Which PC is the best for music recording?

M

mansi07

New member
Hello dear friends,
Which PC should I take for music recording? And at the same time, its processor is also good to work even more, And what should be taken care of while taking such all in one computer/laptop? Please help me in this regard.
Thank you!
 
Almost any modern computer that’s more than $400 should be fine for audio recording. Video editing is an entirely different story, however.
 
Either of those two computers would be adequate for audio recording. I would spec a solid state drive rather than 5400rpm hard drive. There is little difference in cost between spinners and SSDs.

On the other hand, I'm not as sold on the "all in one" units unless it gives you easy upgrade access. Just like some laptops, it may or may not be able to add capability in the future.
 
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If you are looking at used/refurbs like the link shows, in Macs you want something more current (IMO) than the one shown there that is running OS X "Mountain Lion" because it may not upgrade to the latest version, which is where current hardware manufacturers will be targeting their products. So, you kind of need to at least have some ideas about what software and hardware you plan to use with the computer, so you can confirm compatibility.
 
You really don't need to invest a lot of money in a computer for recording only. However, there are 2 key things to keep in mind :
1 - How quiet the system is. This can be a problem if your desktop computer's fans get too loud and you're recording vocals with a condenser close to your computer, for instance.
2 - How stable the audio drivers are. The reason why most people in the industry use Macs is because the native audio drivers are much better.
On Windows, you have to install drivers called ASIO in order to get any kind of stability. However, those drivers only works for you DAW (recording software). This means if you record different sources from inside your computer - like a chat room during a livestream for example - those sources are going to go through the native drivers.
Currently, on Windows 10, the drivers are terrifyingly bad in my experience. Realtek drivers are horrible, and sometimes drop when you adjust the volume on YouTube... and the "high definition device" I installed instead forced me to double the internal volume to get the same loudness, as if my headphones impedance suddenly doubled. Ridiculous.

If you want an all-in-one, do not buy from whatever site you linked. This look very dodgy to me, especially when it's "price N/A" and shouldn't cost more than around 800 bucks. I recommend OWC.com, their refurbished products are great and the customer service is spot on. They will ship you the computer with the latest OS as well - I don't know why your link says "OS X Mountain Lion" but this dates a few years back already. Wouldn't trust a company that doesn't change this on their website for years.

I have a 2012 MacBook pro, a very dependable machine that you can easily open up and repair. Not the case with the newer models at all, which I don't like. 1080p video editing works fine for me as well. If you want 4K video editing, you're looking at a whole other kind of beast.
 
JasminB said:
On Windows, you have to install drivers called ASIO in order to get any kind of stability. However, those drivers only works for you DAW (recording software). This means if you record different sources from inside your computer - like a chat room during a livestream for example - those sources are going to go through the native drivers.
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I'm not convinced by this. I'm on W10, using a Presonus interface and its ASIO drivers, and everything goes through it: DAW, YouTube, assorted streaming services, Teams, Zoom and the like. The ASIO drivers have been extremely rellable. However, others may have had less satisfactory experiences.
 
Never even thought about it. My music and video machines seem to be perfectly happy using my audio interfaces With their drivers. I also have a MacBook, currently a 2 yr old one but I also have my old iMacs and they will NOT run Cubase or Adobe, and even the web browsers are dodgy now. Firefox still works but you don’t want to go to some websites on them any longer because New HTML is too much. They wont upgrade to anything remotely modern, so beware of buying old macs now.
 
rob aylestone said:
Never even thought about it. My music and video machines seem to be perfectly happy using my audio interfaces With their drivers. I also have a MacBook, currently a 2 yr old one but I also have my old iMacs and they will NOT run Cubase or Adobe, and even the web browsers are dodgy now. Firefox still works but you don’t want to go to some websites on them any longer because New HTML is too much. They wont upgrade to anything remotely modern, so beware of buying old macs now.
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How old? I have a 2011 iMac that’s still running super smooth.
 
gecko zzed said:
I'm not convinced by this. I'm on W10, using a Presonus interface and its ASIO drivers, and everything goes through it: DAW, YouTube, assorted streaming services, Teams, Zoom and the like. The ASIO drivers have been extremely rellable. However, others may have had less satisfactory experiences.
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Likewise. I can run my NI KA6 with this Lenovo 510 W10 laptop no bother. I just select ASIO drivers in Samplitude but I think the same would apply in any other DAW?
If I want to record the sound from YT, Radio3 etc I have Audacity setup to do that then I just 'Export as .wav' and stuff it in Sam for editing. Rarely have any problem.

This laptop does NOT have any kind of audio input. I have searched the net for drivers and solutions, just ain't one but Audacity fools the fekker! I have a headset that uses two 3.5mm TRS plugs but a cheap gadget called a "TEKNET" About the size of a big wi fi dongle, this takes the two TRS plugs, plugs into a USB port and voila! You have a working headset.

Dave.
 
CrowsofFritz said:
How old? I have a 2011 iMac that’s still running super smooth.
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I have a 2011 MBP and it works well, too, but it's stuck at High Sierra, and then you can find it difficult to install newer apps, which may have a later minimum version of OS X. (I know there was a point I had to update an OS X version to install Final Cut Pro X.)

The latest versions of OS X are 64-bit only, as well, so if you've got dependencies on 32-bit apps you want to use, getting a machine that's preloaded with one of those might create a problem. But, for someone starting out, a system that only supports 32-bit OS X raises the specter that there will be software in the not too distant future that probably is not delivered for 32-bit versions of OS X. Starting out, I'd want a system with "bones" to run the current [64-bit] version of OS X smoothly for the work I wanted to do.
 
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