Best components for a music computer?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Monkeyface
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save money, save money, save money

thats my new message

I was not comparing the g4 400 to a pc 400. I believe that the mac is slightly faster.

I was comparing a g4 400 to a pc 633. THe 633 will kill the g4 400 and it is still $500 cheaper.

As far as emachines go,
I am using a $400 emachines monster right off the shelf, with a $175 upgrade to cdr AND 256 megabytes.

It is a rock solid as they come, I SWEAR, and it performs as well as any mac. I have got 21 tracks before, while recording another one, and I was not even pushing the system.


A raid system is the beast, but if you want to save money, a 7200 rpm drive will do just fine, and you can add like 30 gigs for $120 these days.


anyhow,

save money save money save money save money save money save money save money save money save money save money save money save money
 
speed aside, how about stability?

Wow - thanks everyone for all the great info in this thread!

I'm hearing a lot here about speed comparison between Mac and PC, but I'm wondering about stability. A friend of mine who does a lot of recording (using apps like Cubase and Gigasampler, Logic Audio) and works at home and professionally in both environments claims that he gets a lot fewer blow-ups in the Mac environment, so I was just heading toward getting a Mac.

Anyone here recorded in both PC and Mac environments? If so, do you also find that there more stability with audio software applications and sound cards on the Mac?
 
Why do you think the PC 633 would kill the G4 400? The PC 633 probably only has 256k of L2 On-Die Cache. The G4 400 I beleive has 1MB, I aint sure if it is on-Die or not.

The MAC OS is GERNERALLY more stable then say Win98. But it still will lock up. It isn't as stable as say Win2000, but unfortunatley Win2000 is not compatible with a lot of Recording Equipment. If your main objective is to use this as a "Audio" Machine, and you got the money to spend I would go ahead and get a MAC. Just so you know though, you could get the equivalent on the PC side for hundreds less.
 
nutdotnet,

yes, the mac os is more stable than win98, BUT win ME is the beast as far as stability.

Let me see. What kind of problems do I have with my pc.
-After about 2 hours of recording, vegas starts saving with two file names, while only saving one file. It does not affect performance

In logic, when I try to change the maximum number of tracks, it closes.

thats it. Stable as a steed. No lockups or anything.
I have no irq conflicts either.

thats another reason I don't like buying componets. An emachine puter is already tested so that everything in it works together.
 
WinME? You think that is Stable? HAHA, boy, you are one of the very few people that I have heard that from. :)

But hey, if it is working great for you then GREAT! :)
 
I wouldn't worry about the speed difference between a PC and Mac. Similar priced systems will probably be close enough in performance that other factors would outweight the difference. I've dug up benchmarks on the two processors invovled and they tend to reenforce the idea that the a 400Mhz G4 is probably slightly faster (15-20%) than a 400Mhz Pentium.

The thing is processor performance is only one part of the picture. Its way to easy for the motherboard chipset, the disk, and the memory system to hamstring a good performing processor. In the PC world there are a range of processor options, chipset options, and memory options that make any comparison difficult. What you really want is info from someone who actually ran your chosen applications on different systems and measured the results, and I doubt you'll find that information anywhere. In the end I think the safest assumption is that well built systems with comparable speed processors will probably perform similarly.

As far as stability... the sheer number of combinations of component choices in the PC world mean PC stability is always going to be a bigger questionmark. There's no getting around that, fewer component configurations will always mean that Macs have an edge over PCs in terms of stability. Whether you choose to use a Mac or PC, you can improve your chances of putting together a stable system by choosing components recomended and tested by those who provide the software and/or audio hardware. For example, emagic can tell you which components they've tested and in what configuration. If you choose to use Logic picking from the components they've tested will go a long way to insuring a stable system.

IMHO both a Mac and a PC are valid options. If I were you I'd first decide what applications and audio hardware I want to use, then use that to help decide on the platform.
 
Firsthand VIA Experience

I havent looked at this thread before today. I have to chime in about the VIA chipsets with Intel chips.

I went through 3 VIA133 boards in 3 months because I could never get them to work with my Delta card or with N-Track or CoolEdit. I would get everything from video errors to lock-ups to just strange crap happening. I posted lots of problems with not being able to record successfully. I finally got the Intel815 chipset and connected all of the same hardware to it and never had another problem from that day foreward.

H2H
 
Monkeyface

What are you trying to achieve by having this computer?

What kind of music are you creating?

What sorts of things will you be connecting to your computer?

Will you be recording live sessions?

How much money are prepared to spend ?

Have you done any computer based production before?

Are you more comfortable working on a PC or a MAC?

By answering some of these question, I'm sure we at HomeRec.com will be able to help you come to a decision on what equpment you should buy.

peace,

spin @ PSYLAB INC.
 
H2H,

Did you try 3 different brand and model motherboards with the VIA chipset, or 3 of the same board? If all 3 were the same model, then how do you know it wasn't an inferior board design? I've seen boards of different brands with the same chipset vary drastically in compatibility and performance.

I'm not trying to be a jerk here. I just get really tired of people making broad generalizations about a product without taking all factors into consideration. There is a lot to what makes a motherboard "good" besides the chipset it's designed around. A number of people I know who have slagged the VIA chipset only had experience with one brand and model board. Then they got a board with the Intel chipset and had fewer problems. They assumed that the chipset was the magic bullet. That is not necessarily the case.
 
3 different makers...an Asus, Aopen, and Gigabyte were the makers.
I am well versed in PC setups also. I am currently a Network Analyst for a very large company and am certified to service IBM and Compaq PC's and laptops, as well as Compaq servers.
Just because I didnt have luck doesnt mean that no one ever could. Who knows? But, I DID have first hand experience with that chipset. Any PC's purchased for my company have the Intel chipset, I make sure of it.

H2H
 
Nut-
That was all about 10-12 months ago, so thats how old the boards are. At the time, they were fairly hard to find. Probably not so any more. I honestly don't remember the models, but I was sticking with the 133 FSB. At the time, Intels 815 was even harder to find and no one was sure of it yet.
Mind you, I am using the P3 chip. I think the VIA sets work well with the AMD chips, and maybe they've fixed it since then to work better with the P3. But I already am working on my P4 system, so we'll see where that goes!

H2H
 
Just goes to show you, your mileage may vary.

My brother has had a number of systems with the 815 chipset and they all did very strange things. For example, if you boot from a Windows 98 or Me startup disk, the screen goes dark. On the other hand, when he made a clone of the HDD on working machine with Ghost, it booted just fine - but the screen did go dark briefly during boot. That never happened with any of my VIA machines.

Now, I will say that all of my VIA machines are AMD processors, so there may be a bit of merit to that statement.

Back to what someone said earlier - the PC platform will always require tweaking to run properly due to the sheer number of possible combinations. I think the same person also mentioned that, if you want a minimum of tweaking, you might want to stick with a configuration recommended by the software/hardware manufacturer whose gear you want to use.

Another suggestion for those trying to figure out what is "good": Since no one is really benchmarking motherboards, processors, etc. exclusively in a recording environment, you'll have to look elsewhere for reviews and information. Try some of the sites that cater to 3D gamers. They usually torture test everything and rate performance, stability, and ease of setup. Here are a few sites I visit:

www.tomshardware.com
www.firingsquad.com
www.anandtech.com

I usually check all three and maybe a couple more just to see if everyone has the same observations. That's how I came to choose my ABit KT7-RAID/Duron combo, and I'm quite pleased. (Overclocking a 650 to 800 with great stability should put a smile on anyone's face.)

You know what they say about opinions.. ;)
 
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