Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Enough With The Gear Grabbing.. Make Some Music!

It's a common ailment.  Most of us suffer from it.  Gear Envy, Gear Grabbing.. whatever you want to call it. At one time or another we all go through it. I've read about it, watched videos about it and no matter how many times I say to myself  "I'm done for now", there always seems to be some piece of gear or software that grabs my attention.  

Here's the latest situation... I'm in the process of rearranging my studio room.  I've got acoustic panels ready to be installed. I've spent time planning out how the room will be organized. The last missing piece being a new studio desk that will fit my workflow perfectly. In fact I wrote about my plans to build one the other day.  Honestly, I've been thinking about this stupid desk for weeks now...What size do I need?  Will all my equipment fit?  Will my mixer fit on the desktop? How cool will it look with the racks on the desktop! Will there be enough room for my monitors...etc, etc.   Looking and searching without find the perfect design. Since I felt I was going in circles I decided to take stock in what I have now.

I have a 54" x 24" desk space and I've set it up to fit 2 screens, a Mac Mini, keyboard, mouse, trackpad, Faderport, external drives and a 16" x 16" mixer.  It's a little tight but it gets the job done.   I have two speaker stands that hold my studio monitors which are adjustable to multiple heights.  I also have a 8U rack that I have sitting on top of a small table. It has plenty of rack space for my gear and a few extra spaces for growth (more gear grabbing in the future).

Alright.. its not the coolest looking workstation but that's my studio rig and I kinda like it.  So now I have to ask myself.  Why do I need a new studio desk?  The one I have now fits everything I have and then some.  It's enough space to work.  The answer is.. I don't need one.

The set up I have now works fine. Sure it would be nice to have the RUs right on top of the desk but with the set up I have now its a simple turn to my left to make adjustments.  OK so my mixer is set up on the corner of the desk with a little over hang... so what.. it's stable and right at my finger tips.  So that's that!   The quest for a new desk is behind me, at least for now.  Now I'll have more time to make music.

Wow.. I feel better already.

Fred