My sound booth is in a different room to my main computer. The reason is simply the noise; computers whirl, monitors buzz and keyboards clatter. A long cable runs from my microphone interface through the attic dropping down to my little office, leaving the computer and monitors to do their worst at a safe distance.
The problem then becomes how to control the computer while sitting in a different room.
Solution 1 was to start Audition recording, pop into the recording room and rabbit away, hoping that all was OK and the computer hadn’t decided to have a breakdown halfway through my recording. Oh the joy of recording an awesome half hour of an audiobook then returning to the computer to find that it had decided to run a virus check instead of recording audio about 5 minutes into the session. That happened more than once, believe me.
Solution 2 was to connect a speaker to my interface, set the output on my computer to the microphone, then use a wireless keyboard in my recording room to magically control my computer. So I could hear my computer, but I couldn’t see it in action, or indeed inaction. Did it work? Well, yes, as long as the computer didn’t do anything unexpected, otherwise confusion most definitely abounded.
Solution 3, and the best so far, makes use of my little Chromebook. It has no fan, it doesn’t buzz, creak or click, but it does run Teamviewer very well. So my new setup is my Chromebook sitting next to me in my recording area, connected remotely to my main computer via Teamviewer, plus a little speaker connected to my interface so that I can playback clearly.
Happy times.