$0 to pro studio: your first 5 music production tools that replace
$3,000 of gear

If you’re a new music producer, one major obstacle you’ll face when getting into music production is the initial onset costs. When you’re building a home studio, the cost of hardware equipment, vintage keyboards, and acoustic instrument purchases can really add up. Even on a small budget, you may be looking at spending upwards of $3,000 or more on production equipment to get you started.

One of the smartest investments you can make as a new music producer is the NI 360 Essentials subscription. This monthly subscription gives you instant access to the best-in-class tools from Native Instruments, iZotope, and Brainworx for a low monthly price.

The NI 360 Essentials subscription helps you avoid the cost of traditional pro studio gear and equips you with cutting-edge tools for creating, mixing, and mastering music. Let’s do an NI 360 Essentials review of how we can replace expensive analog gear with affordable VSTs.

Jump to these sections:

• How to get a cheap pro home studio setup
  • Which VST synthesizer is as good as an expensive analog synth?
  • Which mixing plugins can replace analog gear?

  • Which plugin can replace analog mastering gear?
  • What plugin can I use to replace an analog sampler, synthesizer, or instrument?
  • Which affordable reverb plugin could replace an analog reverb unit?

Try 360 free

How to get a cheap pro home studio setup

Technology has skyrocketed over the past few years. Analog vs. digital may still be part of the discussion, but if you showed a mastering suite like Ozone to a mastering engineer 20 years ago, they’d hardly believe what you were showing them.

Nowadays, it’s almost impossible to tell the difference between analog gear and high-end plugins. Let’s take a look at how we can replace hardware gear with VST plugins for an affordable and great-sounding studio right at home.

Which VST synthesizer is as good as an expensive analog synth?

Massive X makes professional sound design accessible by delivering the sonic weight and complexity of a $1,500+ hardware synthesizer. While physical synthesizers demand significant upfront capital, expensive cabling, and potential repair costs, Massive X is a maintenance-free investment that can be installed on a computer or laptop you already own.

Included in the NI 360 Essentials bundle, Massive X is a next-generation flagship wavetable software synthesizer designed for advanced sound design. It features a dual-oscillator engine with over 170 wavetables and extensive shaping modes that deliver high-fidelity sound with distinct analog-style warmth.

One of the advantages of using Massive X over traditional synthesizers is the ability to load multiple instances of Massive X in a session. To replicate running five instances of Massive X simultaneously using hardware, you would need to purchase five separate analog synths, which would cost a fortune. By eliminating these limitations, Massive X provides an entire studio warehouse of high-end polyphonic synth sounds at a fraction of the cost.

Which mixing plugins can replace analog gear?

Neutron 5 is a powerful assistive mixing tool that can replace any analog counterpart. Elements is the entry-level version of iZotope’s intelligent mixing suite, designed to balance your tracks quickly using AI assistance.

One of the best features of Neutron Elements is the improved Mix Assistant, which listens to your audio and automatically creates a custom preset to give you a great starting point for your mix. You can then dial in your sound to taste, all while retaining creative control.

When building a traditional studio setup, you’d need to look at investing in an analog channel strip (including an equalizer, compressor, and gate) for mixing a single track. This purchase alone can easily cost more than $1,000.

iZotope Neutron Elements, included in the NI 360 Essentials subscription, gives you a way to easily kickstart the mixing process. Its intelligent suggestions and presets are a great starting point for your mixes.

Which plugin can replace analog mastering gear?

iZotope Ozone Elements allows you to finalize tracks in seconds with essential assistive mastering tools. If you’re looking at mastering your tracks yourself, this is the perfect replacement for an analog mastering chain.

Mastering engineers who prefer outboard gear utilize analog equalizers, compressors, saturators, limiters, and converters to achieve the coloration and particular sound they’re after for their masters. These analog processors are very costly and require an investment of thousands of dollars – easily $10,000 or more for a truly professional setup.

More and more mastering engineers are using in-the-box plugins like iZotope Ozone.

For beginners, a budget-friendly option for mastering is iZotope Ozone Elements, an AI-powered entry-level mastering plugin. It relies on the Master Assistant to analyze your audio and apply processing using internal Equalizer, Imager, and Maximizer technologies.

To achieve a polished, release-ready sound, place the plugin on your master bus, run the Assistant, and adjust the macro controls for a polished, release-ready sound. iZotope Ozone Elements is included in the NI 360 Essentials subscription, so you’ll be able to save thousands and get started mastering tracks right away.

What plugin can I use to replace an analog sampler, synthesizer, or instrument?

Kontakt Player is the perfect replacement for any analog samplers, synths, or even real instruments.

When you’re starting your studio, buying vintage keyboards, synths, and acoustic instruments like guitars and percussion instruments can run up your credit card bill quickly. While it’s tempting to purchase real instruments, the reality is that each purchase is expensive, easily $500 or more per instrument. Every instrument requires physical space for storage, maintenance, and a time investment to learn how to play it or design sounds on it.

Kontakt Player and the sound libraries available in NI 360 Essentials are great alternatives to acoustic instruments. You’ll save upwards of several thousand dollars using the included sound libraries, and save time loading up instruments in seconds in Kontakt Player.

The sound libraries that come with Kontakt Player and the NI 360 Essentials subscription include Analog Dreams, Hybrid Keys, Alicia’s Keys, Session Guitarist – Electric Sunburst, and many more free libraries are compatible.

Whether your productions call for the sound of real instruments or you want to utilize a more synthesized sound preset, the NI 360 Essentials subscription provides a vast range of sounds, ready to be used in your next song or soundtrack.

Which affordable reverb plugin could replace an analog reverb unit?

When it comes to reverb and space, Raum is one of the best music production plugins for beginners and pros alike.

A hardware reverb unit is a physical device used in audio production to create the effect of reverberation, which is the natural reflection of sound off surfaces in a space. Reverb is applied to vocals and instruments of all kinds to add depth and space to a sound, simulating environments like halls or rooms. Conventional hardware pieces or convolution reverb units are very expensive.

Raum is a reverb plugin that replaces those conventional hardware or convolution reverb units. Raum’s reverb effects range from subtle to experimental sound design. It features three styles of reverb and advanced controls like Pre-delay feedback, a Freeze function, and Modulation to create a wide range of effects.

Raum is part of NI 360 Essentials, and gives you state-of-the-art reverb effects at a fraction of the cost of a traditional hardware reverb unit.

Build a studio on a budget by replacing hardware gear with VST plugins

If you’re looking to start a home studio, NI 360 Essentials offers you the best music production plugins for beginners, and is a great way to build a cheap pro home studio setup.

You can save yourself a ton of money by replacing hardware gear with VST plugins included in the NI 360 Essentials subscription, and get down to work on your tracks faster.

Try 360 free