I have found that consuming whey protein powder can be very beneficial for building muscle faster. But I also have experience with them not being very effective at all. The trick is that you need to use them with an exercise routine and eating plan.

Before you start choosing which supplements your going to use, make sure that you have an eating plan in place. The reason that I stress this, is because I attempted just using supplements as meal replacements and it does not work without a good diet.

Try to include so high protein foods in your diet, like red meats and if your vegetarian legumes like lentils and black beans. This way you can start feeding your body most of it's protein needs from day one and then increase that will powders later on.

Whilst carbs and fats are less important, you still need to eat them. However, you should moderate your consumption on days that you aren't working out because they have less use on these days.

You see, if you stop eating fats and carbs your metabolism could easily crash. This is because there are functions running in your body which need that nutrition and if they don't get it you'll at least suffer from extremely low energy.

Now that you've got your diet set out, are you ready to take protein supplements? In my opinion, no. I really think that you should also have an exercise routine down and have completed it at least a few times. To design one you should test out different exercises and patterns in which you do them until you come up with the final draft.

I advise that you eat a good pre-workout meal before you do your routine. Then do your exercises for about 45 minutes followed by another meal once you've finished. This will provide your body with the optimum nutrition to build your muscles after your workout.

Once you have been doing your workouts and keeping to your diet for about 2 months, then you can begin to think about using protein supplements. But remember, they're not magic bullets and will still require you to work just as hard as before.