questions with running a hybrid mac/pc studio.. help!!!!!

[beat_banger]

ok folks here is what im doing. i am gonna be running a macbook pro 2ghz w/ the intel duo core w/ 1.5 gigs of ram
i am gonna be using a digi 002 on my macbook w/ a 200gb external glyph drive. the macbook (or "mb for short") is going to be solely dedicated to pro tools only and thats it. no "reason, ableton" or any of those programs will be used..

on my pc which i will be using either an "amd 3600" processor or a "pentium 4 3ghz processor"
the p4 is sightly faster than the amd but it tends to get hotter and thus i will have to use @least 2 fans to cool it down, which equal to more noise in the studio..
so i am more than likely going to use the "amd 3600 processor"
so pretty much the pc will be
-3ghz
-2 gigs of ddr2 ram
-sony dvdr/cdrw drive
-internal zip drive
-floppy card drive with multimedia card reader (for sd, and other type cards)
-160gb internal hard drive 7200 rpms
-60 gb internal hard drive 7200 rpms
the card i am gonna be using is an "emu 1212m" card.. the reason i picked this card is because for the price, specs and reviews it got it seems like the right choice.. basically what i was looking for was a card that had "adat lightpipe" so i can dump what ive done on the pc into pt via digital "8 tracks @ a time" and avoid any digital to analog conversion which would result in loss of db. i had an mbox 2 pro and sent it back after 2 days cause the only digital inputs it had is "spdif" and that would be extremely time consuming due to the fact that "spdif" is only left and right..

on the pc i will be running
-giga sampler
-reason 3.0
-spectrasonics trilogy & atmosphere
-ableton live
-absynth
-acid pro
-and a variety of other soft synths.

thse are the specs on the emu 1212m card :
E-DSP Hardware-accelerated Effects, Mixing and Monitoring:
E-MU's Digital Audio Systems feature the powerful E-DSP chipset, which features a hardware-accelerated effects processor with over 20 effects plug-ins (over 500 presets). This effects architecture is fully expandable, allowing you to add more effect plug-ins to your system as needed. E-DSP also provides zero-latency, hardware-based mixing and monitoring via the included PatchMix DSP mixer, delivering unmatched flexibility in routing audio between all of your physical and virtual (ASIO/WDM) inputs and outputs- no external mixer needed.

E-MU 1212M Effects Plug-ins:
1-Band Para EQ
1-Band Shelf EQ
3-Band EQ
4-Band EQ
Auto-Wah
Chorus
Compressor
Distortion
Distortion
Freq Shifter
Leveling Amp
Mono Delay 100
Mono Delay 3000
Stereo Delay 100
Stereo Delay 1500
Phase Shifter
Rotary
Speaker Simulator
Stereo Reverb
Vocal Morpher

E-MU 1212M I/O Configuration:
Two 1/4" Balanced Inputs
24-bit/192kHz ADAT In/Out (switchable to S/PDIF)
24-bit/96kHz S/PDIF In/Out (switchable to AES/EBU)
MIDI In/Out


i basically dont care about the card only having 2 1/4" inputs cause the only outboard gear i will be using is an "asr x pro" as one of my outboard samplers and i have a scsi card for it so i can dump my samples via scsi into the pc and edit them that way.
the other piece of outboard gear i will be using is an "akai mpc1000".
with 2 midi in's and 2 midi outs and a flawless and easy to use sequencer it will be used to lock up both the pc, asr x and the mac together. the mpc will be my other outboard sampler which i can use to do sample dumps via usb. so basically i am using the emu 1212m card primarily cause of its "adat lightpipe" abilities. the 2 1/4" inputs on the card will be hooked up to my turntable mixers output to which i have my technics 1200 decks connected to.

whenver i am recording a vocalist, guitarist, etc. i will use the 002 to record directly into pro tools..
and finish mixing in pt.

whhheeewww.. my fingers are tired
i basically would like some help or suggestions on this setup..i believe in doing things the right way and not half assed
i feel i am going the right route but i am always open to suggestions
thanks for taking the time to read this very long
but hopefully interesting post..

 

[Steve Henningsgard]

Out of curiosity (as I've got a decent P4-based PC sitting around doing nothing now that I have my MacBook with Pro Tools: very similar situation! ) how do you plan on hooking them up to work with eachother?

 

[Bulls Hit]

Any reason why you can't just run everything on the mac?

 

[ssscientist]

i feel i am going the right route but i am always open to suggestions.

I don't believe you when you say you are open to suggestions.

I think you've gone too far down the 'everything needs to stay digital' road to realize that you can get just as good results using balanced analog cables to connect your gear without digital headaches.

If I was setting up a similar studio, I would treat the PC as a giant softsynth and the Mac as the recorder which is the way you are already thinking about them. Then I would find software for the PC that compliments both your Ensoniq and Akai outboard samplers as you use them. The 'as you use them' is the important part because you've obviously produced music successfully in the past using a much more modest setup and you'll have enough to learn without pressing a whole new way of doing the basics into your plan.

I might quibble with some of your softsynth choices --- for example, I get better bass results out of the shareware Monolisa mono bass synth than I ever have out of Spectrasonics Trilogy. And the learning curve on NI Absynth is fierce if you want to do anything more than use the presets.

Overall I think you are on the right track --- there are many advantages to PC softsynths that are just not available on the Mac. Where you are going wrong in my opinion is taking a giant leap when a simple big step is all that's needed. Get the basics of your two computer setup first. Buy the computers, start with PT on the Mac and Reason and Live and maybe REAPER on the PC and see where you go from there.

Doesn't the Digi 002 have adat/toslink optical inputs? Or haven't you bought it yet?

Also, here's a link to the best $30 you'll ever spend on your MPC1000 --- link --- it's a 3rd party operating system called the 'JJ OS' and for your $30 investment you get a whole new and improved file system which is much less prone to those 'bad data' and 'file corrupt' errors which the stock Akai operating system was so full of - and that's just the start.



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