MAC vs PC for recording

[Monkeyfist]

I'm just learning on my Ibook, but, garageband is a pretty simple prgram to navigate (plus it comes with it free), and I haven't had any problems with it getting bogged down yet. PC's, I just have a bad taste in my mouth about them. I worked Cubase, Soundforge, Cakewalk, all really frustrated me, all froze, crashed, memory dumped. So that is honestly just one persons experience. I have plenty of friends that use them (PC's) without to many problems, and enjoy all the software available for them. So my suggestion, do some serious research into what you want and what both types offer, whiegh out the differences and get more input from people.

[trask]

I have been recording for years on cassette four-track with very little outboard gear--just for personal demos. I can finally afford to jump into recording on computer but do not own one at the moment. I have used very basic programs like Garageband and found it's limitations are fine with me. I can afford a Mac, but could get a similar PC built through a friend for less than half the price and THAT is appealing to me! I am unfamiliar with any simple recording software available for Windows. Any recommendations--is there freeware or something I should buy? Is there an easy-to-use piece of hardware that functions like a Griffin IMic? I also need practical advice on how much memory I might need, as I found a 40gig powerbook G4 got dragged down pretty quickly with my GB experiments. Thanks for your help!

I've been using Cool Edit, which is now Adobe Audition, for about 3-4 years now, and I've loved it. Easy to use, but has tons of features tucked in there. I still learn new things every time I record (I'm not big on reading manuals), and it can do basically anything I need. The other plus, is that if your computer DOES crash for whatever reason, or if the power goes out in your house, it'll restart from where you left off, except for any unsaved WAV files. But once you get in the habit of saving them after you record, it's not a big deal at all, and doesn't take but 15 seconds to do.

[wedge]

I like PCs... I love Macs... I've been fruitful on both, and my current comp is a PC. My next comp is going to be an intel Mac, so I'll be able to run anything I need/want to... No more hard choices... If an interface works better in one os than another, I'll record in that os... It'll be cool!!!

[KyleHale]

Im running boot camp on my mac pro so I can record in windows since there isnt any free audio apps on the mac. It almost seems like a double negative, but its my only option right now. I havent had any problems with boot camp... I would personally like to be running in logic or pro tools on my mac, but cant afford the hardware. Ive run audio apps on windows for years and havent had any huge problems. I think the main thing is GUI appeal and we all have to admit, Mac has a cleaner and nicer looker GUI.

[John Jeffers]

Im running boot camp on my mac pro so I can record in windows since there isnt any free audio apps on the mac.

What about Audacity? I've never used it so I don't know what it's capable of, but I know that it's a free audio app that runs on the Mac.

[stratology]

Not many people try to write viruses for the Mac because the market is so small compared to PC's.

The 'security through obscurity' argument is a myth. Have you read about the easily cracked swipe credit cards that tried this approach?

Macs do not allow software to be secretly installed, so spyware is simply not possible.
Look at the way users are set up on Macs: administrators do not have root privileges by default, and the root user is disabled by default. Simple, common sense measures like that make a huge difference.

2ghz mac is MUCH faster than a 2GHZ PC.

How do you suppose that's possible when everyone is using basically the same hardware these days? How can a Core Duo processor be any faster on the Mac vs. the PC?

It actually is possible - when the OS is capable of fully using the resources of multiple processors or multiple cores (as opposed to relying only on applications). Multiprocessor Macs have been around for ages...


The biggest advantage of using Macs is OS X, and when you are very familiar with it, the differences to a Windows box are indeed huge...

[John Jeffers]

Not many people try to write viruses for the Mac because the market is so small compared to PC's.

The 'security through obscurity' argument is a myth. Have you read about the easily cracked swipe credit cards that tried this approach?

Macs do not allow software to be secretly installed, so spyware is simply not possible.
Look at the way users are set up on Macs: administrators do not have root privileges by default, and the root user is disabled by default. Simple, common sense measures like that make a huge difference.

I was talking about viruses, not spyware. Different animal. I've been a sysadmin for a long time and seen enough to believe that *any* system can be compromised given enough time and expertise. Anyway, arguing this is pointless because the fact is that Mac does not have the market share of Windows, so we can both stand by our points until that happens and one or the other is disproven. For now, we all get the benefits of being under the radar of virus writers, however long that lasts.

Oh yeah, I agree with you that OSX is much smarter about root permissions than Windows has been in the past (glad to see they're finally addressing that when Vista comes out). But don't forget that many viruses rely on social engineering to propagate. It only takes one cleverly disguised virus to get someone to type in the root password because that person thinks it's a legit app, then there goes your permission-based security.

How do you suppose that's possible when everyone is using basically the same hardware these days? How can a Core Duo processor be any faster on the Mac vs. the PC?

It actually is possible - when the OS is capable of fully using the resources of multiple processors or multiple cores (as opposed to relying only on applications). Multiprocessor Macs have been around for ages...

The biggest advantage of using Macs is OS X, and when you are very familiar with it, the differences to a Windows box are indeed huge...

Bold statement. Care to back it up? BTW, multiprocessor Windows has been around since Windows NT, ten plus years. It's not like Microsoft is new to this game.

[stratology]

John, I agree with most of your statements. Claiming that OS X is invulnerable would be very naive. Still, if an OS 'features' over 120 000 viruses, this might say something about the quality of the code.
OS 9 had similar market share as OS X, there still were a few, mostly harmless, viruses (less than 150). Security through obscurity didn't work back then, either.

You are right that social engineering (or getting physical access) are the most promising routes to compromise a Mac.

Now about multiple cores and processing speed:
OS X supports multithreading and symmetrical multiprocessing. Here's a quote from David Pogue's 'Missing Manual' for 10.4:
"Macs containing more than one processor chip are nothing new. But before Mac OS X, only specially written software - Adobe Photoshop filters, for example - benefited from the speed boost.
No more. Mac OS X automatically capitalizes on multiple processors, sharing the workload of multiple programs (or even multithreaded tasks within a single program), meaning that every Mac OS X program gets accelerated. Mac OS X is smart enough to dole out processing tasks evenly, so that both (or all) of your processors are being put to productive use."

For the Windows side: I had an opportunity to work with a Windows only IT consultant a short while ago. Quote from one of his articles in a local paper:
"The hottest new desktop PC technology is dual-core processors (...). Problem is, there are few mainstream multithreaded programs on the market. If you use Photoshop CS2 (...), you will notice a significant performance difference. But the overall speed increase with other programs is modest at best."

Sounds a bit like a description of OS 9...

Frank

[SteveE9C6]

I'm currently running a AMD X2 3800 dual core system with win xp and Sonar 6PE. For sure, this utilizes the dual core.

At this point, the only difference between the new Macs and PC's is the OS. With multiple universal binary drivers coming online and dual platform programs becoming more common, the line blurs furthur. Computers/DAWS are simply tools. True 64 bit processing and access to gobs of fast RAM is fixing to really take off.
Intel just released it's first quadcore. AMD is releasing their quadcore in December. Pricing on the new core duo and the AMD X2 chips will fall. New mobos, optimized for quad core, and utilizing very fast buss speeds are coming. Vista is finished as of today and is being manufactured as we sit here.

If anyone hasn't figured it out.... the next few months may bring quantum leaps in DAW power.. be it Mac or PC. The big question is... are the software developers keeping up?

neat stuff...

[jeddypoo]

Im running boot camp on my mac pro so I can record in windows since there isnt any free audio apps on the mac. It almost seems like a double negative, but its my only option right now. I havent had any problems with boot camp... I would personally like to be running in logic or pro tools on my mac, but cant afford the hardware. Ive run audio apps on windows for years and havent had any huge problems. I think the main thing is GUI appeal and we all have to admit, Mac has a cleaner and nicer looker GUI.

There are lots of free Mac apps, both DAWs and plugins, many of which are great- and Garageband is like 80 bucks or something, if you want to use that.

[hammertime]

Apple stuff sucks. They just package overpriced mediocre hardware with a bunch of glossy packaging and brushed aluminum, fluff it up with a bunch of hip "alternative" (and false and misleading) advertising, and then watch as peope eat it up. True, though, if you're a complete knucklehead, and you can't handle your own file management and driver updates, you can pay twice or three times what you should for a computer. All this crap about viruses and spyware -- I've been on a million porn sites, and I've almost never had a virus. It's a situation which, at least on the home computer level (aside from corporate networks and such) is totally blown out of proportion by people trying to sell you anti-spyware (which by the way you can get for free -- I'm using AVG anti-virus and the firewall built into my router).

[John Jeffers]

Oh, hammer. Why can't you ever play nice? I don't know why I'm bothering to reply, but here goes.

Have you ever owned a Mac? Not just played with one in a computer store for 10 minutes, but actually owned one and used it for a while? I use Mac, Windows, and Linux machines at home and at work almost every day. Apple stuff doesn't suck. OSX is a really nice operating system, and Mac hardware seems fine to me. And some people actually value the thoughtfulness that Apple puts into their product design.

Viruses and spyware are "crap"? Obviously you've never had to support Windows machines other than your own. Viruses and spyware are real problems. I've spent literally hundreds of hours cleaning that crap off of Windows machines that were used by people who didn't know any better.

[hammertime]

True, I've never supported any computer other than my own (except for my brother, and dad, and a few friends). As I said, there are a bunch of people who are dumb enough to do things everybody warns them against, e.g., opening an attachment in their emails, or loading up an executable file that they shouldn't, or whatever. And being on a corporate network is a totally different issue. But for a personal consumer, the whole virus thing is just misleading, and it definitely isn't a selling point. It's been totally blown out of proportion by Apple and the security industry (norton, etc) to get you to spend money that you don't have to. I haven't owned Apple stuff in a while. The one thing that is good about Apple's as far as I know, is that they work out of the box with music apps. If that's worth a couple of grand to you, then go ahead. I wish I had the money. In reality, there is no such thing as a "PC," which is why alot of them don't work out of the box. There are a million different hardware configurations, and there isn't even one Microsoft Windows anymore. Each manufacturer (HP, dell, etc) has there own version of Windows Media center bundled on their machine, which further complicates life. Either build your own, or be aware of the fact that there is no such thing as a "PC." Or get an Apple and be a knucklehead.

[stratology]

Apple stuff sucks. They just package overpriced mediocre hardware with a bunch of glossy packaging and brushed aluminum, fluff it up with a bunch of hip "alternative" (and false and misleading) advertising, and then watch as peope eat it up. True, though, if you're a complete knucklehead, and you can't handle your own file management and driver updates, you can pay twice or three times what you should for a computer.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA (sniff...)

[stratology]

Here's another good one that I heard a few days ago:

'The problem with Apple computers is that they don't have enough USB ports'.