Is this computer worth it? MUST KNOW TODAY!

dudernut

dudernut

New member
Hey all,

I'm in desperate need of a more powerful PC for recording. Saw this deal-of-the-day and I was wondering if it's worth buying. My DAW is Reaper, I record up to 8 tracks simultaneously (through a Presonus Firepod) and would like plenty of processing for VSTs and VSTi's. It seems with my current PC (Gateway cheapo Dual Core), any time I start to use more than a few plugins, it starts to lag and crackle. Lately, it's even been happening without using plugins or lots of tracks...I'm not super tech savy, so any insight on why this will or will not work would be appreciated.

http://computers.woot.com/offers/dell-t5400-intel-xeon-quad-core-workstation?ref=cnt_dly_wobtn
 
No.

The Xenia processors are very low end, if you need the horsepower, your going to want at the low end, an i5 chip or an AMD 6 core+ (they are decently priced), 8 gigs of RAM (I get along just fine with that amount) and a nice HD (7200 RPM). The SDDs really are worth the money, with a traditional for main storage.

What you are looking at there is not much better than what you are moving away from. IMO. The system I outlined will run you, in a desktop, about $600 on average. Pi X :thumbs up:
 
DM60 said:
No.

The Xenia processors are very low end, if you need the horsepower, your going to want at the low end, an i5 chip or an AMD 6 core+ (they are decently priced), 8 gigs of RAM (I get along just fine with that amount) and a nice HD (7200 RPM). The SDDs really are worth the money, with a traditional for main storage.

What you are looking at there is not much better than what you are moving away from. IMO. The system I outlined will run you, in a desktop, about $600 on average. Pi X :thumbs up:
Click to expand...

Thanks, that's what I needed to know! I'll keep on looking.
 
Xeons are intel's ferraris, they're made for servers. This cpu pair is from 2007 but will still blow away many current i5s according to cpu benchmark. What's your cpu exactly? We can get a benchmark comparison between them. It probly also sounds like a jet in takeoff, maybe not the best recording computer despite the power haha
 
easlern said:
Xeons are intel's ferraris, they're made for servers. This cpu pair is from 2007 but will still blow away many current i5s according to cpu benchmark. What's your cpu exactly? We can get a benchmark comparison between them. It probly also sounds like a jet in takeoff, maybe not the best recording computer despite the power haha
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Yea, server grade processing can mean a lot of things. Maybe six of these in a server would be good (lots of reasons why one would want to do that), but a dual core stand alone? I will stick with what I stated.

Best bang for the buck, AMD 6 core. The i5 is still better for single user type computing than a Xeon.
 
Read again, this dual quad-cores! :O I didn't even know they put them in workstations (why? Calculating pi to a billion places or what!)

The benchmarks say it beats my i7 quad core by 50%. Wow. . .
 
easlern said:
Xeons are intel's ferraris, they're made for servers. This cpu pair is from 2007 but will still blow away many current i5s according to cpu benchmark. What's your cpu exactly? We can get a benchmark comparison between them. It probly also sounds like a jet in takeoff, maybe not the best recording computer despite the power haha
Click to expand...

The PC I'm currently using is Gateway Model# SX2110G
 
easlern said:
Read again, this dual quad-cores! :O I didn't even know they put them in workstations (why? Calculating pi to a billion places or what!)

The benchmarks say it beats my i7 quad core by 50%. Wow. . .
Click to expand...

Well, they are cheaper for a reason. But hey OP, give it a shot.
 
Yeah, it's dual quad cores.
Two processors, each with four cores.

Servers and older Mac Pros often use this configuration although, as said, these particular xeons are showing their age.

In terms of single core performance, their going to get lumped in with core2duos from the same era. Not great.
In multicore they'll fare much better against modern chips, in and around some of the 4 core i5 34 series and i7 2/3 series chips.




I'm in a similar boat with 2x6core xeons @ 2.66.
Per core it's not an impressive machine at all, but the sheer number of cores make it a powerhouse.


It's probably a decent step up from what you have, but you could probably do better for the money, I guess.

Geekbench published benchmarks might be useful as a rough gauge of what's what.
Benchmarks are only so useful but at least the range of core2duos, i5s, i7s and 4/8/6/12 core xeon setups are covered here under the same single and multicore tests.
 
I've had too many Dells die on me to ever buy one again. Same thing for where I work. We've gone to HP everything here.
 
mjbphotos said:
I've had too many Dells die on me to ever buy one again. Same thing for where I work. We've gone to HP everything here.
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Funny...I've used nothing but Dells...and none have died on me...and at work its nothing but Dells. :D

For my own use, I only used the Dell Precision line.
Running an older Quad Core Extreme right now...it kicks ass.
 
Multiple cores don't always help with intense audio work because you can kind of only split the processing so far if it needs to be synchronous. An article I read a while back did tests that seemed to show that any more than four processors was a waste in DAW work. If you have choice between eight cores at slower speed or four at faster, go with the four.

So I built a brand new machine that was quad 3.9GHz with 8G RAM and it came out right around $350 and it is a serious beast. Course, I didn't have to buy OS or anything, so that might skew the numbers a bit.

I agree wholeheartedly with the SSD recommendation. Booting from SSD is amazingly fast, but it using it as your main working audio drive will make a real difference on your track counts and functional latency times.
 
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HP i5 laptop here - 700 bucks Canadian. Beat the hell out of my old AMD Quad core for CPU and plugins
 
ashcat_lt said:
Multiple cores don't always help with intense audio work because you can kind of only split the processing so far if it needs to be synchronous. An article I read a while back did tests that seemed to show that any more than four processors was a waste in DAW work. If you have choice between eight cores at slower speed or four at faster, go with the four. .
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Yeah...I read some similar stuff.
Also about cores VS number of actual CPUs.

I think some folks just go for the numbers...8 cores is more than 6....etc.....etc...which doesn't always mean what they expect.

Anyway, I don't think you need an absolute monster PC to handle basic multitrack recording or mixing. I think some folks just get a bit too carried away with plugs and pile them on too much.

I dunno...maybe I'm not doing it right...;)...but I rarely have more than a couple of plugs at the same time, on a few tracks...and I rarely have even a single plug on each and every track.
Often, many of my tracks have no plugs on them....and only few tracks with a handful total of plugs for all.
Even when I was using all outboard gear...it was the same way...never overkill with FX and processing.
 
Even if multi cores did help, there are still calculations it has to do. That is back to the processor speed. Servers don't crunch number for the most part. The ones that do, are not your run of the mill servers.

I know a car manufacturer that runs simulations (like crash, door openings, so forth). They use the server to find idle desktops and use the computing of the idle desktops to run the calculations for the mathematical models. The server was more of a traffic cop.

The short of it, server CPUs are not for crunching numbers. They are mainly for processing data.
 
miroslav said:
Yeah...I read some similar stuff.
Also about cores VS number of actual CPUs.

I think some folks just go for the numbers...8 cores is more than 6....etc.....etc...which doesn't always mean what they expect.

Anyway, I don't think you need an absolute monster PC to handle basic multitrack recording or mixing. I think some folks just get a bit too carried away with plugs and pile them on too much.

I dunno...maybe I'm not doing it right...;)...but I rarely have more than a couple of plugs at the same time, on a few tracks...and I rarely have even a single plug on each and every track.
Often, many of my tracks have no plugs on them....and only few tracks with a handful total of plugs for all.
Even when I was using all outboard gear...it was the same way...never overkill with FX and processing.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I try to go easy with the plugins, but with compression, verbs, and EQ, I still usually end up using several per project. Also, I recently dropped the big bucks on Komplete 10, and it has SOOO many cool virtual instruments that my CPU simply cannot handle....or some that it can only handle when I set my latency really high.
 
If you're doing "traditional" recording of actual acoustic sources where you can use source properties (including amp knobs, etc) and mic choice and placement to get your sounds then you don't need much for plugins. A couple EQs, maybe a compressor here and there...

Many of us, though, actually generate most or all of our sounds ITB. Between amp sims for guitars and basses and VSTis for everything else, I pretty much have to have at least one plugin on every track or else there's nothing to mix. I've been trying to render those things down to flat audio sooner in the process just to force myself to commit and get over "option anxiety" and endless tweaking, but when (like many of us) you're kind of composing while tracking, you sometimes can't render too much till the whole thing is pretty much finished.

Also, if you're never actually monitoring a live track through the computer (using real amps rather than amp sims and/or direct monitoring) you can get away with a lot more latency, so CPU demands will be lower.
 
dudernut said:
Yeah, I try to go easy with the plugins, but with compression, verbs, and EQ, I still usually end up using several per project. Also, I recently dropped the big bucks on Komplete 10, and it has SOOO many cool virtual instruments that my CPU simply cannot handle....or some that it can only handle when I set my latency really high.
Click to expand...

On reverbs...I'm only using 1-2 maybe... on Aux tracks and then I send to them what I want. I don't think I ever applied a reverb plug to single tracks. Not to mention...reverbs are processor hogs.

If you are using compression on a lot of tracks, then make some commitments, and apply it, freeze it with the track, and that removes the plug. If you need to go back, you can undo/unfreeze...but no need to keep a lot of real-time compression.

With EQ, again, if I need to use a lot of EQ plugs rather than the built in DAW eq...I'll adjust, freeze and move on.

I mean...you can find ways to deal with plugs crashing your system.

Also...just because you have 500 new plugs that your dying to try out...you don't need to try then all at once. :D
 
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