Going for a new computer - please, some help will be cool

[Nestor]

Hello guys

Ok, I have been using Win XP for a long, long time already, as the foundation of my studio. As you know, I don’t like to be changing my system too often, it is too much of a hassle when you are in the middle of audio projects, and I am always in the middle of one.

As I have always been an advocate of concentrating myself in music first, and technology later, I have to say that this formula has given me many gifts and fulfillment, and of course, peace of mind too. What I most liked about it, was to completely forget about the system, like it if it wasn’t there. I have spent more money in outboard gear and instruments these years, and yes, it was a good idea.

Well, anyway, the time has come for a new machine nevertheless, due to the natural degradation of the hardware itself, which has started to give me some random errors that eventually drive me mad, most probably coming from RAM and Motherboard. I have done many tests and this is what I guess it is happening, so it is a good moment to build a new machine.

The problem is that I have been so disconnected to what is going on in PC technology and the so, that I have to start all over again learning the basics of all these new ways.

I will keep using the Pulsar 1 + I already have, but I know I will need to upgrade my drivers so to work in the new windows platforms offered today. I guess this is something about 150 Euros or something.

The first obvious question is: Which socket should I go for? I’d like to go for LGA 1150. How good it is for my old Pulsar 1 Plus? Has it been a stable platform for you guys?

I think that 16GB of RAM should be enough for a very good performance, even using lots and lots of samples. I have been able to use many samples in my projects in XP, having only 4GB…, so I guess it should be fine.

If I get the latest SCOPE drivers, should I go 64 bits OS, or just 32 bits?

How relevant it is for your DAW to get an SSD for your “C” partition?

A quad core i7 3.7 or 4, should be also enough for a good go.

I know I am asking knowledge from the last century guys! But I have been absent in technology for the last century too!

Any advice, comment, etc., would be greately appreciated.

After a while, I will post here my considerations and posibilities, so we can build up the best possible option.

Tnank you very much!

[garyb]

socket 1150 should be fine.

[stonberg]

Remember that to address the additional RAM you're thinking of, you'll need a 64-bit OS, which will mean 64-bit drivers throughout.

The price (for me) to upgrade to the latest version of Scope (i.e. from 4.1 to 5 IIRC), in order to get its 64-bit drivers, was 239 Euros. Perhaps a little steep for what was essentially a driver upgrade, but it is what it is.

As for OS, XP is still good but not supported any more by Microsoft. Windows 7 64-bit is pretty good; that's what I use in my main DAW workstation currently.

[Nestor]

Thanks guys

Well, then I will go with socket 1150

OS mmmm, don't know..., it seems that Windows 10 comes with a fix, finally, to all audio and multimedia related production. But I would probably go 64 bits Stonberg. Which is your experience with it?

Anyway, I will give myself a few days, as I have to know what I'm doing. I will build it myself, as always, and I don't want to mistake about compatibility.

What about PCI? Because, Pulsar cards work in PCI, not PCIe, I hope there are still motherboards with those old PCI slots...

[Nestor]

Asus motherboards have been exelent, I have used them most of the time. The two latest one have been Gigabyte nevertheless, but still like much more Asus, best stability I have seen so far.

[Nestor]

CPU, well..., I like this one, plainty of power already:

Intel® CPU Core i7-4790K 4.0 GHz (1150)

Mobo, it could be this one, I have read a little about it, and it seems good for what I do:

Asus® M/B Intel® Z97-K (1150)

RAM, should be studied a little for compatibility issues, I don't know much about new systems, but it could be something like this I guess:
Kingston® DDR3 16GB (2x 8GB) 1866Mhz PC3-14900 Fury

Videocard would be:
Asus® Video NVIDIA GeForce GTX750 Ti 2048MB GDDR5 OC

That should make a pretty good system for a long time.

[garyb]

the only fix in win10, is for things like games and movies. audio for the sequencer is handled by ASIO and with good reason. m$ has been claiming that WDM driver are the stuff since XP and it's never been true. even if it is this time, it doesn't matter for your uses.

[Nestor]

Thank you Gary. In that case, win 7 or win 8 for us?

[Nestor]

Stonberg, this is my price, because I have a 4 DSP card:

http://sonic-core.net/shop/product_info ... 4-DSP.html

[Nestor]

As always, I will use it for multimedia productions in general, and most of all for audio projects.

[garyb]

win7 or win8, it doesn't matter that much.

[Nestor]

win7 or win8, it doesn't matter that much.

Ok, cool.

the only thing I have heard over and over again, nevertheless, is that win 8 is rather irritating, becuase you need to do several steps to achieve the same things people used to achieve in xp. It is hard to believe, how will they go such a leap back in design.

Do you use 7 or 8 Gary?

What I'm most interested in, of course, is the much bigger amount of Ram and the compatibility with some new software that I would like to have. You tought me to keep simple when comming to systems, and over the years I have understood your repetitive advice, very, very well... I second it totally!

[garyb]

yeah, win7 is similar to XP, it's probably less trouble.

i use XP and win7.

[Nestor]

Ok, I see... Now, why do you still use xp, having 7? Aren't you waisting your ram amount this way?

[Mr Arkadin]

I only got my brand spanking new computer this year and opted for Windows 7. Having used Windows 8 on a work laptop it drove me nuts. If you're like me thenusic comes first, OS does not have to be the latest (and not necessarily the greatest just because it is newer). You have access to tons of RAM in W7 and 64-bit, what is 8 or 10 really going to offer any of us?

[garyb]

i don't need more than 4gb of ram.
my XP computer still works fine for the jobs that it does. why would i change it?
some of my favorite software might stop working, so unless there's something better...

if i need other or more, then i'll change it.

i record vstis to audio or freeze them, once they're composed. this takes no significant amount of time. i don't pretend to record orchestras and i mostly work with musicians, who are people that can actually play instruments, so i don't need to play band-in-a-box arrangements. my computer is very purpose driven. i have plenty of dsps, so i only need vstis for samples of special instruments, for the most part and for vst fx, i use very little. again, those parts can be recorded. also, i don't attempt a full mix while i'm creating. i wait to hear all the tracks together, then i mix. the XP machine is great!

[ronnie]

True. FWIW, I run my laptop (I7 4710MQ @ 3.4 Ghz, 32 GB RAM with SSDs) on Win 8 64 but in desktop mode (the "classic" GUI) even for things like Photoshop. I use this machine for Sonar and samplers, etc, on top of a MOTU 828 Mk II with ASIO and ADAT connected to my Scope box. All other audio drivers except MOTU ASIO are disabled. I also disabled all the Windows 8 "gadgets" like news, weather, appstore, etc., which steal bandwidth. I pick my updates after I've researched them, including the video drivers. nVidia has a lot of fine print on their latest drivers that one should check before updating. Win 8 is very stable and gives low latency after all tweaks are done including disabling wireless and Bluetooth. If I need the net for email and browsing I use hardwired Ethernet. I find that WiFi is the number one latency killer. However it is not as stable as my Scope desktop where I run Win 7 64. That box does not have the "horsepower" of the laptop but runs smoother. It is a humble 2.8 Ghz HP XW4600 Quad-Core with 8GB of RAM and a hybrid HD/SSD. It boots faster than the Win 8 laptop (under 30 seconds compare to 60). It runs Sonar and samplers just as well. All other audio except Scope is disabled and no WiFi. I am very grateful to garyb for steering me to that box as it was a very inexpensive way (under $250 plus the upgrade to Scope 5.1 64bit) to revive my Scope system (significant investment; 3 cards - Luna 2 +2496, Pulsar 2 and Pro with lots of plugs) after my Dell XP workstation died. If the humble (but industrial strength) XW4600 does a perfect job, what you have spec'd out should definitely be first class.

[dawman]

Z97 is really good and SSDs everywhere are cheap.
But I suggest a hybrid storage device with SSD speed and HDD writes and erases without penalty of garbage colloction and limited writes.

SSDs are awesome for streaming but the less you write and more you read the better things will be in terms of longevity and performance.
Unless of course you get an NVMe device....

[Nestor]

I only got my brand spanking new computer this year and opted for Windows 7. Having used Windows 8 on a work laptop it drove me nuts. If you're like me thenusic comes first, OS does not have to be the latest (and not necessarily the greatest just because it is newer). You have access to tons of RAM in W7 and 64-bit, what is 8 or 10 really going to offer any of us?

Yes I am like you in that regard.

Ok, it seems that most of you people tend to go 7, cool.

[Nestor]

i don't need more than 4gb of ram.
my XP computer still works fine for the jobs that it does. why would i change it?
some of my favorite software might stop working, so unless there's something better...

if i need other or more, then i'll change it.

i record vstis to audio or freeze them, once they're composed. this takes no significant amount of time. i don't pretend to record orchestras and i mostly work with musicians, who are people that can actually play instruments, so i don't need to play band-in-a-box arrangements. my computer is very purpose driven. i have plenty of dsps, so i only need vstis for samples of special instruments, for the most part and for vst fx, i use very little. again, those parts can be recorded. also, i don't attempt a full mix while i'm creating. i wait to hear all the tracks together, then i mix. the XP machine is great!

Well..., I have used XP untill now, many years already. But, of course, if I'm going to change my PC, that would be silly to go back to XP, having the posibility to go to win 7 for the same price. I do use much more ram than you, this is one of the reasons I would be interested in this change. I would build big, huge arrangments sometimes.