyboard near the mix position - I have a wireless mouse and (computer) keyboard that I move around the studio to whatever (music) keyboard I'm playing.

 

dB

 

 

[SamuelBLupowitz]

[Dr Mike Metlay]

I have debated getting a proper console desk for my studio for over 20 years. I don't really have the room for a big one, and so I have made do with an unusual solution from many years back:

 

I have an old computer hutch from back in the days when computers were all huge boxes with gigantic heavy CRT monitors. It holds my computer, QWERTY keyboard and trackball on a slide-out tray, peripherals on lower shelves, and small monitors for quick auditioning and mix checking on the top bookshelf. The real center of it all is the copy shelf, a slanted board that was originally designed to hold books or manuals while you typed; it's where I mount my Linnstrument and two of my iPads, in easy ergonomic reach.

 

Argosy furniture is gorgeous, but out of my size and price range. I am contemplating one of the Output desks, which is apparently very nice, but I am trying to avoid anything with a heavy offering of rackspaces at the expense of other gear, as I have practically no rack gear left by now.

 

I always have to have a keyboard controller of some kind in front of me. For many years, I would use metal hooks to precariously hang 3-octave or 4-octave controllers at an angle on my copy shelf; at one time or another, it held a Korg Prophecy, Novation X-Station 49, Samson Graphite 49, KMI K-Board Pro 4, and probably a few others I'm forgetting, but the ergonomics of playing keys at that angle were very awkward (the LinnStrument works great, though). It is very tempting to get one of those big consoles with a slide-out controller tray, but then I'd have to pick one keyboard to put there out of the six I currently own...

 

mike