HD question for music PC.......

  • Thread starter Thread starter dicblack
  • Start date Start date
D

dicblack

New member
Hi all,
I just got new PC and i also have a 2 week old Maxtor HD that i want to use.
The maxtor has an 8MB cache and the pc has 2MB but the O.S is on the 2MB HD. I am using this pc mostly for music in my studio and i was told that since i am using lots of vst plugins that i would benefit from the larger cache.
question 1.)
Can i still use the maxtor (i have some music programs on it already that i don't want to erase) and have it be the main drive that runs my pc or will i have to put the o.s. on it and lose all my files that i have?
Thanks for helping
p.s. sorry if unclear with post :eek:
 
No, you can use the Maxtor as a data disk.
(You WANT a fast 8mb cache drive to be the one streaming the audio tracks.)

Leave the OS on the slower drive and use the Maxtor as a data drive.
 
dic.
ideally a pc should have two HD's with 8 mb cache.
one for win - one for audio tracks. and 512 to 1 gig ram.
the benefit for windows with 8 mb cache is faster boot up for example .
the benefit for tracks on their own HD (once again 8 mb) is no contention from windows simplistically and better opration. if your stuck and cant afford two 8mb cache HD's.
then a bit of a catch 22. but i would use the 2mb cache hd for win only and the 8mb cache drive for audio tracks if i had to choose.
 
Does it matter that the 8mb cache drive is slave or secondary drive?
Will it effect performance of recording and or playback?
p.s. system is: AMD Athlon64 3500+ 512K L2 Cache 512MB Ram
200GB/2MB cache (main HD),80GB/8MB cache (2nd HD)
Looking into getting Cubase,Sonar,Reason,FL Studio5.
I just bought Mackie Tracktion2. I intend to make R&B/Hip-Hop and Dance.
Any advice?
p.s.s. thanks again for helping me with this issue because i was almost afraid to even get into the PC side of recording but the help here has changed all that :)
 
dic.
ideally each drive should be on its own channel.
if your looking at software ...two products i recommend you at least demo are the band in a box and powertracks combo from pgmusic.
band in a box essentially can save you a ton of time doing backing tracks for vocals, guitar and other live tracks. as the name implies you choose a style of music (or a style of your own making) and it creates a back up band on your pc. while others are still pasting loops if you get into it and understand it youll have backing tracks very quickly by comparison with the loop based
approach. one neat thing it does which loops wont do is it has a soloist feature (different every time if you wish) and for example will generate a sax solo or whatever patch on a synth you choose. in order not to get cheesy sounds (as in a pc sound card) you need a multitimbral synth with very good sounds.
hope this helps.
 
Not understanding "each drive should be on it's own channel" please explain.
 
You have two IDE connectors in your box; IDE1 and IDE2. Each can handle 2 drivers, a master and a slave. What you want to do is make each drive a master on its own seperate controller.
What you do NOT want to do is make one the slave of the other.
 
fraserhutch said:
You have two IDE connectors in your box; IDE1 and IDE2. Each can handle 2 drivers, a master and a slave. What you want to do is make each drive a master on its own seperate controller.
What you do NOT want to do is make one the slave of the other.
Click to expand...

Now, what about CD drives? The IDE cable would never reach from the HD to the CD drive to make the CD drive slave to the HD.
 
IronFlippy said:
Now, what about CD drives? The IDE cable would never reach from the HD to the CD drive to make the CD drive slave to the HD.
Click to expand...

Sure it would. I do it all the time. You may have to move your drives around, but in modern cases that's no problem.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top