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Mac or PC?
- Thread starter JordanDelap
- Start date
I have both in my lab, and use both--I think for the complete beginner, everything is just slightly easier on a Mac. I'm not saying it's a big deal, though, or that you can't run things on a PC.
If your going to go that way you should dual boot. That's what I used to do. Debian and FreeBSD. Sometimes I play around with Plan 9. That's what we should all be using, just script the automation in a text editor. Use LISP. Sweet.
Get a mac, less time spent for solving issues, more time for creativity.
I'm not an Apple fanboy, but OS X is a much better user experience than Windows, especially Vista.
I'm not an Apple fanboy, but OS X is a much better user experience than Windows, especially Vista.
Amen, Brother, though I'm more of a SUSE guy than Debian.
That's the beauty of Linux, there's so many (FREE!) versions to choose from.
- Apr 3, 2007
- 108
- 3
- Disclosures
- Endorsing Artist: Ashdown Engineering Amplifiers, Elites Strings and Cosmic Ears IEMs
I teach Cubase at a school in the UK and we use a Mac to record and PCs to produce.
For this programme there is no difference between the two...having said that Logic is a great programme and Mac only.
Have fun choosing!!
For this programme there is no difference between the two...having said that Logic is a great programme and Mac only.
Have fun choosing!!
it really is a personal preference. Whichever OS you are more comfortable with is your best bet.
Also the two major things to consider are the hardware device you are going to use. For example if you buy a mac and it has leopard on it and you happen to have the m-audio firewire 410 the drivers are very new (and still in beta) so you may run into issues.
and what software package you want to use. Yes garageband is cool. But personally I found it cumbersome and a PITA to work with.
That being said I have a mac and pc at home and work on both. Aside from the driver issue with my firewire 410 they are both solid tools to work on.
You can't go wrong with either.
Another thing to consider is if you want to share your recordings with other people to work on, you may want to use the same hardware/software as them just for ease of use (and troubleshooting)
Other than that its all the same sh*t.
Don't buy into the mac vs pc thing. Its all marketing.
Also the two major things to consider are the hardware device you are going to use. For example if you buy a mac and it has leopard on it and you happen to have the m-audio firewire 410 the drivers are very new (and still in beta) so you may run into issues.
and what software package you want to use. Yes garageband is cool. But personally I found it cumbersome and a PITA to work with.
That being said I have a mac and pc at home and work on both. Aside from the driver issue with my firewire 410 they are both solid tools to work on.
You can't go wrong with either.
Another thing to consider is if you want to share your recordings with other people to work on, you may want to use the same hardware/software as them just for ease of use (and troubleshooting)
Other than that its all the same sh*t.
Don't buy into the mac vs pc thing. Its all marketing.
And here's where the hurt come trying to buy a Window based laptop nowadays. Most of them use Ricoh based subsystem, which has well documented bugs directly affecting audio performance, as a cost saving features; and of course no vendor advertise this, they'd rather advertise processor and GPU speed. In fact, it's next to impossible to know that ahead of purchasing, short of diving into the hardware manager of each laptop manually beforehand.
Of course there's ADK, but in my case I'd need to import such a laptop into my country which can be troublesome.
Tower don't have such problems, so buying a tower today it's still best to build it yourself, or have it built, than to buy a Mac which, let's face it, is not only very expensive but also has limited configuration options.
Linux people: What software do you use for recording/jamming? I use Hydrogen for a drum machine but other than that haven't been able to get Audacity to pick up on my mic. I use Ubuntu, and want to put this machine to work with my new bass! 
I use both, my home based rig is Cubase VST32 on a P4 box, I've used it for years without major issues. My portable rig is as Powerbook G4. It's about personal preference.
For a recording newbie it's hard to beat the ease of use of Garage Band on a Mac tho. I will admit to having spent 5 years supporting windows on a professional basis (MCSE) and I prefer the Mac platform. Go figure...
-mike
For a recording newbie it's hard to beat the ease of use of Garage Band on a Mac tho. I will admit to having spent 5 years supporting windows on a professional basis (MCSE) and I prefer the Mac platform. Go figure...
-mike
Depends on the user. The machine per se is only as good and the person moving the mouse and clicking the keys.
I have a very low spec Toshiba Satellite L25-S119 (PC) that can with only 256mb RAM and a 1.5GHz Processor that I've been using for over 2 years now - no special sound card, nothing enhanced at all. I've been using it to do Photoshop, Flash, Sonar and many other projects that I was sure would choke it - but they haven't to this day.
I've been able to record, edit and produce music at-will with this machine, much to my surprise. No lock-ups, no "I can't handle this" - nothing. Works like a champ! I currently have a Sonar project that has over 24 separate tracks of audio that I am rather easily editing and mixing.
My drummer (may explain a lot...) has Mac computers all over his house, and while I am sure they are fine machines, his first problem when he decided to try to use his Mac laptop to record his daughter was the notorious lack of a mic input. Hmmm... gotta buy that special, it seems... Can't just get a little 1/4 to 1/8 adapter and plug in a mic/guitar/whatever as you can with any PC out there... Nope - gotta hit the Mac store and by a Mac thing that lets you plug an everyday mic in...
OK - so his low-spec Mac notebook doesn't come out of the box ready to answer the most basic needs of someone who wants to record stuff. Once you have the correct add-ons, I understand Macs perform like champs running Garage Band, Pro-Tools, Logic, and so on...
But even with the correct connectors, my drummer still cannot do the most basic audio recording/editing tasks - to Mac vs. PC is not even on the table. Person vs. ability - there's a talking point.
I have a very low spec Toshiba Satellite L25-S119 (PC) that can with only 256mb RAM and a 1.5GHz Processor that I've been using for over 2 years now - no special sound card, nothing enhanced at all. I've been using it to do Photoshop, Flash, Sonar and many other projects that I was sure would choke it - but they haven't to this day.
I've been able to record, edit and produce music at-will with this machine, much to my surprise. No lock-ups, no "I can't handle this" - nothing. Works like a champ! I currently have a Sonar project that has over 24 separate tracks of audio that I am rather easily editing and mixing.
My drummer (may explain a lot...) has Mac computers all over his house, and while I am sure they are fine machines, his first problem when he decided to try to use his Mac laptop to record his daughter was the notorious lack of a mic input. Hmmm... gotta buy that special, it seems... Can't just get a little 1/4 to 1/8 adapter and plug in a mic/guitar/whatever as you can with any PC out there... Nope - gotta hit the Mac store and by a Mac thing that lets you plug an everyday mic in...
OK - so his low-spec Mac notebook doesn't come out of the box ready to answer the most basic needs of someone who wants to record stuff. Once you have the correct add-ons, I understand Macs perform like champs running Garage Band, Pro-Tools, Logic, and so on...
But even with the correct connectors, my drummer still cannot do the most basic audio recording/editing tasks - to Mac vs. PC is not even on the table. Person vs. ability - there's a talking point.
I have been working with all types of computers PC, Mac, Unix, for decades. I would say for working with audio Mac is the way to go. Yes, they are more expensive, but you will save time and frustration things just tend to work you won't be dealing with driver issues all the time. A big part of that is Apple makes both the hardware and OS so it is a known quantity so for software makers to QA test on. Now be aware OS X just had a major upgrade a few months ago some of the audio software hasn't upgraded yet. So if you go with Mac you might want to check the software/hardware you want to run to see if you need Tiger instead of Leopard. Actually checking what the hardware/software you plan to use is compatible with is good idea no matter what computer you plan to buy.
PC you can save money by building your own box, but you're going to be dealing with driver issues. Some of those driver issue can get ugly because there are so many combinations of PC parts there is no way companies have tested the 1000's of possible combinations so you have to work out the issues. PC you can choose your OS either XP or Linux. XP is old enough to be fair stable now and unless you want to be a computer geek the way to go. If you want to save money but learn to be a computer geek Linux is an option, but you are adding more driver configuration and compatibility issues. Linux there is some good audio software for free so its a trade off.
PC you can save money by building your own box, but you're going to be dealing with driver issues. Some of those driver issue can get ugly because there are so many combinations of PC parts there is no way companies have tested the 1000's of possible combinations so you have to work out the issues. PC you can choose your OS either XP or Linux. XP is old enough to be fair stable now and unless you want to be a computer geek the way to go. If you want to save money but learn to be a computer geek Linux is an option, but you are adding more driver configuration and compatibility issues. Linux there is some good audio software for free so its a trade off.
Linux people: What software do you use for recording/jamming? I use Hydrogen for a drum machine but other than that haven't been able to get Audacity to pick up on my mic. I use Ubuntu, and want to put this machine to work with my new bass!
first the disclaimer:
A properly configured Linux system is the most powerful option available. Getting to that point can be a pain in the ass, and an improperly configured system is not really very usable for doing good work. Look at Ubuntu studio for getting a proper kernel. I was rolling my own for a while on Debian, I've since just gone the planetccrma route.
now for what I'm using these days:
multitrack DAW : Ardour, I've built from SVN in the past but the latest source tarball (2.4 I think) is quite good. Way, way, way more powerful and then Audacity.
audio editor: snd. Documentation sucks but it's worth learning. Going from audacity to snd is like going from notepad to emacs. In fact in many ways it really is like emacs for audio: super powerful, old school, and completely extensible using LISP. also a bit obscure until you get the hang of it.
software synths: AMS is alright, as is ZynAddSubFX. I'm pretty much working at a lower level than that now. I like Csound, ChucK and Common Lisp Music depending on what I'm doing. I've also been known to wire up a minimal jack client and code up the DSP stuff in C. Linux is pretty much an ideal environment if you want to work in this manner, which is the biggest practical reason I'm using it.
MIDI: I don't use it much actually, if I want to hear a GM type file played back I just use TImidity++. I dabbled with Rosegarden a couple times but it's not something I spend a lot of time working with. Seemed alright I guess.
notation: Lilypond is fantastic. Really. Really nice looking scores. Again, something of a learning curve but the results are great. I use the emacs mode. My graphical scores are prepared with a combination of Lilypond and X-fig.
random other stuff: I'm using Fedora Core 7 with the planetccrma stuff, KDE desktop. All text editing is done in emacs. I do a lot of algorithmic composition stuff in Haskell, I've used both Hugs and GHC for that. I'm still using Makefiles, although Scons looks neat. I've moved from CVS to Subversion for newer projects over the past couple years. I've actually got one thing in a Darcs repo as well. C/C++ and Fortran are compiled with the GCC suite. I'm using SBCL for LISP. Slime is great for LISP hacking.
That pretty much covers what I use on a regular basis I think.
I don't know particularly about Canada but I know ADK ships systems to EU all the time so I can't imagine Scott wouldn't ship to Canada. Canadian dollar is doing pretty good against wimpy US cash these days so should be fine
+1, So many people want laptop DAW these days (myself included) I always overlook the PC desktop option. It's EASY to build a desktop PC that will compete with a Mac, for MUCH cheaper. I just posted rough specs for a $600 base audio PC on another thread (Just the tower, not including external components, but Macs don't include that stuff either and they sure don't cost $600 for a 2.66 GHz Intel Conroe mac. Mac mini is $600 for a 1.83 and much lower specs overall).
Look into Rosegarden. I haven't used it but it's like free Cubase on linux basically. Not sure if it's totally ready for primetime yet.Linux people: What software do you use for recording/jamming? I use Hydrogen for a drum machine but other than that haven't been able to get Audacity to pick up on my mic. I use Ubuntu, and want to put this machine to work with my new bass!
BTW - I haven't experienced a driver-related complication on any of my PC's running XP.
Vista, on the other hand...
I'd been cruising along since 2001 or so doing any and all audio coolness on PC's running XP. Early on there were some driver issues - but XP tended to resolve them for you by providing easy access to driver updates. Prior to that, drivers were an absolute nightmare and you had to be a serious tech-head, or know one, in order to get by. After XP, the driver-related stuff became a non-issue.
Then I got a box with Vista and my life turned back the clock to pre-Windows 98 type, "can't do this, can't do that" stuff... to the point now where my Vista machine is now my wife's 'check email, play scrabble' machine and I go happily along using my low-spec Toshiba laptop.
Vista... Blech!!! I used to poo poo the whole Mac Vs. PC debate UNTIL Vista happened. Now I actually thing the Mac'ers have a legitimate point in their favor.
Vista, on the other hand...
I'd been cruising along since 2001 or so doing any and all audio coolness on PC's running XP. Early on there were some driver issues - but XP tended to resolve them for you by providing easy access to driver updates. Prior to that, drivers were an absolute nightmare and you had to be a serious tech-head, or know one, in order to get by. After XP, the driver-related stuff became a non-issue.
Then I got a box with Vista and my life turned back the clock to pre-Windows 98 type, "can't do this, can't do that" stuff... to the point now where my Vista machine is now my wife's 'check email, play scrabble' machine and I go happily along using my low-spec Toshiba laptop.
Vista... Blech!!! I used to poo poo the whole Mac Vs. PC debate UNTIL Vista happened. Now I actually thing the Mac'ers have a legitimate point in their favor.
Mac OS is a shell over BSD. Linux will have more of a learning curve for your average Joe. I think he wants to get up and running with minimal hassles.
Get a Mac. You wont have to worry about viruses, stupid crashes etc. Plus its just a simpler, more intuitive and elegant operating system.
I don't know particularly about Canada but I know ADK ships systems to EU all the time so I can't imagine Scott wouldn't ship to Canada. Canadian dollar is doing pretty good against wimpy US cash these days so should be fine
Probably what I'll end up doing. I almost pulled the plug on a Macbook pro last week, had the salesman bring the box down and everything, but I backed off when I saw the price of the 3 year Apple care plan. No way am I buying a laptop with just 1 year warranty, and no way am I paying what Apple want for their 3 year coverage.
- Jan 23, 2008
- 960
- 7
- Disclosures
- Endorsing Artist: Spector Basses
+1000000000000000000000000....
I don't understand if it's just sitting in you room why you want a laptop.
I'm going to disagree on a technicality, and that is when you pay for mac hardware, you're actually leasing it from Apple. They retain ownership rights. Meaning that if something fails (probably a HD) when you take it to apple to get a new one they keep your old one with all your personal data on it, then refurbish it and use them again. That, in my eyes is not acceptable. Anybody with access to the internet and that knowledge could recover all sorts of data from a "refurbished" drive.
Other than that I have nothing against Apple products and would even run a copy of OS X, just a soon as they let me put it on my PC. Good or bad I like control over my computing experience.
