The Logic Off Topic list

Hi List,

NOTE: This is not intended as platform flaming! If you have problems with
MAC vs PC, stop reading...!

When viewing this list the majority of entries are regarding LAP on the PC
platform. Does that mean that there's a majority of PC users or that PC
users have more problems or are simply more active on this list?

This is just a question, not platform flaming or anything. The reason why I
ask this is because a friend of mine wonders if he's gonna go for the Mac or
the PC solution. I don't have any oppinion either way, but if the marked
tends to move towards PC I'll suggest that he do that too.

The reason why he's uncertain is because lots of musicians advice him to go
for Mac, but his wallet, experience and "instinct" says PC...

Any constructive thoughts regarding this issue? I am interrested in price vs
performance, stability, future support, current external hardware support,
etc.

And please no silly replies that Mac has better looking icons etc... ;)

Best regards

LV

Hi Lars,

>The reason why he's uncertain is because lots of musicians advice him to go
>for Mac, but his wallet, experience and "instinct" says PC...

I would say to him go with his wallet, experience and instinct.

>Any constructive thoughts regarding this issue?
I don't know if the above is constructive, but that's what I would advise.

>I am interrested in price vs
>performance, stability, future support, current external hardware support,
>etc.
Seems to me that you have already pretty much addressed all this in the 
earlier parts of your post. Vis, roughly speaking, Macs SEEM to be more 
expensive, Macs SEEM to be more stable, PC people SEEEM to be in need of 
more support at present and will probably get more of it in the future, 
PC's SEEM to have more in the way of external hardware support etc. The big 
SEEM's are my attempt to avoid rancorous debate on those issues.

>And please no silly replies that Mac has better looking icons etc... ;)
Doing my best not to give a silly reply. Pretty much of a muchness all this 
in the end.

The end result's in the music you make, and the comfort and ease in which 
you can make it. Lots of people in MAC land making music in comfort and 
ease. Lots of people in PC land making music in comfort and ease.

Personally, I'd go with where we started above: wallet, experience and 
instinct. The rest's down to how much these things have let him down in the 
past. Which is a whole other ball game. You got any good stories about him 
in that department you want to share??!!!!!

Kool Musick
Keep Musick Kool


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I can only say what my experiences from the past teached me:
Macs for a long time seemed (or SEEMED, as Kool Musick would've said) to be
the more stable choice.
By myself I had true nightmares configuring a PC as an audio workstation
back then (like 4-5 years ago). But then, I was running a buggy version of
Cubase with an audiocard that doesn't deserve the name (a way too expensive
TerraTec EWS64), no proper drivers until now.

But then, in the meantime I am on my 4th audio machine (well, one only was
some refreshed older one), and the last three machines all worked pretty
well.
So, if that was one part of your question: Yes, it is possible to build a
reliably working audio PC.
I highly recommend looking at some recommended hardware though. Also make
sure the mainboard and chipset is no crappy cheap stuff. I would stay away
from stock PCs, one should rather rebuild a one other persons are using
sucessfully.
In teh end, if necessary, I can use my machine in a professional environment
any day, I'm sure it wouldn't fail or crash more than any other machine
(Macs included). Actually Logic hardly ever crashes on me at all unless I'm
testing some new stuff, such as weird VST plugins.

Also, so far PCs offer more computing power, especially for the money. But
then, in early spring there seems to be a new 1600mHz Mac (don't know the
exact figures) which should really rock. Personally I wouldn't like to even
think about the price though...

In the end I think that Macs still *might* be a slight bit more stable
statistically, but that might have to do a lot with the fact that it seems
to be a common PC user habit of stuffing the machine with all kinda funny
hardware (such as cheap and crappy soundcards) and to install every stupid
little freeware app ever.
If you try to stay away from that, buy quality hard- and software, there
should not be too much issues when going the PC route.
I build a number of PCs for friends, from relatively low cost ones to pretty
much high end machines and all of them are just running fine.

Sorry if this sounds a bit PC biased, but I simply don't know enough about
Macs to say anything (be it good or bad) about them.

Regards,
Sascha

I was just thinking that macs posted just as many problem posts if 
not more. maybee i cant count.
A lot of pc traffic at the moment is due to the w2k compatability 
with 4.8.1. When there is a development on the mac front, you get 
more mac posts.
The poll did show that there were slightly more pc users than mac , 
but we will never really know if that is true list representation or 
not.
I know for a fact[that little word fact may start a war] that macs 
dont really have a stability advantage over a well configured pc, for 
audio, unless you want TDM, but this is the thing, are you or your 
friend able to configure, a pc.
I went pc because my flatmate is a pc tech. Then i learned that you 
needed to be an audio software/hardware tech as well, as audio uses 
the computer diferently to office apps. Together we have built 
several succesfull audio pc's. You pick up what you need to know 
fairly easily.
Macs do seem easier to operate on first use, the os is nicer to use.
Pc's seem to have to power advantage for audio/logic at the moment.
[digitalnaturalsound]
Work out the price difference for each [mac and pc] WHOLE system, for 
machines that will acheive the same result, not for machines of equal 
cpu speed.
The bigest problem I run into on the computer is running out of horse 
power with plugins and vsti's. To upgrade mobo and cpu and ram on a 
pc is very cheap. what's it like to upgrade on a mac?
Emagic seem to suport macs better. I guess they think more pro's are 
on macs.
I would be very interested in their sales figures for the various 
logic versions on each platform.

Maak Bow

>But
>then, in early spring there seems to be a new 1600mHz Mac (don't know the
>exact figures) which should really rock. Personally I wouldn't like to even
>think about the price though...

The prices usually the same, but the processing gets better. Its the same 
thing with hard disks, CDRs, etc. The prices are essentially constant 
after they come down, then the horsepower keeps increasing for the same 
cost. Entry Mac towers are always about $1600.


>If you try to stay away from that, buy quality hard- and software, there
>should not be too much issues when going the PC route.

If you go to all of the trouble to custom build a PC like you did, are 
you really saving money and trouble? Sounds like a lot more trouble in 
research, compatibility issues, quality issues, component buying, 
construction, etc.


>Sorry if this sounds a bit PC biased, but I simply don't know enough about
>Macs to say anything (be it good or bad) about them.

That distinction was what the guy was asking for ...

> The poll did show that there were slightly more pc users than mac ,
> but we will never really know if that is true list representation or
> not.


I'm quite sure that poll is not very representative. :-(
One thing we know for sure: this list does not represent the "average 
user". Some marketing people at Emagic explained this to me. I forgot 
the reasoning behind it, but it made sense.

> I know for a fact[that little word fact may start a war] that macs
> dont really have a stability advantage over a well configured pc, for
> audio, unless you want TDM, but this is the thing, are you or your
> friend able to configure, a pc.

Even TDM doesn't guarantee stability.

-- 
Joeri Vankeirsbilck
joeri@...

Belway Productions      -     http://www.belway.com
List-admin   Logic-users/SoundD*ver-users/Logic-TDM

Hi,

> Any constructive thoughts regarding this issue? I am interrested
> in price vs
> performance, stability, future support, current external hardware support,
> etc.

A PC dedicated and built as a DAW wins in every point you just mentioned.
No bias - I'm lucky enough to have both platforms.

Best regards,
Adam P