Global Music Resource

A Digital Audio Workstation can either be a very professional, high-end recording console installed in a professional studio or it can be the desktop computer sitting in front of you. Any computer or digital sound production equipment dedicated to music production (or spoken word) can be termed a Digital Audio Workstation. It can even be a laptop computer. They all have some common features:

• They each have an operating program to manage all of the functions of the system.
• They each incorporate sophisticated, audio-related software applications that perform specific DSP processing functions such as sound synthesis or effects editing.
• They complete all of these functions with the processing power of a microprocessor, anciliary hardware and usually some type of graphical representation or a screen.
• A sophisticated soundcard (audio interface) allows various analog and digital In / Out signal connections, ADC and DAC and DSP capabilities.
• There may be an intermediary modular device, such as a mixing board that incorporates the necessary I/O connections and provides additional processing, effects editing and then the signal is eventually routed to the microprocessor.
• The workstation relys upon the storage capabilities of the computer’s hard drive to hold the data that may be generated from recording live instruments or editing an existing file of a previous recording.
• The processing capacity and configuration all combine to function as a console or Desktop Multi-track/channel Mixer, Digital Audio and MIDI Sequencing, effects editing, Hard Disk Recording (sampling analog signals or re-sampling existing digital audio data) and sometimes direct to CD burning.