question regarding protools bootcamp mac and windows

[color me bad]

i got a macbook pro with an mbox 2 protools LE

2gb of ram too

about to get leopard with bootcamp and xp

i was going to run protools on windows on the mac in bootcamp so i can use other programs i need that are only available on windows at the moment

so if i install protools and mbox2 windows drivers is it going to make any difference just doing everything on windows bootcamp on the macbook as opposed to just running protools normally on leopard?

[barstool719]

i tried running bootcamp on my mac pro.

everything worked fine for a little bit. i could use all those old programs i had bought over the years for my pc. soundforge and sony acid ran amazingly. pro tools didnt run so hot though. there was a huge difference between performance on the mac side and on the windows side. another problem was the HFS driver that PTLE for win installed. it would work intermittently, sometimes telling me it couldn't read a drive that drive utility and diskwarrior both said were good. eventually it reached the point where PT would keep saying that i didnt have a valid recording drive, as it couldnt read it through macdrive. all in all i dropped it, and just use my old windows stuff on my old windows pc.

you really see the difference when you run win xp on a mac pro. osx is so much faster!

[Alan Brownstein]

I am running Pro Tools 7.3.1 on my Mac Pro and it works great running under both the MacOS and Windows XP (Boot Camp). I am a long-time Macintosh advocate and it actually surprised me to find that Pro Tools runs at least as well if not better on the Windows side (at least for me). I've never had a single crash or bus error that I can remember running under Boot Camp. On the Mac side it took quite a bit more configuring to get things settled down. At this point in time I'd say they are both very stable and efficient.

The trick to getting any Pro Tools system running smoothly is to follow all of Digi's advice with respect to system configuration. Do a clean install of the OS, and once everything is configured according to Digi's recommendations, turn off automatic software updates. Keep other installed applications to a minimum, particularly those which have background system processes. On my PT system, I have three system partitions: MacOS X 10.4.8 with PT 7.3.1cs7; Windows XP SP2 (Boot Camp) also with PT 7.3.1cs7; and a third parition with MacOS X 10.4.11 (which someday I'll update to Leopard) for basically everything else (Final Cut Pro, etc.). I find keeping things clean and separate in this way really helps maintain stability.

Of course, YMMV. :)

-Alan

[color me bad]

how are u using bootcamp without os x leopard????

i have the exact same specs as you but i thought bootcamp only works with leopard

[Matt Darcy]

bootcamp is just a boot loader.

It shouldn't effect anything ?

[Rail Jon Rogut]

Boot Camp and Pro Tools work perfectly here... I use the full version of MacDrive.

Rail

[Alan Brownstein]

I technically didn't use Boot Camp to install Windows. I just installed Windows onto a Windows partition directly from the XP install disc. Then I installed the Boot Camp drivers that were included with the Boot Camp beta that was available at the time (this was before Leopoard was released, so it worked on Tiger). Of course, you have to have an earlier Mac Pro that will actually run Tiger. I think the newer Mac Pro's might only run Leopard. The Pro Tools installer for Windows has an option for Macintosh hard drive compatibility (I think they call it the HFS+ option), so if you install that as well you can use the same data drives for your sessions under both platforms.

[color me bad]

ok thanks

so i found the bootcamp beta that was released for tiger before leopard came out

supposedly it works if i keep my clock date before 2008

so once i use this and put windows xp on here, ur saying i can install protools and share the sessions between operating systems

thats great!!!!!!!!!!!

i need to figure out how to set that up

is there anything special i would have to do or is it as simple as making sure i install the HFS+ option at the same time i install protools on windows????

[Alan Brownstein]

Once you install Windows, and the Boot Camp drivers, then just install Pro Tools for Windows including the HFS+ option. There are a few system optimizations Digi recommends for XP, so be sure to do those as well.

On my system, I have a separate internal hard drive (Mac HFS+ formatted) that I use for my PT sessions. Since I have the HFS+ option installed, I can access those same sessions whether I'm booted into the MacOS or Windows XP. I was just sure to install the same PT plug-ins for both platforms, and use the same version of PT on both (in my case, 7.3.1cs7), so there are no compatibility issues. Works perfectly.

One thing I'd recommend on the Windows side, is once you get everything configured, stay off the Internet as much as possible. PC's are especially susceptible to viruses and malware. If your system gets infected it could hamper the performance and stability of Pro Tools.

-Alan