Changing from MacBook to Windows

[ebrowne]

Hi guys,

As my MacBook pro doesn't seem to be powerful enough to sustain my large projects, I'm going to shift over to my Windows Desktop. The AMD processor/motherboard is not agreeing with PT10(tried absolutely everything, had a post or two about it here as well), therefore it seems worthwhile to invest in one of the powerful intel i5 or i7 processors along with a compatible motherboard and some RAM.

I'm from Ireland so in euros my budget is between 500-700($620-$870). I'm quite new to this side of things so I wondered if anyone had any advice on where to go with this. I should also mention that I have 2x4 GB DDR3 RAM in my AMD machine at the moment, but presumably the more RAM the better right?

I appreciate any and all input :)

Cheers

[Eric Seaberg]

I've been running HD4 on an HP 8600 workstation with 4-dual 3GHz processors, 8GB RAM and lots of HD space. This system has been 'running' for almost 4-years and I've had more problems with it in that amount of time than I've had with more than a dozen Macs in the last 9+ years. The ONLY reason we used a PC in this system was that i needed 4 slots for the HD4. As soon as this pig dies, we're replacing it with a MacPro and 2 HDX cards to get my 128-IO back.

It really has nothing to do with the hardware as much as it is the way Windows works to SEE all of the hardware. If you've been using a Mac for any amount of time, you will have much frustration getting this to work.

Nothing against my fellow PC users in this forum, but settting up a system on Win7 just isn't the same as doing it on a Mac.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by ebrowne

Hi guys,

As my MacBook pro doesn't seem to be powerful enough to sustain my large projects, I'm going to shift over to my Windows Desktop. The AMD processor/motherboard is not agreeing with PT10(tried absolutely everything, had a post or two about it here as well), therefore it seems worthwhile to invest in one of the powerful intel i5 or i7 processors along with a compatible motherboard and some RAM.

I'm from Ireland so in euros my budget is between 500-700($620-$870). I'm quite new to this side of things so I wondered if anyone had any advice on where to go with this. I should also mention that I have 2x4 GB DDR3 RAM in my AMD machine at the moment, but presumably the more RAM the better right?

I appreciate any and all input :)

Cheers

Well before going down the "set up a new machine" path, what was the problem you were running into on the MacBook? What exactly was happening/going wrong when you hit the limits of this computer? With what interface? What playback engine dialog settings? What exact model MacBook? With what model processor? How much memory? With what hard disk drives (make/model/specs, what drive was used for what (eg. System, audio sessions, VI sample files etc. What does a session look like? How many/what plugins? How many/what VIs? What are your engine settings? Did you try printing any plugin (especially VI) heavy tracks to reduce the load etc.?

What of the standard Avid recommended optimization for the Mac did you do (eg disable Bluetooth. WiFi, spotlight etc)?

There is not a clue if your problem on the Mac was IO, CPU or memory capacity related or a mis configuration issues (a leading cause of "my computer is not fast enough" complaints) or some other limit that upgrading hardware may not even address.

Pro Tools is a 32 bit app which means it ends up being able to actually use a bit less than 4GB in practice. So total installed RAM in the 4GB to 8 GB range is usually all you need. HD and CPTK users can also use the Pro Tools 10 disk cache feature so can benefit from more installed RAM for that cache. if you are running out of memory within Pro Tools say with heavy VI work adding more RAM won't help. You need to look at reducing the workload or separate/external memory servers for those VIs.

Darryl

[bobcats]

Hey ebrowne

I posted this January of this year. System still rocks, I am have a full time facility, running every day no problems what so ever with the PC platform, as I have used Macs and PC's since the earlt 90's. Hope this helps, Good Luck!!


Very Happy PT10HD User, My Labor of Love for this platform! ~

Back in May of 2010 I started having some minor problems with my trusty Mac G4 Based Mix Cubed system, running PT 5.1 on OS 9 if you can believe it, which I have been using for music production nearly every day for the last 10 years. I also have a backup PT 6 / Digi 002R based system running on a MacBook Pro which I primarily use for Live Recordings, and has worked flawlessly since I purchased it. Since I use PT to supplement my income, I thought it was time to upgrade from the ground up. I struggled with choosing between the Mac Pro, and a PC based system, and as much as a Macoid as I am, I was reading on the DUC that more Mac Pro owners were having problems with the Newer Mac Pros, and I really did not want to hunt down an older used Mac Pro. So I decided to go the Windows route, using tried and tested components from hardcore hardware pro’s like Zion and filosofem, from the Avid DUC, I purchased the suggested hardware from New Egg and Tiger Direct, and built the system, installed Windows OS7 Pro and overall was impressed with how easily everything integrated, and just worked, so much so that I bought an entirely duplicate system as a backup. Ironically at about the same time Avid offered users of legacy hardware a trade up program towards the new Native Card, so I blew the dust off of my trusty old Digidesign P24 card, and sent it on in. The Native card arrived from Sweetwater a few days later with PT 8, which I immediately upgraded to PT9. I needed an interface, and found a great deal on an OMNI someone one in a contest, after just buying one, so he needed to sell it, and I was ready to buy it and got a great deal on it. Got it FedExed for next day delivery, and then I dug in. After about a month of tweaking settings, and experimenting with the hardware, PT 9.03 ran pretty solid, but had several bugs that I could not work out, on top of it all, I could never get it to run solid tracking or mixing with a 32 sample buffer. I toyed with the idea of updating the firmware on the Native and upgrading to PT 9.05 but knew others were having problems with the firmware update. Just about the same time Avid announced PT10, and although I was not eligible for the free upgrade, I took advantage of the Service and support plan for $599 through Sweetwater on 12/31, which included PT10HD, pretty much a no brainer, especially considering it comes with a free upgrades for the next year, (hopefully PT11 will be released before 12/31/12, and if all goes well, and the Mayans turn out to have been wrong, I will be styling with a 64bit version of PT) With the wheels in process for PT10HD, I decided to pull out the primary HD leaving everything intact as a back door, added a brand new clean drive, Installed a new OS, and downloaded and installed the Free Trial version of PT10, all the updated drivers, and add on upgrade packs for the PTEK, which by the way, if you don’t already have this, it’s a must have if you do any type of music production. Once again, tweaked all of the OS settings and updated all of the service packs and updates, booted up a session previously run on PT 9.03 and could not believe my eyes and ears. Not only did the system run like it was on steroids, it actually sounded cleaner on the top end and tighter on the bottom, which I totally did not expect. That was before I tried the 32 bit floating point setting and the Disc Cache. I loaded the same session into cache using 8 gig. I pressed play, and to my amazement, I could not get the session to even stutter, random access points, in and out, instantiating plugins in real time while session was running (50 plus tracks with D2 & D3 on each channel). I received my authorization code last week from my Avid, Service and support plan. Needless to say I will not be going back to PT9. ProTools 10HD Rocks my world!

I am a Very Happy ProTools 10HD Camper.

THANK YOU AVID!!!!!


System Details
MOB-MSI MS-7522/24GB DDR3 1600 Kingston/Video Card Nvidia GTX460FPB 1GB/Intel Cor i7-950 Processor/Avid HD Native Card and OMNI HD/IO, Avid 192 16 x 16, Pro Tools 10 HD/Windows 7Pro 64bit SP1/ Hard-drives 1Western Digital VelociRaptor 300GB 10,000RPM 1 Seagate 2TB 7200rpm and 5 Seagate 1TB 7200rpm drives, 2 Blu-ray Optical Drives, iStarUSA D-410-B10SA-RED Red Zinc-Coated Steel 4U Rack mount, Hot Swappable 6 bay SATA Server Case, 1000 watt Cooler Master Silent Pro Power Supply, Dual 23” Acer HD Monitors.