What Should I Do About a Recording Computer?

[Confusitron]

I have just begun recording with a PreSonus Firepod and have encountered some problems with my computer systems.

I managed to record, for the first time, a full song, on an IBM Aptiva computer with an Athlon 550 MHZ computer from 1999 (I think). The song turned out surprisingly well for a first recording and that it was recorded on that old (and slow) of a computer. Now, I knew this old machine could not hold up on everything. For instance, the computer can't handle playing back sixteen recorded tracks simultaneously and the audio clicks all the time in playback (some of the clicks are actually in the recorded audio). Sometimes the computer can't handle playback in general. I had intentions of getting another computer in the first place. I do have an Apple iBook that I believe is 1.2 GHZ, but we've tried to use that before, and we aren't very comfortable with Apple systems.

We have considered selling the iBook and building a faster Windows based machine with some kind of high end AMD processor. Does that seem viable? I was thinking of getting either a faster XP processor or a 64 bit. I'd probably end up staying within about a $900 area price range for the entire system.

What do you suggest for a recording system? Do my plans sound good?

 

[Codmate]

Sounds fine to me.

I built myself a system based around the Shuttle sn95g5 recently.

It's got a gig of RAM and an AMD643000+ in it and goes like the clappers in both WinXP and Linux.

 

[whattaguy]

Sounds like a good plan, and $900 should get you a screaming AMD64 system.

I would also suggest using the search tool as there are many great suggestions for systems on this board.

Good luck!

 

[Confusitron]

Now I have a few more questions.

I have so far decided to get the following:

Processor - AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Venice Integrated into Chip FSB Socket 939

Motherboard - MSI K8N Neo4-F Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4

Memory - CORSAIR XMS 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit

Now, those are just the system items. I've all ready picked a Firewire card, case, PSU, and heatsink for the processor.

I am debating on motherboards. I could get an nForce4 board which does not have Firewire incorporated and does not support AGP graphics cards, etc., or I could get an nForce3 Ultra board which has Firewire incorporated and supports AGP graphics cards. I intend to use this machine for both audio and video editing. I intend to capture video from cable sources and camcorders. Is the SATA on these motherboards reliable? Is SATA totally necessary? Is it really so much faster? I have looked at reviews and it seems like sometimes it is, other times it isn't. Does anyone have any input on this subject?

 

[apl]

You might wanna give these guys a call. They are DAW specialists and can send you just parts if you like.

 

[deepwater]

I bought a new Dell off ebay 2.8mhz 160gig HD 512MB for $420.00 with shipping. They are on there all of the time. I even got a 17" Dell LCD for $200.00 brandnew off ebay. I'm running a Tascam FW-1884 and just tracked 16 tracks into Sonar 4 with no sweet. I have not had no problems with plug-ins or latency.