Customer Reviews

Sound Studio Construction on a Budget

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The new edition is called "How to Build a Small Budget Recording Studio from Scratch ... , With 12 Tested Designs" is much more accessible. Both editions cover the same area with the same info, so I don't know why they are continuing to publish this old edition in parallel with the new.

This book is an update of Everest's classic "Acoustic Design for Home and Studio". It is great for what it is. For more capable types, Everest's "Master" book is more complete. This one has the basics. For those who thought this is too technical, I wonder how they expect to deal with the other aspects of audio engineering. Just knowing how to twist a knob is not a path to excellence.

In actuality this is a well written, very direct primer, starting with very basic physics, and leading to easy design engineering. It's not hard to calculate, design, finance or construct good acoustics, and the payoff is huge. It does require a modest amount of work, and calculations to get good data. Remember: "Garbage in, garbage out." Acoustics control your recording and playback. This book will give you a fighting chance.

as another reviewer says, this appears to be the previous edition of what is currently titled "how to build a small budget recording studio....". also, as another reviewer has noted, you dont have to read it in order -- each example project its its own chapter with its own self-contained presentation. each example does stress diffferent design goals that translate to different acoustic treatments.

its a little annoying that every page seems to be an advertsemen for an rpg product. this is mitigated by the author's inclusion of journal and patent references that tell you everything you need to know to build these treatments yourself if you like. or if your budget doesnt allow for the beautiful wood forms from rpg, just take the keywords and run -- diffusor, absorber, abfussor -- and its easy to find someone besides rpg that makes the things using less expensive materials.

i enjoyed the book enough that i'm ordering the next edition. i also recommend his book on stereo theory if you want an overview of the psychoacoustics involved.

The subject of the book looks promising, but the author might better have warned that the book is not conceived to be read from the beginning to the end, but directly jumping to the chapter that relates to the specific type of construction that you want to know more about. Otherwise, you find the same concepts explained again and again... and surprisingly, half way through the book it gets organized and the last chapters explain the basic concepts (again). In my opinion, a better structure would have reduced the lenght of the book to a half and provided a clearer understanding of the valuable information that it contains.

This book is useless if you already own "The Master Handbook of Acoustics" by the same author. However as the title suggests it's all about being on a budget, which it explains fairly well. If you are building a projects studio in your house for example..this is a must read.

If you read the first books of Mr. Everest, this practical approach is a very useful complement. I use it as a series of examples of my courses on Acoustics. The theorical treatment of difussion is very good, and completes what has been said about it in the Master Handbook of Acoustics. Two good and easy to understand examples are the talk booth and the home project studio, the latter for the difussion approach (you will learn here about the bass trap, the skyline and the abflector, all in one chapter) and the former for the axial modes treatment. Here, again, the Cutoff frequency (chapter 18) is different from the one in the other books written by Mr Everest. What is the truth?. Anyway, my collection of books on Acoustics would not be complete without this excelent title.

It's a good book with a lot of good information, but when it comes down to it, most of what it's advising you to do for sound treatment involves buying several $200-$300 units, with no instructions on how to build them on your own. It seems like the title could be "Sound Studio Construction on a Healthy Budget".

Excellent Book. Very Well Written, Exactly what I wanted, I have laerned a great deal from this book.

As one who was being cross trained from RF engineer to Broadcast and then to assist with studio design work, I found the book to be quite accessible. If you want to, you can just use the given designs in the front for ideas or use them wholesale. The back part of the book presents a more detailed scientific picture especially of key construction details such as windows and the advantages/disadvantages of wall construction techniques.

I found myself studying and adapting the material in the back to the situations I face, which usually are retrofits of spaces not purposely designed for audio in 2nd and 3rd world environments. As others have noted its not the be all and end all of acoustics, just a practical primer, but it does provide the necessary information to create a passable recording space for less demanding applications. If you need top end specifications, get a good engineering house behind you, if not this book will be a lot of help and a good starting point.

bought this for my friend. i flipped through the pages, and it seems pretty technical. not a "for dummies" book.