hey guys, im thinking of upgrading my computer unit..i was wondering can anyone point out parts for a PC to buy. im getting a friend of mine to put it all together so i want to create a computer system that will be easily able to cope with heavy vst's and alot of samples. basically i want the fastest best possible system for 1200 euro..i dont need to buy keyboard screens, just the main tower..sorry for annoying you guys but i have no clue about motherboards and the best ram etc so im unable to select whate system i should create..by the way, i use cubase and reason so maybe there are certain specs tat cope with these applications better??

thanks again

this is big help..im really startin to understand what i need..a friend of mine posted this link to me and said this is best update for my current system..it will replace my processor motherboard and ram...http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=338524
is their any better i can get??

so finally to sound card...i have no idea where to start..that upgrade kits costs 380, then ill leave aside 100 euro to reducing noise of pc and maybe another 100 for hard drive. that leaves me with roughly 500 euro for a sound card...any suggestion???what do most dance music producers use as sound card??

Re sound cards: Not really, no. You'll want an external audio interface unit. If you go rummaging through magazines like www.soundonsound.com or Electronic Musician and such, they regularly review these, and select their choice for product of the year or editors choice or whatever. It's usually a good benchmark for good equipment.

Re computer: Over the weekend, I taxed my pc to it's limits, and need more processing power, so I'm PC shopping as well. A typical audio PC doesn't have much of anything different from a normal PC. The only difference are your priorities. Processor/motherboard capability comes in at #1, followed by hard drive security, hard drive speed, and ram(in no particular order).

When you're looking to upgrade, there's a lot of potential pitfalls, like paying a lot of money for little benefit, or compatibility issues. In my experience, the best place to look for information that I know of is http://www.anandtech.com.
At the top of their site is a tab titled GUIDES. Read their mid-range buying guide, make sure you read at least the conclusion pages of their articles, and work from there. It's not their newest guide, but the information is still pretty much accurate. I have used AnandTech as my PC component compass for years now, and it has never let me down. Actually, heres a direct link to a solid PC spec, with a few extras that you wont need(vid card, peripherals, etc).

For a realistic idea of benchmarks, you probably will not need more than a $250-300 (american) processor, a $100ish motherboard, and you don't need the best ram. Heck you probably will be fine with 2 gigs, especially if you're relatively new to production. Just make sure you give yourself an upgrade path. There is no sense wasting money on the best pc money can buy if you cannot utilize it. Save that money or use it more wisely on a good midi controller or something.

Last edited by MOK on Mar-25-2008 at 19:33

1tb of ram , oh my god am i dreaming

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quote:

Originally posted by benoster 1tb of ram , oh my god am i dreaming

What OS and hardware platform can even use that much? Thats crazy!

(or are we talking 1tb distributed over a server farm/cell?)

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What?

i think the fact that the advice came from ******** should be enough for you guys not to bother with it. lawl

any high end dual is good these days, the new exxx series dual core (45nm chips) are quite good.. what DAW do you use? Some DAW's use quads better than others do, in which case a dual is the right option..

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quad 2.4
2gb ram (2x1gb sticks dual channel)
320gb hd

anything more is a waste imo.

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quote:

Originally posted by DJ Robby Rox I've never had a problem with FLs tech support till this day. (I've actually never used it till this day)

quote:

Originally posted by floyd741 i think echosystm is a pretty cool guy. eh pwns robby rox and doesn't afraid of anything.

Actually, I'll piggyback this thread with a question:
Who here uses a RAID array?

I've been getting worried about the implications of a hard drive failure. You simply can't predict them, they're very random. Were my own hard drives to fail, I'd lose my record bag, my software, and my music projects. Very bad!
Redundancy with RAID means buying an extra hard drive, but perhaps its worth it... Given that money doesn't grow on trees around my parts, what do you folks think? Whats your experience?

quote:

Originally posted by MOK Who here uses a RAID array?

for desktops, don't bother, it is a complete waste of time and money. if you are going to use raid, use it for performance (striping), not redundancy.

the only time i have bothered with mirrored raid is when i have setup servers. i know these hard drives are going to be going full bore 24/7, so hard drive failure is a risk. these hard drives would be seeing as much work in one day as your music pc would get in a month.

hard drive failure is so rare these days it is not funny. data loss is far more likely to occur from viruses, power surges, user mistakes and so on. raid doesn't provide protection against any of this. i actually have a 500mb seagate drive from the 90s in my print server/proxy at the moment. going strong for over a decade.

time and time again i see dumbasses in the computer industry setting up raid and expecting it to be a complete backup solution. then they get a power surge on their point of sale and have to stop business for a week while they try to recover.

"i thought our system was foolproof"



people seem to be so attracted to the "1337ness" of raid, that logic goes completely out the window. "omfgz i r hax i got teh 1tb raid arrayz!111".

buy a second hard drive, put it in a usb case and do regular backups. only have it on/connected when you need to.

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quote:

Originally posted by DJ Robby Rox I've never had a problem with FLs tech support till this day. (I've actually never used it till this day)

quote:

Originally posted by floyd741 i think echosystm is a pretty cool guy. eh pwns robby rox and doesn't afraid of anything.

edit:

one more word of advice on backing up... always ensure your project files are independant. for example, when you save your project, don't have it pointing to "D:\Samples\" for all your samples. export them into the project folder. this way, when you are backing up, you don't need to keep backign up your samples dir etc.

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quote:

Originally posted by DJ Robby Rox I've never had a problem with FLs tech support till this day. (I've actually never used it till this day)

quote:

Originally posted by floyd741 i think echosystm is a pretty cool guy. eh pwns robby rox and doesn't afraid of anything.

quote:

Originally posted by echosystm edit: one more word of advice on backing up... always ensure your project files are independant. for example, when you save your project, don't have it pointing to "D:\Samples\" for all your samples. export them into the project folder. this way, when you are backing up, you don't need to keep backign up your samples dir etc.

That's currently what I do, and sound organization... But boy, I'm still worried. A friends HD failed recently, so perhaps that's the source of my paranoia. It does indeed happen. To be fair though, I think it was a power surge. Just need to make sure one has a good surge protector.

And on a side note, I don't think striping raid arrays actually improve HD access times by an appreciable amount. I read an overview about 3 years ago that claimed as much, anyways....

quote:

Originally posted by MOK And on a side note, I don't think striping raid arrays actually improve HD access times by an appreciable amount. I read an overview about 3 years ago that claimed as much, anyways....

access time depends on:
1. how fast the platter/read heads are
2. the density of the platter
3. if the data is in cache (or how much cache the drive has)

so, having two hard drives of the same speed, density and cache size will have little difference on access time. you are 100% correct. however, it does greatly increase the ammount of data that can be pushed through (think of it as bandwidth). although not particularly important to EDM producers, anyone doing a lot of recording will benefit from this, as more data throughput means lower buffers. it obviously also means big programs and sample banks load up quicker.

the downside of striped arrays is obviously that you're twice as susceptible to hardware failure and data corruption (if it is a shit controller). tbh, striped arrays are becomming less and less necessary. modern hard drives are already as fast as a raid array not too long ago haha... people only really do it for the leetness factor.

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quote:

Originally posted by DJ Robby Rox I've never had a problem with FLs tech support till this day. (I've actually never used it till this day)

quote:

Originally posted by floyd741 i think echosystm is a pretty cool guy. eh pwns robby rox and doesn't afraid of anything.