why OS X and a MAC instead of a PC and XP ??

[Rigsby]

The thing i've found with macs is that your machine and it's compatibility to new mac products gets old pretty quickly. . . . If you'll have the money to get a new machine again in a few year's time, i'd go mac for their running et al, otherwise go PC.

Just my 2 pence.

I feel exactly the opposite- my current machine that I run Pro Tools on (rock solid) was introduced in 1999. I have no compatibility issues, other than ones Digidesign has imposed.

It's a G4/400, and I can upgrade it to a 1GHZ or more for under $300 and keep it running even longer.

I guess I've always thought that was one of the strong suits of a Mac- longevity and resale value.

I guess what i mean is that macs have changed their hardware interfaces a fair bit over the years and compatibilty with newer models isn't there as they don't stock older components and parts (least not in the Uk).

[Family Hoof]

I run a PT TDM system off a Powermac 9600 w/G3 processor upgrade from 1997-1998. It's all based on the old school 5MB/s SCSI. Works exactly the same as it did when new, very stable, and shows no signs of quitting. I could never imagine a PC from the same time period performing like this.

[maz]

The thing i've found with macs is that your machine and it's compatibility to new mac products gets old pretty quickly. . . . If you'll have the money to get a new machine again in a few year's time, i'd go mac for their running et al, otherwise go PC.

Just my 2 pence.

I feel exactly the opposite- my current machine that I run Pro Tools on (rock solid) was introduced in 1999. I have no compatibility issues, other than ones Digidesign has imposed.

It's a G4/400, and I can upgrade it to a 1GHZ or more for under $300 and keep it running even longer.

I guess I've always thought that was one of the strong suits of a Mac- longevity and resale value.

I guess what i mean is that macs have changed their hardware interfaces a fair bit over the years and compatibilty with newer models isn't there as they don't stock older components and parts (least not in the Uk).

Yeah, you're right about that- I have a box of old SCSI junk in my garage that I keep thinking someone is going to find one day and offer me $35 for.

Then there's the whole ADB mouse and old printer port. Then Firewire. All that stuff kind of sucked to change over. But the boxes themselves seem fairly useful for a long time, as long as you can stay connected to them!

[apropos of nothing]

Man I'd get a Mac in a second if I could afford one.

OSX is bees' knees. Its a nearly perfect windowing system on top of a freaking great Unix, and the windowing system is so perfect that many of the Mac users don't know that there's another layer to the OS. Awesome.

I'm excited by the core audio aspect too. I wish there was a platform-independent open-source audio-card addressing scheme. Can you imagine how great a Linux DAW would be? You could run that shit on a P2 and be blazing.

There's just no way I could afford a Mac, though. Just not in my price-range.

So its tuning my damn OS all the time and whatever. Oh well. I've had pretty decent luck with my Windows installs. Current 2k install has been running reasonably well for about two years. Its getting time to redo it, but I've been lazy and in the midldle of stuff. Prior to that, I had a '98 install on the same machine that ran fairly well (believe it or not) for about a year and a half or two years prior to that, without many major hitches.

'Course this machine has been connected to the internet for about maybe an hour of its total lifespan, and I count that as a major factor in its longevity and reliability. DAW's not on internet is a religious tenet for me.

Edit: With that in mind, I'm reserving the right to laugh at the Mac security by obscurity crew the first time some abitious hacker writes an OS X security exploit. /dons,asbestos suit

[FishB8]

Can you imagine how great a Linux DAW would be?

www.ardour.org

[48volt]

I wish there was a platform-independent open-source audio-card addressing scheme. Can you imagine how great a Linux DAW would be? You could run that shit on a P2 and be blazing.

There's just no way I could afford a Mac, though. Just not in my price-range.

So its tuning my damn OS all the time and whatever. Oh well.

You pay for a PC with time, blood, sweat and tears when u have to install obscure drivers and upgrade patches cos there are tuns of testing MS security. I was a PC user by default for years and when I finally could afford a Powerbook there was no turning back. For music the Mac is great; granted it's not the best bang for your buck when it comes to runnin umpteen plugins and tracks. I have a PC still but uggh do I hate having to sit there and constantly trouble shoot it!

Now about LINUX, thats a whole other stew of trouble. I came into contact with a DJ tunning Tracktor on a linux machine. The interface is just plain weird! All the left-brain command line work really takes me off track from enjoying music.

[apropos of nothing]

I will run Ardour.

As soon as someone writes an ALSA Driver for my soundcard, cuz I don't have jing to replace it.

Time, blood, sweat and tears? I came into the world with that! ...Unlike money.

[spankenstein]

I haven't used macs much but I'll comment anyway

I have almost no problems with my DAW. I use it for recording. I don't spend a lot of time on the internet on it other than downloading plugins or mp3s. I don't change it. I don't play games on it. It stays working.

I work at a computer company (we build Linux clusters) so I get PC hardware CHEAP. The Macs sure do look pretty and OSX seems pretty cool but I can't, for me, justify the cost when my Windows PC runs just fine.

As of now I'm not worried about interoperability since I mostly do demo work for bands and they aren't going to be taking the sessions into any place else anytime soon. When that time comes though I know my software (SONAR) can export OMF files that nearly everythign can read (PT users have to dish out $500 for it though).

[brew]

I was diehard PC from about the age of 14 when I first got into computers, but now with OS X I am definitely seeing the Mac light. In my opinion, Mac wasn't a contender until OS X...

Still, I think starting with PC's is the only real way to hone your skills and computer savvy. I'd be totally clueless if I was Mac born and bred. I might liken it to starting out on acoustic guitar cause it's a little harder, then moving to electric. PC's allow for (and almost require) much more tweaking and fiddling, and because of their instability you get to learn about fun things like formating and installing OS's and partitioning and hardware etc which are applicable to any computer.

But there's still room for acoustic and electric. For younger folks interested in learning about how computers work, I'd definitely suggest PC. But if you're tired of fooling around, Mac is the way to go.

[48volt]

For younger folks interested in learning about how computers work, I'd definitely suggest PC. But if you're tired of fooling around, Mac is the way to go.

Nicely put!

[rhintz]

ok...so defrag and disk repair aren't the same thing...but is disk repair the closest thing for a mac to a defrag?

You are correct, running defragmentation and disk repair are two seperate processes. But, running disk repair is not the closest thing to a defrag! There are several companies that make notable software for defragging (optimizing) a disk. I prefer Micromat TechTool, but Disk Warrior and Norton are also decent.

[Tim Casey]

If you walk into a Mac retailer today and look at one of the new iMac G5s (which I did last night), your jaw will drop to the floor, you will sell whatever you have to, and you will purchase this work of art and worship it forever...

I thought it was just a monitor. A REALLY cool monitor that I would love to watch DVDs with. Then I figured out it was the whole computer.

For the size and shape of the monitor, and for all the peripherals built into it, the top-of-the-line iMac isn't really outrageous at $1999 (which is what I'm pretty sure it's going for).

http://www.apple.com/imac/

[jmiller]

A lot of good stuff has been said here, but i thought i'd add my two cents.

I use everything. I use PTHD systems at work on OSX, an office computer on OS9, and at home i have two XP Pc's i built (one for my wife after she ditched her old imac ), and a linux box i've slightly tinkered with. All those OS's can really warp my mind sometimes (doing command+key commands at work and CTRL+key commands at home).

Point is, i've seen all of them go very wrong at times. I've seen mac jedi's scratch their heads and wonder what the hell happened. I've seen PC's go bad. At some point, something will go wrong. You will have to know something at some point on how to correct it (just like you wouldn't own a tape machine if you didn't know how to do basic maintenance i.e. demags, etc.). So it comes down to what kind of problems you feel comfortable handling.

I've had my DAW PC since early 2001. It has run nearly flawlessly since then, except for a couple whoopsies (i accidentally installed a driver once without uninstalling the old one- didn't notice for a while but was easily fixed in 5 minutes), or acts of God (a hard drive failure- can and does happen on any platform- installed a new drive and dumped my backup on to it and was running again in about an hour). The problem with most pc's is that they are shitty pc's.

Despite everyone's (incl my own) grievances with microsoft, one thing about their OS is that you do not need their proprietary hardware to run it. This is a mixed blessing, because it keeps pc hardware competitive, so you can get descent parts at a fair price, but it also means their is a lot of shitty harware out there too. The suggestion to not be stingy with your computer purchase is excellent advice. A $400 E-machine or even a $400 dell will not be a great daw. But for the 900 to 1200 dollar range, with the right RAM and an audio drive, you could have a good machine that can last you quite a while, esp. if short on cash. If set up properly, (with a mozilla browser and email prog. to cut down security woes ) it will run very well. And i really don't think it's that hard. I'm confident my pc will continue to serve me well for at least another 3 years or so (by then it will be 6 or 7 years old), after perhaps a ram boost and a CPU upgrade. That will cost me a total of about $250 at most. If i decide that's not enough, i could even pop in a new mobo/CPU combo and keep all my drives the same for a nearly new computer for less than 4 or 500 bucks, which is considerably more economical than buying a whole new machine. This cannot be (easily) done on a mac.

I'm not making a case against macs, i just think most pc problems are due to crappy machines that were ill-informed purchases, and then are operated in the same ill-informed fashion. I think macs are a great product. You do get what you pay for, but you will pay for it. It comes down to what you are most comfortable with. To reiterate advice given elsewhere on this board, find the application you prefer most, and choose your computer around that. It's mostly a preference thing these days. And i hope linux rises in popularity and usability.

P.S.- the most reliable computer i've ever owned is my still-running 66mHz notebook running Windows 3; despite being dropped a million times and it's display barely still attached, it's never crashed in 10 years.

[Tim Casey]

I agree. I love Macs and hate Windows, but when someone brings up the price of a Mac, all I can think of is "how well can a $400 PC run my studio?".

And with both platforms, things go wrong and you have to know how to fix them. If you don't like reading manuals, you're going to be paying big bucks to have someone else do really simple fixits for you.

[phait]

I started this article on starting a little home studio getup and releasing an album all for under $5,000 but some points were brought up in another forum when I went looking for suggestions so I haven't finished it. I did however write about 1600 words about the first step - choosing a computing platform. I'll paste some stuff here - there are positives and negatives listed.

? PC / Microsoft Windows
+ several prebuilt brands are available such as: Dell, Gateway, Hewlett-Packard, Alienware and more...
+ Many commercial and freeware/shareware software options available
+ Windows XP has proven to, if properly configured, be a stable and well performing OS
+ You can build your own system to compete spec-wise with manufacturers, for much less or equivalent price range ($600 will get you a good system, not factoring the monitor). The benefit? You choose the parts (generic or brand-name reliable?) and can have a solid system.

- prebuilt systems seem to have a reputation of being unreliable. This is most likely due to the manufacturers using generic components and well - you get what you pay for.
- prebuilt systems also usually supply a system restore CD - this contains the actual Windows operating system, usually along with a host of other applications users typically do not actually use or need!. I also know of one person who bought a prebuilt that came with no restore CD. This may or may not have been the distributors fault.
- if you don't know how to build your own system (hey, I can tell you it's not hard, but would you agree?), it can seem daunting - especially if you know of nobody that can put it together for you.
- when you build your own system, each component manufacturer provides their own warranty - but you won't be getting customer support for the entire computer, as you would from Dell for example.

So, you might feel stuck. "Do I get a potentially unreliable prebuilt system, and depending on the configuration spend more than I need to, although get customer support and complete warranty, or do I build my own system, save money, and if I have problems, bring it to a friend, shop or troubleshoot it myself?" While I personally recommend a custom-built system to save money (because I know what I'm doing), this may not work best for you. You're going to have to weigh the options yourself.

If you do buy a prebuilt, do your research first! While a manufacturer may entice you with the latest deal, are you really getting a good deal? Check consumer reports, customer reviews and then compare and decide. Compare warranties and customer perks in addition to pricing.

? Apple / Macintosh
+ While even Macs are prone to errors and crashes, when they crash usually do not bring the operating system down with it, so you can often close the offending application and resume work. Although Windows XP operates similarily with some if not most crashes.
+ If you need to re-install the operating system, it's much more simpler and in my experience, quicker. Where you have to format a PC hard-drive completely empty, configure the drive and CD-ROM drive to use the installation CD, etc and fiddle around in the archaic DOS operating system, on a Mac you just slip the CD in and a much more intuitive interface is launched, formatting your hard-drive is straightforward if you need to do that, and the OS usually installs quickly.
+ Not as important as other factors, but I have to credit Apple's design team for their truly, works of art. I know we've seen some cool PC cases and such come out, but Apple is really innovative with their designs. You'll appreciate that.
+ This is always up for debate, but for some the Mac operating system is just easier to learn and use. Also, since Apple builds the hardware AND the operating system, they are integrated tightly, thus their reputation for stability and reliability. Another related bit to the system and OS union is that often when you plug devices into a Mac, they just simply work, right out of the box. PC's are getting better about this issue, but sometimes you are required to fiddle around just to get it working.

- Price. While Apple does offer the rather affordable eMac line under $1,000, their more powerful systems range from $1300 to $1500 and above, depending on system configuration. Some say though that the Apple/PC pricing difference really isn't too radical, and that the price you pay for Mac is certainly worth it for the long-term reliability.
- Sure, Mac and PC's share some applications like "Microsoft Office", but some PC favorites aren't on the Mac. But do realise there are Mac equivalents, and that there is also a wide variety of freeware and shareware apps for the Mac too.
- Minor, but Apple supplies their systems with a one-button mouse. Some people do not realise that the Mac does support 2-button mice! So if you're used to right-clicking (the Mac alternative is CTRL + click), by all means get a 2-button, and make sure it is Mac compatible.