Do you really need an audio interface for your budget home studio?

If you’ve read the first part of my home studio setup, you probably know that I have a “legacy” M-Audio Fast Track audio interface that has no drivers for either Windows 10 or modern versions of macOS. It kind of works but in a very limited capacity (no inputs!):

I was confused as to whether I need to buy a new one right away or it can wait for a later stage (if ever). If you search for something like “home studio budget setup” on YouTube, most of the top videos would say you need one and even put it as #1 on the list. (kudos to Sanjay C for not doing this)

What most of those videos, primarily produced by those who don’t really remember what it means to setup a first budget home studio, don’t take into account is:

1. different people setup their studios for different reasons;
2. people may already have some parts that may influence further decisions.

So I decided to whip up a simple flow chart to take all of this into account and answer this question for most of the budget-minded newbies like me. Here it is, and I’ll add some comments below:

Figure1. Do you need an audio interface for your budget home studio?

Feel free to share this flow chart with your peers who may be wondering about the same thing by posting it on social media, or just retweet this.

Comments

First of all, if you just want to have a cool and relatively inexpensive gadget that could spur your creativity, by all means go ahead and buy it.

Second of all, I think built-in interfaces of modern computers should be fine for newbies like us in terms of quality and latency. You may disagree. Then just skip all of this and go ahead and buy an audio interface ;)

Audio interface settings in Reason 11 on PC and Mac

Then we come to the purpose of setting all of this up. Do you really plan to record any external audio (vocals, live instruments, etc.)? If so, what is it? If it’s guitars and other live instruments then you just need an audio interface to get those sounds into your computer and we are done here. If it’s just vocals it may get a little more complicated. You may already have some decent USB microphone that you used for podcasting or streaming or voice-over work. I have a Blue Yeti as a leftover from my podcasting days. If that’s the case for you as well, then the need for an audio interface is no longer predicated on the inputs, and you are in the same territory as those who don’t need to record any external audio. No microphone? Then you should probably get an audio interface and an XLR microphone to plug into it.

OK, now if you don’t need any audio inputs for now… You may already have some high impedance studio-quality headphones that you used with something else (your stereo amplifier, etc.). It is likely that your computer can’t properly power them (you should try though). In this case an audio interface is up for the task and you should get one. No or low(er) impedance headphones? OK, the final question is whether you already have the software — a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) — that you will use for your music. If not, most of the audio interfaces come with some “lite” versions of popular DAWs, and if you know which one you are interested in, you should research if there are interfaces that come with it. Likely, you will outgrow the lite version quickly but you may be entitled for a discounted upgrade from lite to a full version (do check before buying) and that could justify at least a part of the interface’s price.

That’s it for now. Disagree? Did I miss anything? Let me know here or on twitter.

P.S.: If you decided to buy an audio interface, after this, I did a little bit of research and Focusrite Scarlett Solo (Amazon US, UK, DE, ES, FR, IT) seems to be the most recommended one of those that don’t break the bank.