It used to be every PC had a hard disc drive (HDD) although these are being succeeded by faster – albeit more expensive – solid-state drives (SSD). Storage also refers to the storage volume. In our experience, upgrading the RAM is the simplest and quickest way to breathe new life into an ageing production machine too. At the budget end of the price spectrum, you should be looking for upwards of 8GB as a minimum, although with some PCs you may be able to upgrade this yourself. The bigger the RAM, the larger and more complex the DAW sessions you can run. On it, the audio you’re using in a session is stored so your digital audio workstation (DAW) can access it quickly. RAM requirementsīreaking it down a bit your PC’s RAM is the short-term memory of your computer. Storage, on the other hand, is arguably more important as it dictates how quickly your PC can write your tracks ‘to tape’ and then, subsequently, how quickly it can re-access that audio when it needs to. Performance comes in the form of how long it takes to export an audio file, or how long you’ll be waiting for a plugin to load. Don’t be distracted by flashy RGB lights, or a 4K screen with music production, it’s all about performance and storage.

When you are looking to buy a budget PC to produce music on, you need to be aware of a few key specifications you should be looking out for. Why you can trust MusicRadar Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you.

Budget home studio computer