Having your own home recording studio is one of the biggest advantages you can provide for yourself as a musician. In this 7 part report on setting up your own home recording studio, we are discussing some of the technical specifications and advantages to necessary recording equipment. As we arrive at Day 5, it is time to discuss the necessary software your computer should have to record music from your home recording studio.

As we have mentioned before, the modern advances of technology have provided many outlets for new music to be developed. Software is no exception. With the appropriate software installed on your computer, you can eliminate the huge amount of hardware that used to be required for recording audio. From freeware to expensive software suites designed for specific purposes, the software available for home recording enthusiasts offers some great options.

Free is always a good thing, especially when you are just getting started. Believe it or not, if you are a Windows user, one of the best applications for recording your music may already be on your computer. Windows Media Encoder is an application that offers the ability to record and save your music in the wmv format or stream the recordings via web server for live broadcast. The bitrate and quality can be adjusted to meet your specific needs. While the Windows Media Encoder may not be as fully featured as some of the paid software suites, the advantage of being readily available on most machines and not costing any extra money is a definite selling point.

There are many great freeware applications that do an excellent job of recording audio but sometimes you just want options that freeware may not provide. If you choose to take things further, paid software suites are available with all kinds of bells and whistles to turn your home recording studio into a professional sound studio. When you choose any software application, especially paid applications, it is important to consider a few things to make sure you get the most for your money.

Recording Formats - Does the software record in popular formats or will you be required to use a format converting program to make the recording useful to your fans?

GUI - The Graphical User Interface is the part of the program that you interact with. Choose a program with a simple GUI that you can make sense of and you will be much happier than if you choose one with hundreds of adjustments that you don't understand their functions.

Features - Software is only as good as it's features and if it doesn't have the particular feature you are looking for, then it just isn't worth the money. When shopping for audio recording software, make sure you get features you need now or think you might even possibly want to use in the future.

Two more days are left on our seven part discussion. In the next segment, we will discuss the editing software you will need to make your home recordings sound their best.