MacBook Pro :: C2D Vs I5 / I7 For Music Production
Aug 16, 2010
I hope this conversation hasnt come up, cos I did do a search for it. I mainly use my MBP for music production, running Logic 9 with one or 2 other soft synths. I was going thinking about getting a new 13" MBP but upgrading to the C2D 2.66 and the HD to 500G. I was wondering whether the 15" i5/i7 would provide any real benefits to me for what I mainly use it for, i.e. recording/producing music. Almost all of the apple docs and threads relating to the new to new processors seem to concentrate on graphics, and visual stuff. 13" will be limiting my screen real estate...but ill be travelling extensively but when in the studio can always connect up to a monitor.
I do not own any Mac at home, but looking into one for college. I have read up on all the pros/ cons of the MBA (non-removable battery and RAM, lack of ports and optical drive, etc). I am not a computer gamer, so I stick to the consoles. I was wondering if a MBA is ideal for any kind of music production. Can it handle heavy music editing with GB or Logic Pro? Is it ideal with the somewhat "lack" of external ports? share your opinions and/ or experiences with music production for fun or work on a MBA. (By the way, I am asking this to decide whether I should be looking into a MBA or MBP for college September of 2009, so I have LOTS of time to wait for newer models).
I've been tracking this forum for about a year now reading some great discussion on 2008 MacPro and actually held off buying one b/c of the comments recommending waiting for the new 2009 MacPro. So I did, and now I've been reading a lot of less than excited posts about how this is a step backwards in the price vs speed camp. Rather than hijacking a thread that is really providing a lot of great discussion on benchmarks and other more general pros/cons of 2008 vs 2009 I wanted to get some advice on a very specific request. I produce music on a PC now which is way past it's prime. Originally I spec'd a 2008 model and was prepared to buy with my company discount when I was advised to wait until the new 2009 MP came out. Right now the cost is equal for a 2009 system (with my corp discount) and a used/refurb 2008 system so $$$ can't help me make a decision. The machine I'm spec'ing is
* Two 2.26GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon * 8GB (4x2GB) * 1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s * NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 512MB * One 18x SuperDrive * Apple Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter
My question is, is this the right move for my specific needs? I run Cubase, Ableton Live, and mainly Native Instrument plug ins (synths) In terms of hyperthreading and quad vs. octo cores: will I even be able to realize this potential given my software? Is there any value in trying to sink in the large amount to take me to 2.66 or 2.93 Octo 2009? As I understand it, music on a Mac relys more on Ram (number of effects and synths that can run without latency) vs. raw CPU speed. But I've even heard debate on that. If all things are equal I'd rather take advantage of my corporate discount as well as emerging technology.
I am looking to upgrade to a new mac and have been set on getting the new 8 Core tower. A few people have told me I would be better off getting the new imac i7 instead. I am only going to be running logic 9, ableton 8, and protools le 8.. My sound card is a digi002 rack. I will only be using this machine for these purposes and no other. Would it be better to just go ahead and get an 8 core tower or would the imac i7 be just as good if not better? And, would the imac i7 be as durable with a full time work load?
what new imac to get. I really need to upgrade my macbook because I do a lot of music production and I need more cpu power. Currently I have a C2D 2.0 ghz T7200 and 2gb of RAM. What I need to run: Around 40-45 tracks (24 bit 44100Hz) in Ableton/Logic with around 4 devices (EQ, reverb etc) on each track. As one can imagine my macbook doesn't cope with this. Audio starts lagging and I need to freeze tracks which dramatically decreases my working efficiency. So I decided to get a new imac, I don't need more power than what the above requires. Other apps I will run is the CS4 suite but that doesn't require as much power as my music production. So mainly for music I was thinking a 3.06 ghz would do the trick. From benchmarks I see it's about twice as powerful as my current CPU. Would it be enough? By the way, I know about the coming update, but that can only be better than the 3.06 C2D so that's not the issue here.
Just bought myself a 2.8 mac pro with a stock WD Caviar SE 3200AAJS drive and would like some opinions about which hard drives to get and how to partition them.
From what I've read on digilloyds site, I've concluded that it would be best to get a rather large harddrive with a small partition as bootdrive. The reasoning behind this is that data on drives gets read faster when that data is on the outside of the drive. So an 80gb partition on a 640gb drive would be faster than an 80gb partition on a 120gb drive, because with option 1, the partition physically remains small in regards to the whole, and therefore physically remains on the outside of the drive where seek speed is fast.
So my questions are about the technical details really:
1) Is there a measured percentage as to where drives begin to lose their fast outer rim performance? If that's say 10%, then I could calculate: I need 80gb boot partition, so the drive must be 800gb. Also, to calculate how tiny my bootpartition should be, I need to know how many gigs "breathing space" the boot partition needs. Anyone?
2) What's your drives config and partitioning? I myself was thinking:
- boot drive (how big?) - drive with 2 partitions, one 10gb scratch partition for the current project and one projects partition for things I'm not working on. - drive for reading samples from for drums etc. - drive for time machining the projects drive, the samples I can always reinstall from cd, so won't need space for that..
3) What brand should I get? I was thinking Western Digital caviar black for the first three drives, and a more energy efficient caviar blue/green as timemachine drive. Do I need server drives like the R3 for any of this?
4) Where can my stock 320 drive fit in? Is it good enough for one of these jobs or is it just too old? I'm willing to replace it but I don't want to be splitting hairs. The potential replacement DOES have to add something in real world feel.
I'm eyeing the mini right now because os x >>> windows for music (inherent midi drivers instead of 3rd party, stability, etc etc).amittedly I currently run a hackintosh on a previously windows pc. It is stable with the exception of gfx crashes every few hours and its inability to use the gfx card to its full extent. This gets to me though and is kind of a bitch. So I'm thinking about getting a mini when I have the money for one. I would get the standard with the 4gb ram option. How well does it deal with heat under stress? and is the HDD 7200 rpm for the non server edition?(edit: roarrrr just read that its 5400, so lame)
I am going to buy my very first mac and I've decided it's going to be an imac. I'm completely new to mac and don't know which one of the two 21.5 inches (i3 3.06 or i3 3.2) to buy. Like the title says the main usage is going to be for music production and Logic or logic express is going to be used with lots of midi plug-ins. I'm also going to work with some photo and video (nothing serious yet), some web browsing and mailing (the regular things to do on a pc). And maybe some WoW. No heavy gaming on the mac, I have a nice windows pc for that I have a discount when buying that makes it harder to choose:
21,5" 3,06GHz - 1079$ 21,5" 3,2GHz - 1349$
Which imac is for me and which one is most future proof?
I currently have a 6 years old Dell XPS PC and want a mac. I've used imacs a lot during college years and now want one for myself, no more PC for me. Now, the question is: what do I need? I would use this mac for pretty much anything, but mostly mostly mostly for music production. I will use it to record songs, I have decided I probably do not need to wait for the refresh, as all I would need is to be able to run plugins and multiple tracks at the same time.. I'm pretty much sold on the imac 27 quad core with 8gb ram right now, but would I be able to make a wiser choice?
[URL:..] As our current MacBook Pros are assembled & manufactured by Foxconn, Apple is shifting to have Quanta Computer in 2010 to assemble and manufacture the next Macbook Pros. Somehow, Foxconn has a hit or miss on quality control, especially the issues we encounter like warped lids, dust under the glass, dead pixels, bad ram, black screen of death, video artifacts, etc. Does this CHANGE of manufacturers mean better quality control?
If you purchase the CS3 Prod Premium can you purchase another license at a cheaper price so that you can install it on another machine? and is there ANY place that sells the darn thing cheaper than the $1700 bones you have to pay for it? And how 'bout us folks who have Final Cut Studio 2 and just need Photoshop and After Effects? If you buy these two separately, it's MORE expensive than buying the Creative Suite Prod Premium so you buy the Production Premium box and you get all that other stuff you may not use.
What's the best way to uninstall this Snow Leopard beast? I've backup files in Time Machine but I'm not sure of what system folders and/or files should be restored.
I purchased a 21 inch iMac computer approximately 3 years ago. The computer ceased working a few months ago and I have since been informed that Apple have recognised this model as faulty. inform me of my options given this is a reasonably new computer with minimal usage. Someone I know had the same issue and Apple replaced thier iMac even though it was out of Warranty due to faulty parts, thus why this model was ceased production.
At the moment most of my music is either stored on my Macbook or on an external hard drive. Is it possible to transfer all my music and videos to an external hard drive and then sync it with Itune so that every time I plug it in I can access them?
I have set my website up in iWeb (so simple and great) and I have added to the homepage a QT music file for visitors to listen to. Unfortunately however when you do click on the song and then navigate to one of my other pages on the website such as my portfolio, the music stops. I was hoping that the song would play continuously while navigating through the website no matter what page the visitor was on. Is this even possible?
I have transferred my itunes music on to my external HD. The music is there and that is fine. I then deleted the old itunes folder from my actual HD. I have now wanted to access the music on the external HD, and have attempted to select the new music file location on the external HD via the itunes/preferences/advanced window,selected the new file path and it will just not show in itunes!
I saw this featured in a yahoo segment on streaming music vs. downloading music, etc. I thought it might be Songbird but the interface looks different.
I have ALOT of music on my macbook pro. so much i don't have much hard drive space left and its really slowing down my laptop. i have all the music on an external hard drive. is it possible to play the music directly off the hard drive rather than having to import ALL the songs to my laptop? itunes just imports all the songs automatically and i don't want it to. i would rather just play the music off the hard drive and save space on my laptop
I have some sound effects that I have on my external hard drive that I want to listen to and add to my iTunes, but whenever I go to do that I get a message that says I don't have permission to write on my music folder. I am the only account on my Macbook Pro. I checked and I have the rights to read and write on my music folder. I don't know how to fix the problem. It also happens when I add music that I downloaded from the internet not iTunes. Sometimes with that I just have to hold option or command (I don't remember off the top of my head) and that'll let me copy the music into a folder that I created. How can I get permission to write into/onto my music folder for my Macbook Pro?
I have some old music that I bought under an old iTunes account and it asks me for my password to play the music. That account is no longer active, how do I list the music under my new account so I can play it?
How can I get music off of music that does not have a 'Download' option? I know Windows has alot of options to do this? I've downloaded a few song on my Win side and god them onto my Mac's iTunes. But they never download fully, because it's trial software.
...now I don't have the same functionality with iTunes. Basically, I can't use iTunes at all anymore as the interface for my music and videos. Once the external drive is mounted, I can navigate through it and play individual songs, but I can't use iTunes to do that. All my previous Playlists show up down the left side of iTunes, but there isn't any music in them.
I downloaded 2 songs yesterday, made a Playlist out of them, and because the path in the Advanced tab of the iTunes Preferences is correct, it automatically added the songs to the external hard drive. I synced my iPod and it was completely erased except for the 2 new songs. Is there a way to use iTunes to navigate my music like I used to when I stored the information on the internal hard drive but keep the information on the external drive? I have a Mac running Snow Leopard and the latest version of iTunes.
I finally ripped my music into digital format. It is a very large library so I performed the rips in four segments creating four folders of music. The highest level folders are Music1, Music2, Music3, Music4. The next layer folder is the artists name, then album name, then the actual MP3S.
How do I merge the folders? If I perform a copy the first artist name is sees that already is exists, the finder wants me to skip the copy or replace the folder that is there. I simply want to add the folder or merge it. Is there a "merge" function in OSX? I tried Carbon Copy but it will not copy or sync fils on the same disk.
I have about 100gb of music in the internal drive of my Mac Mini. Now that is full, I like to fill an external drive. I know how to move everything to an external, but I don't want that. I just want to store future music in the external drive.
Do I just change the music folder location under preference/advance? Is it really that easy?
how do i put new music from cds on my macbook air? i don't think media sharing is the answer in the event you were thinking that . I want to be able to transpoet the CDs to itunes and then to sync or add them onto my ipod.
I've been doing some reorganizing lately, including updating my file structure from My Music to My Media, with Music, Books etc within it. I did this using the built-in iTunes option (File->Library->Organize Library->Reorganize files in the folder "iTunes Media"). I have both "Keep iTunes Media folder organized" and "Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library" switched on.
When I performed this reorganization I noticed that the media folder was still called "My Music", not "My Media", though the directories within for Music, Books etc were all there and organized correctly. So I renamed the folder to "My Media" and updated this name in the Advanced Preferences by changing "iTunes Media folder location."
When I now add new items to the library I find they are being added to the directory My Media, and not to the media-specific subdirectory (Music or Books or whatever) even though the entries within iTunes itself appear in the appropriate media subsection.
