Mac Or Pc

[ropingk]

Looking at a Mac MD 101 wanting to do some recording i can get a dell PC a lot cheaper bigger screen but everyone telles me if you going to do recording go for the Mac

What says you guys????????

[SubLunar]

Makes no difference as long as they are of similar specifications.

The whole debate might have had some truth to it back in the early days of computers when macs had come with better video cards and were thus better suited for video. Almost immediately, however, PC's caught up (and in some ways surpass them in all such regards) and ever since then it doesn't really make a difference. It seems all graphic designers and people in the art world still buy into it, but they fail to justify it when asked-they're just following the herd and have no technical reasons for this claim. Hell, macs use intel processors now anyways.

I record just about every day, and have been doing so for years, on a PC that I custom built.

Are you more familiar with macs or PC's?

The more important question is what audio interface and microphones are you, or will you, be using?

[ropingk]

have you hear of the Per Sonous system its a cheap interface you can get it with the condinser mic and headphones and cables and the interface (I bought it last saturday for $179) I ahve alwasy wanted to mess with recording and decided it was time I ahve never used a mac but i have a freind that used grage band all the time and some of his work is pretty good

[SubLunar]

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/recordin ... ing-bundle

This? Looks pretty decent for the price.

What computers are you looking at? You mentioned the Mac md101 but not the dell.

[ropingk]

the dell is one of the all in ones they look pretty cool almost like a really big lap top i forgot the model the price is close to the same

[SubLunar]

What operating system on the Dell? Windows 7 or 8?

You'll probably be fine either way. Considerations for the mac: a 13 inch screen is rather small. But if you know someone who uses garageband, then you automatically have support for learning how to record on the mac. No driver installation to worry about.

Considerations for the PC: the bundled Studio One software would be your recording software (unless you use something else). And they have a forum you can go to for questions. But you'll have to get the drivers for the interface installed and that can get tricky sometimes.

On either computer, latency will be your biggest concern. If you don't want a delay between what you're playing and what comes out the headphones, you adjust the sample rate to get it as close to 0 latency as possible before you experience the annoying popping and cracking that comes with cheaper hardware. In this case, it looks like you'll be able to achieve about a 5ms delay with this interface. This is a limitation of that hardware over USB.

[ropingk]

what system do you use??? what do you record????

[SubLunar]

Actually, that presonus claims to have zero latency monitoring as long as you're monitoring out the headphone jack so that should be sufficient*.

I use the Delta 1010LT PCI card as my recording interface in a desktop PC that I custom built. It's a bare bones setup but it's a very powerful and high quality interface. But I had issues with it when I started migrating to Windows 7. So I went back to XP on this machine. Works great and since this computer has never been connected to the internet and I don't need to move it around, I have nothing to worry about.

When I upgrade, I'm probably going to get the Mackie Onyx Blackbird. It's 499 brand new but there are others out there that can achieve 0 latency for less.

I record guitar mostly but also keyboards, bass, drums, etc. I use Shure SM57 mics for most things. On my guitar amp I use one SM57 and one SM58 because I have two different cabs and I like the sound of these two different mics mixed together better than two SM57s.

[SubLunar]

* the problem with latency will come up when you're doing a live recording while playing back something already recorded, like overdubs. Reading reviews of this device (I assume this is your device), some users report things like this:

The latency is low for software monitoring (7ms or less on mac, ~9-10ms on Windows)

CPU under 1.5Ghz = noticeable latency. The faster your computer, the less problems you'll have with latency.

To get around latency, you would have to monitor your input from the Audiobox rather than from the program you are recording with.

[Meester Beeg]

The Mac or a PC?

Isn't the Mac a PC?

(Been using macs since 1984)

[Nicotti]

Isn't the Mac a PC?

Nope, best used as a doorstop.

I know, them's fightin wurds!

[ropingk]

its as bad as the Chevy vs Ford and we all knwo
Id rather push a chevy than drive a ford

[Meester Beeg]

PC means personal computer, no?
Th Mac IS a PC.

BTW-remember those "Intel inside" ads on TV?
They were done on Macs.
I had a guy tell me once his Harley was better as a boat anchor than my bike was as a motorcycle.

I offered him a chain. Form before function.

[SubLunar]

PC means personal computer, no?
Th Mac IS a PC.

Since basically ever, people have referred to non macs as "PCs" (or IBM compatibles) and macs as a separate thing called a mac. Yeah they're both personal computers but how else do you differentiate? There's tons of different PC manufacturers out there and only one Mac. So the differentiation kind of stuck.

BTW-remember those "Intel inside" ads on TV?
They were done on Macs.

No.. So?

Form before function.

As a Jeep owner, I thoroughly disagree. Function before form. Especially when it's something I'm buying to perform a specific function. As a cheap bastard and a technical kind of person, I recognized long ago that I could build my own high powered computer for much cheaper than I could buy a pre-made one for. And then above that, there were the over priced and proprietary Macintosh systems. Then there's their aesthetics. Their design process always seemed to be "Whitewash everything, pastel everything else" and you can't change the look of the UI. All my PCs have custom themes because why not.

[SubLunar]

Looking at a Mac MD 101 wanting to do some recording i can get a dell PC a lot cheaper bigger screen but everyone telles me if you going to do recording go for the Mac

What says you guys????????

To summarize if you've never done recording on a computer, there's going to be a learning curve. If you know someone familiar with Garage Band on a mac, then you might want to go that route since you'll have someone to ask questions of. You don't have to use the bundled software that comes with your kit, your hardware will work with any Digital Audio Workstation, such as Garage band or whatever else.

Without knowing the type of Dell you're looking at it's hard to say what best suits your needs. Either way, the recording software will probably take a while to learn.

Personally I stick to Windows based PC's for recording because I save money by building them myself. But I am familiar with technical aspects of computers and configuring complicated software to work with complicated hardware. My room is always covered in microphone, midi and instrument cables. And that's before I hook up the big ol analog mixer..