Carillon PC's... I am about to order one as my DAW, anyone know anything about them?

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pisces7378

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I am in contact with Carillon PC... www.carillonusa.com
They might build my next PC audio system for me. They are cheaper than a Mac by a shit load, but they are also SOOO DAMN impressive from a studio noise level... or lack of studio noise I should say. Damn quiet bastards they are. And it seems that they have done everything that I would have done if I built the PC myself. But since they are building so many, they get the parts for a cheaper price than I would and after I consider all the quiet drive sleeves, and quiet fans, and the casing being made so quiet, plus all of the bells and whistles (transport controls, and a jog shuttle control direct on the front panel of the PC) I just am in fucking love.
Does anyone have anything to say about them?
Does anyone on this BBS have one?
Does anyone on this BBS know of another company doing a semilar system?

Thanks guys... really go check this thing out if you have not seen one yet!

Mike
 
Hi Mike:
Other companies doing similar systems are:
soundchaser.com
dawbox.com
macmidimusic.com

I'm currently doing the same thing but I was thinking of going with soundchaser.com. No real particular reason except they look sweet and they contacted me quickly and spent alot of time on the phone and in prorec.com there's a great article about them (search mad max at the prorec website and youll find the article if interested. I put in a quote request for Carillon but have not heard from them yet.
The quote I got for my perfect system with rme soundcard, nuendo and 16 analog I/0 is about 6K.
I imagined if I built the computer myself and purchased all the other doo dads separately it may save me money, but I figure being a non-computer kind of guy, the time saved, lack of headaches figuring it all out and then the possiblity of having to work out bugs after everything is installed plus the lifetime tech support makes it more than worth it.
But in actuality, I'm looking at the invoice they sent me with a breakdown of all the costs and I'm paying practically the same for all the software, soundcard and interfaces as if I bought it myself.
The computer is costing about 2K, so however much cheaper I could do that myself is basically what I would be saving.
Any reason your going with them as opposed to soundchaser, macmidimusic or dawbox?
JJ
 
Check out rec.audio.pro - there was a recent thread on Carillon....

Overall, the consensus was that they were overpriced and really do nothing you couldn't do yourself a lot cheaper, assuming you have some technical ability with computer components.


Bruce
 
Isn't that the point of a PC?

I would love to read the atricle on that website but I have never heard of that site and I could not find it with the "rec.audio.pro " description your gave. Could you type out the entire URL address for me? A lionk to the article would be sweet.

Anyway...
Of course there isn't anything that Carillon can do that someone with PC building skills couldn't do themselves. That is the point of a PC rather than just buying a pre-built Mac. They are so customizable that you can literally build one from scratch. However, I do not have the leve of PC knowledge needed to do this, nor do I desire to lean it. I do not have the time nor the patience to research for 2 years which mother board with which chip-set if suited best to which processor, as well as solving the argument between everybody of which processor is best for PC audio. Seaking out quiet fans and hard drive sleeves, notto mention which HDD to buy and how many to have and at which size and speed. Which OS is best suited for recording. I could spend 15 years on this and BBSs of the like asking and never getting a solid "across the board" answer. Not to mantion just putting the thing together, and getting it all configured with the BIOS et cetera. And then buying a MOTU 2406mkII annd getting it stuck in there and running.

Then after everything... I STILL have absolutely ZERO warranty. Perhaps as a hobby I would build my own PC for home use. It sure sounds like a fun and educational project. But for my pro/semi-pro uses I can't afford to spend 2 years learning which parts go into a super computer and how to put it together and then not having any kind of warranty should I do something wrong. I need a warranty in case something goes wrong. I had a pre-built machine already and it crashes every second time I turn it on. I can't imagine how bad one would be that I MYSELF built. So I am deffinitly willing to pay a little more to have someone else do it all for me. Especially because Carillon would put in the PCI card (motu 2408mkII) and still have the warranty intact. While other PCs void the waranty as soon as you add something new like a PCI card.

Anyway, if you have a better idea or think that there is a better builder of audio PCs than Carillon, then post a link and I would gladely take a look. I have already sent away for a quote from three companies and I am going to compare and see what they all come up with. I am just leaning towards the Carillon simply because they seem very simply to order since i already have Logic Audio Platinum (most PC companies want to sell you a machine with the software package already there.) Plus the Carillon has the abuility to have a Transport Bar control on the front panel plus a Jog shuttle control. These are cool additions that, along with the extremely impressive noise level make this Carillon look damn sweet to me.

Thanks though,

Mike
 
I agree with you totally,some people dig building their own rig and that's cool,but your time is worth something and you'd probably like to hit the ground running.
My own experience was a nightmare,it took me a year before I got my shit together.Partly me and partly the company I had build it(multitrack recording whats that? ).
All the time you spend tweaking you could be recording and thats what its all about.
Some people are musicians some are technicians and some are both.
We all throw away a little money here and there.I think you're just trying to buy a little piece of mind,but don't worry the software will fry that to a crisp!
GOOD LUCK!
 
First of all, rec.audio.pro is a newsgroup, not a website... but you can view it thru deja.com via http....

The thread I was talking about is here --> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=...o.pro&hl=en&selm=znr1017157719k%40trad&rnum=2

Second - you asked for infomation, I gave you information that I gleaned from the above thread... it's what it is - ignore it and move on, or use it to make a buying decision - just DON'T SHOOT THE FUCKING MESSENGER....

Third - what you do with that information is your bloody business, I don't care -- I don't use a Carillon computer myself. But don't go shitting on me just because you don't like the info.... ....... if you don't want an answer - don't ask the question! Your response makes it sound like you had already decided to buy and didn't like the fact that someone had something negative to say about your decision.

Fourth -- you don't necessarily have to do it yourself directly - the point was that a local place can put a package together to your spec for a lot cheaper. I had Emeric (from this BBS) build one for me and it's excellent, as was the pricing.

Good luck...


Bruce
 
j

Either the...

Pent IV 2 GHz
w/ 512 MB of 400Mhz RDRAM
Matrox G550 Dual Head graphics card
20 GB HDD (for applications)
80 GB HDD 7200 rpm (for audio)
Price = $2,199

Or the...

Pent IV 1.7 GHz
w/ 512 MB of 133Mhz RDRAM
32Mb ATI Rage Pro Card (graphics card)
20 GB HDD (for applications)
40 GB HDD 7200 rpm (for audio)
Price = $1,399

Now, I have been using a pre-built "off the store shelf" PC with a Pent III 933MHz, 128MB RAM. It took a long time to get it all configured to work "perfectly" but I was totally satisfied with it. I could get 10 audio tracks with plug-ins on every track on playback. I could have bumped up the MBs of RAM to 512 and bought a dedicated 7200 rpm HHD and could maybe have squeezed the track count out to 20-24 maybe.
That was only recording one track at a time though. Now I will be recording 8-10 tracks at the same time. No matter what I will be getting 2 hard discs in my new system. One smaller drive for applications, and one big 7200 rpm (80GB) HDD for audio. But I am a little bit worried about having some problems with the 10 simultanious tracks recording. I assume that the weight of this burdon will be shouldered by the Hard Disc and the processor. But don't you think that a 1.7 GHz Pent IV will handle that? The Pent IV 2.0 GHz system is SOOO much more expensive I can not imagine that the extra 300 MHz will make an $800 difference. According to the above systems the...
Dual head Graphics card + 300MHz more on the Pent IV + 40 GB of HDD = $800 more in price. Is that not a bit much?

What do you think?

Mike
 
Jesus dude...

"...just DON'T SHOOT THE FUCKING MESSENGER...."

"...what you do with that information is your bloody business, I don't care..."

"...if you don't want an answer - don't ask the question!..."

"...But don't go shitting on me just because you don't like the info...."

Blue Bear...

Has someone hurt your feelings somehow? Jesus man... what are you talking about? I never shot any fucking messenger and never intended to "shit on" anyone. Have you had a bad day or something?

It's Easter Man,

Mike
 
Several people on rec.audio.pro have slagged off Carillon recently, because of inability to deliver product in a timely manner, even after payment. I also recall when they first appeared- didn't some Carillon guy show up here to tout their wares? It was either here or on RAP- I don't recall. I'm sad to hear that, anyway- I hope they get the bugs out eventually.

I bought my rackmount DAW from Soundchaser, custom built to specs that I gleaned from this site, and got an excellent product with excellent support. It arrived 2 weeks after reciept of order. It booted and was recording music within 10 minutes of arrival- with the W98SE OS already tweeked for DAW use (no time wasted going to 40 websites with conflicting information on "the right way" to set things up).

The only problems I've had with it of _any_ kind have been Cubase bugs- which of course have nothing to do with Soundchaser. The box runs, and the time it would have taken me to get my own equivalent assembly of parts running with equal reliability made the extra expense worth every dime to me. If I'd had to to it myself, I simply wouldn't have bothered: I don't have that much time for my music, and after doing computer-related work 10 hours a day for my living, I want to do _music_, not more computer-related work!

Here's an example of the level of support: they ship you the unit preinstalled, preconfigured, with a test tune that they've recorded for you to play with as you learn the software- and with a CDROM crash recovery disk ready to go if you screw up and have to reformat, or whatever. I was enough of a Windows neophyte that that sounded like a *very good value* to me.

If you build Windows machines in your sleep, don't go this route. But if you are more of a musician than you are a Windows hack, then these companies do offer a very valuable service indeed! I hope Carillon solves their reported production problems, because there is a market for this sort of product- but if they don't, then Soundchaser and others are already there, and already shipping good product into the marketplace.

Your mileage may vary- but like I said, if it weren't for Soundchaser, I wouldn't have a DAW at all. A lot of you have the patience and Windows wherewithal for hacking one together- but I don't. I'm a Unix guy, and Unix don't do multimedia... (;-)
 
Pisces, I checked out Carillon some more and they look great but it seems right now, they are swamped with orders. So if you have the time, I think youll get a nice unit.
I'm just trying to figure out "how much" I would actually save in real dollars by building myself.
To me for the 6K unit that was quoted to me, if I saved 1K to 1,500.00 building it myself, it would not be worth it. To me the tech support and warranty is worth 1,000.00. alone (just me of course)
But If I would save 3K building it myself It would hurt a bit, not doing it myself.
I've been going through their invoice, and I don't think I could save more than 2K.
Their charging:
Steinberg Nuendo software 950.00
Steinberg 96/52 card 498.00
two nuendo 8 I/O's 2,500.00
the computer itself is around 2K for
So my question for anyone who knows: How much could these items be purchased for directly? I'm sure it's less, but how much?
Of course I could always "demo" the software for free and get it through morpheous or something like that, but that can sometimes have bugs etc.
 
In reply to blue bear,
there are probably people who think they can do all the recording themselves and don't need a professional studio.I could go on and on with analagies,but these prebuilt cmpanies offer a service, much the same as a restraunt or an oil change place.We all pick and choose our spots.
If these companies are as bad as you think the free market will take care of them.Capitalism is what makes america great(that should set some people off).
Happy Easter
God bless
 
That was my point -- *I* was not slagging Carillon - I merely presented info from RAP...

I'm neither for, nor against, Carillon myself -- if they provide what you need - go with them...
 
acidrock

You are damn right!

I am a HUGE believer in the free market and open market capitolism. Competition will eat up any slack companies offering this kind of service. I just do not want to be one of the laberatory rats that gets chewed up before they go out of business. If they are fully booked with orders to the point where they can't fill orders on time, then that says to me, either they are doing great and will get the wrinkles ironed out soon. Or they will piss enough potential customers off to the point where no one will order from them when they DO catch up with their incoming orders.

I read all the bad press they have been getting on the thread posted by Blue Bear and they have a valid point in that a company needs to deliver on time or at least in a reasonable time frame. And an arogant attitude is no way to impress a potential client. BUT... I haven't heard yet a single point taken away from the quality of their machines. I would never place an order that I need IMMEDIATLY. I would order at least 2-3 months before I truely NEED their machine so the performance is what is most important for me... and that is what this post was started for; to see if these machines are good.

Thanks everyone for your posts. And Blue Bear, I still think you got your hinney hairs all wound up for no reason. Peace Dude!

Mike
 
re: Carillon

Ouch, even their barebones kits are steep. I'm in the wrong business.

Pisces, I'll build you a rackmount computer system, for way less than that!
 
Polaris20

Do you really think that they are THAT expensive? Taking into account the attention to detail they give to making things quiet? Sure, if it were just a Pent IV 2.0GHz with 512 Mb RAM and 2 high performance HDDs then I would just buy one from DELL and go on about my merry way. But these things have all kinds of quieting systems from the case the whole PC comes in to the HDD quiet sleeves, to the processor fans and pc cooling quiet cooling systems. Plus I would have a rack mounted PC that has Transport Controls and Jog Shuttle controls directly on the front panel. The "barebones three" system is $2,199. That didn't sound HUGELY over-priced to me. I might be wrong though. I want a warranty and support. Not just having a friend or some really cool dude build my next DAW for me. So if you know of a cooler, cheaper, better solution then I am 100% open to suggestions. Do you REALLY think that Carillon is an overpriced system? Considering the warranty and support...

Mike
 
re:

Yes, I think it's overpriced. But I look at it from my perspective, which is building PC's all the time, and not from yours, which is not building pc's, because that's not your gig. That's cool.

I should have looked at it from your standpoint. All in all, I still don't think their "innovations" are worth the extra money, but that's just me.

I think there's a bit of hype factor to Carillon's gear, but it does look top notch, so I don't think it's necessarily a bad choice.
 
Carillon Computers ???

I just got my brand new Carillon. Well, I can tell you that this unit is very quite. When it is on, you can hardly even tell. It is even very quite when the case is open. I wound up getting the bare bones 2 system, but I got mine with 1 gb of ram and win2k.

I have three problems with it.

First, they do take a long time to get your computer to you. It took me about 5 weeks from the time I ordered it.

Next, their customer service really sucks. I called them numeruos times and was told lies. Was told that someone would call me back and they wouldn't. Was told that I would get a shipping confirmation via email, and never did. I think their biggest problem is that they put those big adds in all the magazines and weren't ready for the onslaught of sales generated from them.

The last problem I am having is with my sound card. I purchased the Delta 1010 (not plug & play). When I first installed it, I had an IRQ conflict with the video card. I was finally able to get it off that but it is now being shared with a USB device (I think). According to Midiman, I should be able ot go into the BIOS and change some kind of flag that will allow me to manually set the IRQ for my sound card. Well, guess what? when I boot my computer, I do not get the usual Press F2 to go into the BIOS. They must have it hidden or locked or something.

I do not perfess to be any type of computer expert. On the contrary, I am the complete oposite.

I think once I get all the bugs worked out, I will be very happy with the system. It is just getting to that point.

Just my two cents

Peace
Joe
 
Compared to the Soundchaser? Yes, it is somewhat overpriced. They also offer extensive quieting packages. Call them up and ask. Mine is in the rack directly under one end of my mixer, right down at the bottom, and I find that the cooling fan on the mixer's power supply is noisier than the DAW *at that range* (6 feet away from my ears)...

Opinion follows: I don't think that the front panel transport controls are necessary, or even a good idea. If you intend to use them, then you will necessarily be mounting the DAW within arm's length of ear level- so any noise it produces will be that much more obtrusive. There is no reason whatsoever to have the primary operation controls for your DAW attached directly to its faceplate: that's a nonfeature, to my way of thinking.

You want to be able to put the thing in the bottom of your rack, as far away as possible, but just convenient enough to reach the CD-R drive. Transport controls ought to be on a control surface (which can be _silent_), located close to hand. There are some good and inexpensive ones out there now.

No matter how much effort they put into silencing the machine, it will _still_ make some noise- and you really don't want to be forced to have that noise right by your ear. So I suspect that if you got this machine, you'd still end up eventually relocating it further away to get away from the noise, and using some other sort of control surface (or mousing the software transport controls).

I have my rig set up so that I can use the machine control buttons on my mixer (Soundcraft Ghost) to control the DAW. I really don't think that those front-panel transport control buttons are very useful in the real world, but they sure do look sexy, and probably help them sell machines...

Your mileage will certainly vary- but think carefully about how you will actually use the machine.
 
I just went to www.dell.com and "customized" a machine with...

Pent IV 2.0 GHz
512 Mb PC800 RDRAM
120 GB 7200 rpm Hard Disc
G-force 3 Graphics card
56K Modem
Basic Audio (Cheapest sound [Intergrated sound])
3 Yr. Limited Warranty
Windows XP (That is the only choice they offer.. Ughhhhh!)
Plus MS WorksSuite 2000 (Worthless, would immediatly uninstall it anyway)
... and a partridge in a pear tree.
Price = $2,017

Now all this stuff is going to make a tone of noise and isn't at all customized for making audio. There is no mention of what the motherboard is or any noise reduction attempts. There is no 2nd Hard Disc possibilty giving me an Application Hard disc and a seperate 7200 RPM drive.

Now the "Barebones Three" system from Carillon costs $2,100 but it is ready to go out of the box (after I install My Logic Audio Platinum) and quiet as a mouse fart. Plus it has a dual head Matrox G550 Graphics card giving me dual monitor expandability. And they customize things for me at Carillon. For example... I want the MOTU 2408mkII sound card/interface system. They will put it in and the warranty is intact. With Dell, the minute I open the case to add another HDD or Sound Card... the warranty is void. And with a self built, or friend built PC... there never was support or warranty.

I sure as shit do not mean to sound like my mind is already made up. I am playing Devil's advocate with the hopes that someone will try to prove me wrong. I don't want to spend a ton of $$$ on a machine that I could have gotten somewhere else for 1/2 the price. And I REALLY do not want to buy a computer, and then that company fold up leaving me with no support or warranty because teh fucking company is gone.

So don't feel bad about blowing my "argument" out of the water. I welcome it.

Thanks guys,

Mike
 
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