which PC for music ? Dell ? HP ? Custom

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nisthana

New member
Hi Guys,
I have an old dell - 900Mhz,256MB,40GB,17" CRT - which now I feel needs to be upgraded if I have to do some serious recording (agree ?)

The new config I am looking for is
P4 3.2Mhz, 1GB RAM, 250GB HDD,19" Flatscreen

Should I buy a Dell or HP or build my own PC for recording ? Do you have a choice for particular monitor ?

I will have to buy a good audio interface since I cant use the one shipped with these systems.

If you guys have a preference of either of the brands, or prefer your own, please tell me so. I have kept Sony out of my radar because I dont think they can beat Dell or HP, or can they ? Also, I have a Dell and its been running since last 5 yrs, no hardware issues art all, so I am kinda convinced that Dell is better.
I havent built my PC so dont know if its worth all the pain ?
Please state your opinion.

Oh if someone knows what are the requirements to set up a system with dual monitors, I would really appreciate the info.

Thanks
 
Well, the first question to be answered is this: What do you want to do with it?

How many tracks are you wanting at once? Are you just going to use the internal soundcard, or do you have (or are planning to get) some other type of audio interface? There's always a trade-off somewhere. The systems from Dell or HP or whoever will be cheaper because they build them in massive numbers, and they're all the same. Cheaper, but less flexible. A custom system will have exactly what you want and nothing you don't and will be more easily upgraded in the future, but will cost you a little more up front.
 
I will use this computer to do multi track recordings using Cakewalk, but I dont plan to record more than one track at a time since I am the only one playing instruments.
I plan to get an audio interface like delta 1010T since people here have mentioned that sound cards shipped with Dell or any other stock systems are crappy.
I have not built a PC ever so I am kinda apprehensive to get into that. What happens if I assemble it the wrong way, there wont be any tech support :-((
 
It's scary and time consuming putting your own PC together for the first time - but plenty of people do it...

If you can find an experienced friend to help you, I think that would be best.
You could watch and learn how all the different parts fit together, and which order it is best to do things. That's how I learned :)

I would go for an Apple if I was buying a pre-built PC for music making.

As it is, I build my own PCs. I don't think any pre-built machines, be they Dell, Apple, Gateway etc. can hope to match a custom built machine that has been put togther with specific applications in mind.

It does take some significant work to get to a stage where you're happy speccing and building your own PCs though. Took me about two years.
 
nisthana said:
Hi Codmate
What would be a good spec for audio recording in general ?
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aside from the sound card, as much memory as possible, minimum two hard drives (i have an 80Gb for my OS/software, etc, and a 120Gb partitioned into 80Gb and 40Gb approx. 80Gb partition for project files, and 40Gb for samples, clips, etc). processor - faster the better, but minimum 2.4Ghz P4 is best. there's no real financial excuse anymore for getting anything lesser, processor wise. aside from audio performance, a good graphics card that will support (either now or when youre ready to upgrade) a second monitor.

whilst i have a PC set up for music, i took the easy way out and got an apple mac powerbook, but that's not everyones taste and would probably mean changing software packages.

in terms of building a PC, you have to be careful. not because of the expertise required, as it's actually fairly easy, but you have to watch that the cost of getting the parts and building the PC itself doesnt cost more than just buying a PC off the shelf. i've known plenty of occasions where that's happened. but if you want to take this route, get a hitlist together, go to Tandy/Radioshack/Maplin (or whatever the store may be called in your part of the world) and they'll advise you what parts you need and dont need. madly enough, i always find in these sort of PC parts shops that there's always one enthusiast that actually uses computers for music anyway, which is always a bonus.
 
For solid reliability, I prefer business class PCs. I just think that home-market best buy computers suck regardless of brand. Even custom built PCs from the geek stores use crap components.

Buy name-brand memory, Seagate drives and an extra cooling fan for best performance and reliability.
 
I would also recommend a custom built computer (or a mac). For recording purposes, you need a fairly high performance PC, and it's way too easy to overpay for pre-built, mediocre high-performance PCs.

For tech support purposes: find a friend to help you, or consult forums. As long as you have the internet , you can find a solution to pretty much any computer problem for free.

As to where to buy, I would suggest one of the online dealers. I got my computer piecemeal off of newegg.com and I've heard good things about tigerdirect.com.
 
FWIW, I agree that a custom built PC is probably best, but I also think you've got nothing to worry about if you decide to go with an off the shelf model. Just avoid shitty entry level package deals. I went into a local shop a while back looking to put together a custom PC and ended up buying an off the shelf Dell instead (Dual core Pentium, 1 gig of RAM) , and for about the same money the custom PC was going to run me I also got a 19" LCD monitor. I couldn't pass it up. I spent a little more to install a second gig of RAM and another hard drive and bam! This computer is excellent and is performing flawlessly for me. (By the way, I use Sonar 5 and routinely record 10 tracks at a time and mix 30+ track projects) Anyway, I just wanted to add that if you find a good deal on a suitable off the shelf computer, there's nothing wrong with that. Just avoid the entry level stuff and be sure you can upgrade it like you'll probably need to.
 
my friend mentioned that dell or other off the shelf guys come with crappy motherboards that cannot take up load for recordings, how true is that ? he told me that one of his friend spent $1400 on a dell, only to find out that dell aint good enough for his audio needs and is now going for a custom built. Guess I cannot generalize it, but wanted to know if anyone had such experience.
 
nisthana said:
my friend mentioned that dell or other off the shelf guys come with crappy motherboards that cannot take up load for recordings, how true is that ? he told me that one of his friend spent $1400 on a dell, only to find out that dell aint good enough for his audio needs and is now going for a custom built. Guess I cannot generalize it, but wanted to know if anyone had such experience.
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I've had problems putting various PCI cards in proprietry Dell and Compaq mainboards. Some will work well and some won't, unfortunatly there's no way to tell untill you get the damn thing home.
 
nisthana said:
my friend mentioned that dell or other off the shelf guys come with crappy motherboards that cannot take up load for recordings, how true is that ? he told me that one of his friend spent $1400 on a dell, only to find out that dell aint good enough for his audio needs and is now going for a custom built. Guess I cannot generalize it, but wanted to know if anyone had such experience.
Click to expand...
I also have one of the lower-cost Dells (Dimension 4600) and I also haven't had much luck using it as a DAW. It has both Sonar 3 Studio and Pro Tools LE 6.4 loaded on it and both perform pretty damn poorly considering the computer's specs (P4 2.8GHz, 1.5GB RAM). Even with a reformat and a fresh install of the OS I'm pretty limited on the number of tracks and plug-ins I can mix using.

On the other hand, my Dual 2.3GHz PowerMac is quite the screamer. :D
 
I've been running Sonar 4 (2.0 before that) on my Dell for about 4 years now and I haven't had TOO many problems. My processor is a P4 2.0 gig and I upgraded to 1 gig of RAM when Doom 3 came out. On Saturday I recorded 7 tracks at once and the computer didn't break a sweat. 4 drum tracks, 1 guitar track, 1 bass guitar track, and 1 vocal track.

But this computer isn't ideal at all for recording. I had to remove the damn modem just to put my Layla interface sound card in. I consider myself extremely lucky that the motherboard even had an AGP slot for when I wanted a nice video card. My words of caution in buying an off the shelf computer are, make sure it has at least enough PCI slots for what you're looking to record, make sure it has plenty of RAM, and make sure it has a big hard drive. And "office" grade machines are alsmost always better than "home" machines. You usually get much more expadability in "office" machines.

My next computer will more than likely be dual processor with so much hard drive space I'll be able to edit a full length movie, and it will be built by me. But in the meantime my Dell is working just fine.
 
Build your own computer. It really isn't rocket science, and everything fits together only one way. Configuring your BIOS and installing your OS is the toughest part - have a freind over who has built one before and you'll be fine.
 
I think better then Dell, HP PC computer. Because Hewlett-Packard 540GB hard drive can store up to 125,000 songs, 5GB DDR3 system memory. Silkscreen-quality labels and artwork directly to LightScribe-enabled CD and DVD discs.
 
devidjoli said:
I think better then Dell, HP PC computer. Because Hewlett-Packard 540GB hard drive can store up to 125,000 songs, 5GB DDR3 system memory. Silkscreen-quality labels and artwork directly to LightScribe-enabled CD and DVD discs.
Click to expand...

This time it's a 6 year old thread? Read the last post date before adding stuff, it's dead and buried.
 
markfinn said:
They all use the hardware to establish a good three, and in essence is the same now, Hewlett-Packard Intel processor-based systems. HP may use not widespread support, if you choose to install the HP part of the Windows operating system, you might end audio without Windows drivers.
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What? Huh? I don't understand....
 
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