If you are looking to produce music with your computer you should first considering having a computer with the necessary capabilities in order to run the audio production softwares smoothly. Nothing ruins the music making process as much as delay and insufficient virtual memory to run all the necessary modules for your music software. As for the actual softwares there are many to consider. ProTools are the industry standard but these setups usually start at least $10000. However for a consumer level there are alternatives that are in much reasonable prices, for the PC you can consider, ProTools Le, Sonar, Cubase. For the mac Garage Band and Pro Logic are also highly popular choices.
In addition to the actual hardware of the computer, you may need to consider looking at the additional hardwares that can be incorporated into the music making process. For instruments you can consider keyboards and guitars, for recording purposes of course a microphone would be suitable. Many production setups incorporate a keyboard that can produce many sounds. On the more expensive side of these keyboards we call them "synthesizers" and what these can do is actually have built in sequencers in the keyboard. Packed with a lot of built in sounds and room for expansion through memory card slots you can actually do the whole recording process in your keyboard by itself. On the cheaper side of things we have keyboards with none of those functions, but its main use is to connect to the computer to act as the controller for all the sounds that you have on your computer. Both are advantageous in their own right and it comes down to personal preference. Finally buying an interface allows you to link all these sound sources and translate them to a signal that the computer and your music software can understand.
With all the software & hardware in place you can begin the recording process. One approach is to record through your mic, so that could include vocals, guitars sounds, piano or any other instrument to your liking. When recording with a mic, usually a condenser mic is a lot more popular when it comes to recording vocals. Where as a normal mic is cheaper and may be effective in recording instruments such as guitars. With the interface after you plug in your mic a lot of these interfaces have built in phantom power which is needed to power these mics. Another popular option is instead using the keyboard as a controller and allowing it to instruct "sounds" from your music software and allowing you to record it. The large advantage of this approach is that with simply a keyboard you have access to unlimited sounds as with music production softwares there is a lot of room to experiment with different sounds and effects to your liking. Even with different sounds, you can record with different effects live so that you can hear it in real time. This is gaining popularity because not only is it cost effective but it packs a lot of functions into one computer.
Will C has been producing music for a number of years, in his free time he is also a junkie for home improvement. Check out his website on kitchen unit doors
