Pro Tools 9 and 54RPM

[jamiet]

G'day,

Can anyone tell me what would happen if I used PT9 on a MacBook Pro with an internal drive speed of 5400RPM.

I'm just trying to narrow down some issues.

Thank you very much for your assistance.

Jamie T

[The Dougfather]

If you had you audio sessions on the drive you will likely survive for small sessions but as track count and edit density increases your going to start getting audio and CPU errors, it simply isn't worth the risk if you value your audio and sanity.

To get the best from a MBP you need an external firewire drive with an oxford chipset for your sessions. Having an internal drive for the OS/Pro Tools is fine as long as your audio is not residing on it also.

[max howarth]

it very much depends on your project format and the number of tracks. if you expect to run at 96k/24bit you'll find that things grind to halt pretty fast.

[cheekypaul]

Originally Posted by jamiet

Can anyone tell me what would happen if I used PT9 on a MacBook Pro with an internal drive speed of 5400RPM.

I'm just trying to narrow down some issues...

you would get some success, both on playback and recording.
but as you know, it's not recommended by Avid. (and if you didn't know, you haven't read much of the manual, avid are keen to point this out from early on...)

the speed of the drive (and it being not the system drive) relate to the amount of simultaneous tracks, amount of edits, amount of fades and sample based VI's you can safely record or playback.

what are you planning to do in your session?
studio, live, pro, mess about...

[jamiet]

Thank you everyone for your help!

I am going to be using my system to record local artists in my small country town, school bands and the like.

I am happy to purchase a new drive and I have been looking at the two Avid recommend. However other than that, I have found it really hard to locate a HDD which contains two firewire ports as my MacBook Pro only has one firewire 800, therefore it is a necessity to have two.

Many of the stores I have contacted here in Western Australia have told me firewire is on the out and is being replaced by USB3. All this after I just shelled out my hard earned for an MBox Pro which can only be powered by firewire!

I have had my new system now for 5 weeks and I'm still trying to get it going. It's lucky I have a head full of hair as it gives me more to pull out!!!

Once again, if anyone could provide any more advice I would really appreciate it!

Jamie

[Kobra]

Aside from the ones recommended by Avid, here's one that should work:

http://www.amazon.com/G-Technology-P...3721191&sr=1-3

Personally, I have replaced the optical drive in my MacBook Pro with a second internal HD. This involves opening up the computer and removing the optical drive and replacing it with a bracket that holds the hard drive. This is clearly not for everyone and will (I guess) void your warranty if you screw it up... but for me it works great and is the ultimate portable rig. (The kit I used is available from OWC).

[necjamc]

If your recording live music it wouldn't hurt to have 2 drives. 1 to use and one for backup. I have recorded my band live hundreds if times and more than once I had issues with the drive and was un able to record the entire night. Having that backup has saved me even in the middle of the night during a break a simple swap and you've got peace of mind.
Just a suggestion for if/when you take on important tasks


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- Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[slater05]

Originally Posted by Kobra

Personally, I have replaced the optical drive in my MacBook Pro with a second internal HD. This involves opening up the computer and removing the optical drive and replacing it with a bracket that holds the hard drive. This is clearly not for everyone and will (I guess) void your warranty if you screw it up... but for me it works great and is the ultimate portable rig. (The kit I used is available from OWC).

I just checked out the installation video on OWC and it looks like a really awesome alternative to buying a firewire drive (which would end up being the same price as the one I was looking at (7200/750gb drive) with tools for $170 )

I was just wondering if there were any hiccups installing the drive? or if it went as smooth as the instructional video?

[cheekypaul]

Originally Posted by jamiet

...I am going to be using my system to record local artists in my small country town, school bands and the like.

I am happy to purchase a new drive and I have been looking at the two Avid recommend. However other than that, I have found it really hard to locate a HDD which contains two firewire ports as my MacBook Pro only has one firewire 800, therefore it is a necessity to have two.

Many of the stores I have contacted here in Western Australia have told me firewire is on the out and is being replaced by USB3. All this after I just shelled out my hard earned for an MBox Pro which can only be powered by firewire!

I have had my new system now for 5 weeks and I'm still trying to get it going. It's lucky I have a head full of hair as it gives me more to pull out!!!

Once again, if anyone could provide any more advice I would really appreciate it!

Jamie

on your macbook pro, click on the top left apple icon and select 'about this mac', what does it say?
just trying to ascertain which model you have, the size of the internal (and how much spare gb you have) and how much ram you have...

avid are particular about what drives are recommended because they want to guarantee a certain number of tracks. the minimum speed for a drive for recording, i think you already know, is 7200rpm, its been the standard speed for a professional drive, and although you can get faster drives, its not necessary unless your session is likely to be massive and at higher sample rates.
they also, quite rightly, point out that certain functions and features of your computer should be off or disabled whilst using pro tools, especially for recording.

[The Dougfather]

Originally Posted by jamiet

Many of the stores I have contacted here in Western Australia have told me firewire is on the out and is being replaced by USB3. All this after I just shelled out my hard earned for an MBox Pro which can only be powered by firewire!

Give that Apple are now adopting thunderbolt i really don't see them rushing to add USB3 support. Granted, firewire is getting more niche, but it is still available and very much used in the pro audio community along with the many firewire interfaces.

I did hear somebody saying that Hitachi were offering out of the box FW drives with Oxford chipsets, may be worth an investigation.

Also, if your planning on any professional recording then it would be suicide to even contemplate the internal boot drive, stopping a choirs recording take because you have buffer or CPU error is bad news. It happened to me once with a faulty 003 and needless to say, it is now gone from my rack.