Help with computers!

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='saibuster' post='355223' date='Dec 15 2008, 05:55 PM']If you think about getting a pro sequencer, dont bother with logic(Time stretch in time machine anyone?! ). I've been using logic for the last 10 years and recently switched to cubase. I'd go for a second hand Macbook pro 2.4ghz with 2 gig ram. that should be enough for a big project with cpu hungry plugins like waves.[/quote]

ProTools LE/M-Powered are good "budget" options, and the hardware usually comes with drivers for both Windows and Mac. I use my M-Audio kit at home on a Windoze PC and also at my singer's house on her Macbook.

Again though, all the good interfaces are firewire, so the new Macbooks would be no good.

[thepurpleblob]

[quote name='barks' post='354516' date='Dec 14 2008, 08:08 PM']I am thinking of buying a lap top computer (maybe a Mac) to use just for music ie. iTunes and hopefully to use for some recording.

I'm not very technical when it comes to IT issues so could anyone give me an idea of the kind of spec I should be looking for ?

Neil[/quote]

Get a Mac. It will cost you LOADS of money but you won't look like a sado with a Packard Bell. Everything just works, the keyboard is nice to type on and you'll still be able to use it in 5 years time when all your mates' PCs are long in the bin. It also comes with most of the software you need - the only thing you need to do is to download Open Office (or steal MS Office if you have to). Everything looks nicer, works properly and is a pleasurable experience. Trying to use Vista is just grim in comparison.

And... if you *must* you can still run Windoze on it by various means.

Edited December 15, 2008 by thepurpleblob

[thepurpleblob]

[quote name='YouMa' post='354703' date='Dec 14 2008, 11:47 PM']Yeah good idea lets all have apples stamped on our heads,ok go get a mac there great! hope you are a graphic designer and the company pays for the computer and the software. Get a mac and once you have got bored of the limited expensive software and you have decided to learn a bit more about real computers but cant on one of these machines, blame these guys.(bloody hairdressers computers,lovely pastel shades though.)[/quote]

Mmm.... in case you didn't know, it sits on top of what is effectively Unix and you can't get much more proper than that. Just bring up the terminal window and you've got all that geeky command line goodness You've even got things like DarwinPorts and X11 so you can run all those millions of free Unix/Linux programs. Start with the Gimp... just as good as Photoshop and totally free!

[Tengu]

[quote name='Buzz' post='355218' date='Dec 15 2008, 05:53 PM']Second: Apple OS's are no longer virus free paradises they were when they were niche computers. DO NOT RUN A MAC WITHOUT AV + FIREWALL. Period. I loathe Apple for this as although they've stopped tooting the line of "virus free" they're not telling people to protect themselves.[/quote]
This is incorrect. There are still no Mac OS X viruses and running AV software will gain you nothing other than lost CPU cycles. There have been a few trojans spotted in the wild but they still require the user to download them manually and then give an Administrator password to install.

If you download warez or other stuff from suspicious sites and then authorise its installation then you deserve to lose your data, or worse, and that has nothing to do with the security of the OS. A little common sense is all you need to keep yourself safe.

Macs still run with all ports closed, by default, so you don't really need a firewall unless you are activating services such as web sharing.

Just to add my recommendation to the Mac crowd, my machine is ten years old and still going strong. None of my PC using friends have machines more than a couple of years old and I still get loads more done than they do. I have to add that most of them are just glorified games consoles anyway.

[thepurpleblob]

[quote name='Tengu' post='355376' date='Dec 15 2008, 09:21 PM']This is incorrect. There are still no Mac OS X viruses and running AV software will gain you nothing other than lost CPU cycles. There have been a few trojans spotted in the wild but they still require the user to download them manually and then give an Administrator password to install.

If you download warez or other stuff from suspicious sites and then authorise its installation then you deserve to lose your data, or worse, and that has nothing to do with the security of the OS. A little common sense is all you need to keep yourself safe.

Macs still run with all ports closed, by default, so you don't really need a firewall unless you are activating services such as web sharing.

Just to add my recommendation to the Mac crowd, my machine is ten years old and still going strong. None of my PC using friends have machines more than a couple of years old and I still get loads more done than they do. I have to add that most of them are just glorified games consoles anyway.[/quote]

Just a +1. For all reasonable purposes Macs are virus free. Most of the virus software that runs on Macs actually only detects PC viruses "passing through". The architecture and permissions structure is fundamentally safer. It's much more difficult to get at stuff that really matters as you never run with admin rights anyway. Most of the stupid stuff you can click on is for PCs and will do nothing. Anyway, at the end of the day you can only do so much to protect stupid people. By the way everybody here has just won a £5M prize on the Ugandan lottery - just send me £100 for me to process the paperwork.......

[Mr. Foxen]

Know people with macs, they are hard/expensive to fix when they break. And there are less people to ask for tips. Vista is also a pain in the balls. I've got a PC with XP and it does me fine. I don't do much fiddly music stuff, since I get my housemate to do it on his mac, as he has better software and skills. There is a lot of swearing and cursing dying power supplies though. PC's are easier to maintain, but you need to maintain them. Never felt the urge for a mac.

[crez5150]

I've used Mac's since 1991..... always been stable, never had to use an engineer for repairs as they have never let me down..... in fact I still have my old G4 400Mhz running Digital Performer in the studio perfectly well..... 24 tracks of Audio no problem

[jmstone]

[quote name='thepurpleblob' post='355353' date='Dec 15 2008, 08:52 PM']Get a Mac. It will cost you LOADS of money but you won't look like a sado with a Packard Bell. Everything just works, the keyboard is nice to type on and you'll still be able to use it in 5 years time when all your mates' PCs are long in the bin.[/quote]

This is completely true.. (well in my case anyway!).. The machines are pretty solidly built... although I have heard horror stories of HD failure in some Macs after 1 year.

Personally I use Linux at home, Mac at work, and Windows when I have to. They all have their place, and I guess I would recommend each to different people depending on what they want to do. Personally, after using Linux for 5 years as my only OS at home, using anything else is like torture... but there is a fairly steep learning curve (although as mentioned above, it is so much easier now than it ever has been in the past).

You can't do things like use the iTunes store (but I use emusic), some proprietary formats are hard to play (although still eminently possible), but there is some of the most amazing software on the planet available for free.. As a multitrack drop-in replacement for protools, Ardour is pretty much ideal (and completely free). Above all, the OS is rock solid stable, and you don't have to do things the way Bill Gates or Steve Jobs thinks you should!

... Oh, and I would never buy a second hand laptop ever again, after being seriously stung with the first one I got.. basically prices of computers drop so fast, it is hard to find anyone to sell the laptop at the price it is worth.. they are swayed by the price they paid for it 6 months or a year ago, when in reality it should be worth a tiny fraction of its original value. Also, if anything goes wrong (as usually seems to happen on second hand computers) you are stuck with a hefty repair bill. The only exception I might make to this is buying one of the original lightweight IBM thinkpads - they were very solid and stable computers, perhaps nothing amazing by todays standards, but very portable and good at what they do.

James

Edited December 16, 2008 by jmstone

[YouMa]

It dependzz but i think it wont be to long befor macs are obsolete.Bill won just admit it.Even if vista is sh*t.

[YouMa]

Mac=Boy band they tell you what to do safe..................PC..Rock and roll.

Edited December 16, 2008 by YouMa

[thepurpleblob]

[quote name='YouMa' post='355570' date='Dec 16 2008, 02:22 AM']It dependzz but i think it wont be to long befor macs are obsolete.Bill won just admit it.Even if vista is sh*t.[/quote]

See.... See??? That was typed on a 3 week old PC laptop, the screen is broken and the E and Z keys are sticking or have fallen off completely already.

[xgsjx]

As you can see, you'll get countless responses for mac & pc and what's the best operating system to use (osX, Windows whatever or Linux).

Once you've made up your mind (which will probably change a few months after you've got your desired machine), you need to make sure it has decent specs:
What you should be looking for is a decent sized processor, if it's a laptop you should look for at least a 1.4g but the more the merrier, if it's a pc or mac you want to be looking at 2g+. Try for at least 1 gb of ram, a decent graphics card (256 or above is good) and make sure there's a nice big hard drive in it. Hard drive is not the main concern tho, as you can easily add an external drive on & nowadays you can get a terrabyte drive for less than £100!

Make sure there's plenty of USB ports (4 or 5 is good) as you always find things to plug in, but again if you run out, you can plug in a USB hub that will turn 1 into 4.
You may want either a decent soundcard or audio interface. I find the soundcard in my iMac good enough for what I do but my singer has an audio interface for his macbook as he uses it in live situations.
A decent lcd monitor should be on your list (maybe not if you go down the laptop/imac route) and a good set of nearfield monitors (the speaker type) for listening to your music on.

Then get your desired software (there's countless options) & that's you ready.

G

[zigmondo]

My tuppence: depends on your audience and output and on whether you'll be doing a lot of midi stuff or mainly audio, I guess. Heck, Mac+Logic...PC+ Cubase/Cakewalk..whatever, in a sense. If portability and liive music on the fly is your thang, then the Mac+Logic+Reason/Ableton combo is well-vaunted, if you're of the age and peership that would warrant it. I personally went the pc+Cakewalk route, as I couldn't understand the Cubase interface: there'll be many here who will have found the inverse to be true.
For bang for buck, I'd say: desktop+XPPro+ 2GB RAM+ fast processor; 2 hard drives and Acronis True Image; add a PCI soundcard with 4in 4out breakout box with or without midi depending on your needs. If you're undecided about midi then one could always add a USB midi keyboard like an Edirol PCR-M30 or the like. Something like ESI nearfield monnies; Cakewalk Home Studio. Have your OS and prog files on the smaller drive, audio on the larger, and nowt else. Don't hook up to the internet. Have as many USB ports as you can but don't get a hub. 2 cheapish visual display monnies and a vid card able to support dual monitors. I'd avoid spending out a shedload on audio monitors: a decent set of heads will allow you to lsiten out for artefacts..and you can use really just something to "reference" your sound with: I use the home stereo as that it what I listen to music on. I could go on but I'm boring myself! Best of.

[crez5150]

[quote name='YouMa' post='355571' date='Dec 16 2008, 02:28 AM']Mac=Boy band they tell you what to do safe..................PC..Rock and roll.[/quote]

That's about a sensible a quote as your hairstyle!

[Musky]

[quote name='YouMa' post='355570' date='Dec 16 2008, 02:22 AM']It dependzz but i think it wont be to long befor macs are obsolete.Bill won just admit it.Even if vista is sh*t.[/quote]

Clearly wrong - OSX market share has been rising for years.

FWIW I'd be tempted by a Windows machine - the new MacBooks are horrendously priced IMO, though the white ones are still available at a decent price. And that's from a confirmed Mac user.

[NJE]

MAC x Infinity...

Bill gates can go rot in hell for the travesty that is Windows/Vista ( i have to use it at work) Macs are brilliant and the mac mini is superb and portable if you dont want to lay out for mac laptop. I used PC for ten years and when I got a mac I took a hammer to my desktop PC because it was just junk in comparrison.

Garageband is so much more intuative than most programs, its the recording equivelant to a Tonka toy and when you have mastered it you can take it all over to Logic if you want to advance. Everything about them is better faster smoother and friendlier, and you can get office and all that rubbish on them as well for compatibility issues but saying that all my friends ditched their PC's and bought macs when they saw mine and saw the potential of garageband.

Trust the Pro's my mate works for a very very prolific studio that work with the BBC radio 1 etc and they run two G5's in every recording room, even the receptionist uses a mac.

[Danbass7]

[url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=34507"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=34507[/url]

[thisnameistaken]

I don't understand why people get so brand-loyal over something as utilitarian as a computer. I suppose I can sort-of understand it with Macs, because they're pretty and the software is good and some of the sadder buyers think they're buying into a lifestyle, but I really don't understand why Windoze users are so defensive.

I've used Windows since 1993. It used to be OK before the 9x way of doing things came along, and since then it's been a sorry excuse for a Mac OS. That's the way it is. Yeah it's a shame that you have limited hardware options if you want a Mac, and that you have to put up with some design flaws because aesthetics are more important to Apple than they are to any other manufacturer, but ultimately I think it's worth it for the interface.

Most people don't, or haven't tried, so that's fine, enjoy your Windows boxes, but I'm beyond tired of Windows (and especially the performance issues with Windows) and the Mac way of doing things just works better for me.

To the Linux advocate earlier: I tend to try a Linux install every couple of years and for me it's still not quite there yet. My main concerns are integration between the filesystem, email and a project manager (which I can do with Mac's spotlight pretty well), a particular method of productivity from mail, FTP and an editor which I spent AGES looking for on Linux and was never entirely satisfied, and finally - automation. Which of course is great on Linux because I can shell-script anything I need, but I can do that on a Mac too. And the Mac already gives me apps that work the way I like.

I will continue to evaluate Linux though because I think that platform is the inevitable future of computing. It's just a shame that open-source development is so slow, because open-source developers are constantly forking interesting projects due to - as far as I can tell - pure ego.