Jump to content

New PC for DAW work


philbo

Recommended Posts

  • Members

My tired ASUS mother board PC has finally died. It is about 9 years old, and slowly got sicker over time... First the built-in network card, then the on-board PATA controller. So I added USB Wifi, USB backup drive, USB-2/Firewire controller card, PATA drive controller card; etc. to keep it running till now.

 

Anyway, does anybody have suggestions for a decent Win PC for DAW work? (before you Mac maniacs jump in, I realize 'decent Win PC' is probably an oxymoron for you. Suffice it to say I won't be buying any Apple product, and move on.)

 

I need at least a couple open PCI slots, several USB ports & video. (my old PC had an 8x AGP card, which I understand to be horribly obsolete). It'd be nice to have enough throughput to do some basic video work too.

 

I'd like to stay under $1K. I'll need a couple new internal drives, since my current ones are all IDE-PATA.

 

Any suggestions would be most welcome.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I bought this Gateway system from Best Buy about 3 months ago. Runs like a charm. It has two video outputs for dual monitors, 8gb ram, 64-bit Win 7 and a drive bay on the front for swapping secondary drives. The only thing it doesn't have is Firewire but I use a MOTU 2408 mk3 so I didn't need that, but there is a slot available for a FW card if you need that and if you do, a dedicated TI card is probably best anyway and they're pretty cheap.

 

$999. I actually bought it just to edit video with Vegas but I couldn't resist replacing my studio PC with it. Frankly, I've never used anything but off the shelf systems in the studio, all from Best Buy. It's actually a "gaming system" but it works great for audio production.

 

1401118_rb.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Thanks Lawrence. Looks nice. I'm thinking that my aged audio interface (PCI card, 10-in/10-out, a defunct product from Terratec) will maybe need replacement too, and I'd like to maybe get both replaced while staying under the $1K mark.

 

Plus, since it's from Best Buy, I'd need to devote a couple of days of free time to removing Crapware from it before I could start using it...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I build my own. Have for close to 25 years. Started with the old 386 cpu's. Man Im getting old. Anyway, building your own can be an awarding experience and you will get better componenets than in a store bought unit. Plus you dont have to waiste time getting rid of all the crapware/bloatware that comes pre-installed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I agree; I built the current one & the one before. But I don't have the personal bandwidth to catch up on the last 9 years of PC evolution - - it looks like it would take several days of reading to get up to speed. I'm kind of looking to just put in an order & get back up & running as soon as I can manage.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Yeah, there was some crapware on the system but it takes all of 1/2 hour to uninstall all of it and also go in and shut off non-essential services you won't need. Not a big deal. Building your own system can certainly be less expensive and you can hand pick your components but I don't have the patience for that and (imo) most basic studio work doesn't really require custom components anyway... especially if your audio card is of the PCI variety.

 

Been running my studio for the last several years on an off the shelf AMD Core 2 Windows MCE system with no problems.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

I agree; I built the current one & the one before. But I don't have the personal bandwidth to catch up on the last 9 years of PC evolution - - it looks like it would take several days of reading to get up to speed. I'm kind of looking to just put in an order & get back up & running as soon as I can manage.

 

 

This probably makes a lot more sense these days as manufacturers will pretty much put in the components you request from what they have and save you money over buying them individually.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Yep, that's what I did. Went to a local PC store & told 'em what I want. They're building it & said it should be ready tomorrow.

 

Then, Murphy's Law kicked in. I came home, turned on the old one, and it booted right up! So now I'm backing up whatever wasn't already backed up to a 1TB USB drive. If it keeps running, I'll put it in the bar downstairs for the grandkids to play with when they come over.

 

I'll post what's in the new one & how it works when I get it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • CMS Author

 

Yep, that's what I did. Went to a local PC store & told 'em what I want. They're building it & said it should be ready tomorrow.

 

But you should know by now that everybody lives at least 250 miles from a dealer (of anything) so they have to shop on line. For people like that, there are companies like Rain Computing, ADK, and even big music dealers like Sweetwater who have built plenty of computers optimized for audio. It'll cost more than a Compaq at Best Buy and may or may not work better, but you'll have a good feeling that someone who knows what you're going to use the computer for put it together and tested it before putting it on the truck.

 

I have a local Micro Center store. The last two computers I've bought, including one for the studio, have been refurbished Dells from Micro Center. These had WinXP on them (my choice, still do) and the refurbisher loads on a special version (CD included) for refurbished machines that doesn't have a lot of useless (to us) stuff on it. Cleanup was pretty quick, though I did install a second hard drive, leaving the original (and fairly small) one for the operating system, and added more memory.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I agree; I built the current one & the one before. But I don't have the personal bandwidth to catch up on the last 9 years of PC evolution - - it looks like it would take several days of reading to get up to speed. I'm kind of looking to just put in an order & get back up & running as soon as I can manage.

 

Actually it's gotten a LOT easier to build your own than the last time you built one. But if you have a local dealer willing to put one together for you from quality parts, that's cool. I just don't like buying pre-built ones from the major manufacturers because of the crapware and OEM OS's and stuff they always put in there. I guess it depends what you're used to, but to me, getting rid of all that crap takes longer than putting a new system together from scratch. :D And I am NOT a hardware geek.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Amen, sister. I actually went to look at what Best Buy had, and couldn't get anybody to pay any attention to me for a very long time. Finally, one salesperson asked what I was looking for (anything with at least 1 PCI slot); when I told her, she looked up the cheapest model on-line and told me that wouldn't work, then pointed me to their most expensive one (the same one Lawence Farr got, see photo above), then walked away. I was highly impressed by the apathy and lack of commitment. It really reinforced my already strong opinion of Best Buy.

 

So I voted with my dollars; Barbs Computers (Cedar Rapids) got them instead.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

But you should know by now that everybody lives at least 250 miles from a dealer (of anything) so they have to shop on line. For people like that, there are companies like Rain Computing, ADK, and even big music dealers like Sweetwater who have built plenty of computers optimized for audio. It'll cost more than a Compaq at Best Buy and may or may not work better, but you'll have a good feeling that someone who knows what you're going to use the computer for put it together and tested it before putting it on the truck.


I have a local Micro Center store. The last two computers I've bought, including one for the studio, have been refurbished Dells from Micro Center. These had WinXP on them (my choice, still do) and the refurbisher loads on a special version (CD included) for refurbished machines that doesn't have a lot of useless (to us) stuff on it. Cleanup was pretty quick, though I did install a second hard drive, leaving the original (and fairly small) one for the operating system, and added more memory.

 

 

I don't know... around the midwest it must be different than in Falls Gulch...

Most cities with 50000 or more people have at least one or two stores. There are 3 in Cedar Rapids. I picked the one I did because I've bought from them before, and they have the lowest amount of on-line gripes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I was highly impressed by the apathy and lack of commitment. It really reinforced my already strong opinion of Best Buy.


So I voted with my dollars; Barbs Computers (Cedar Rapids) got them instead.

 

I hear you Philbo and agree 1000%. :)

 

You can't really walk into Best Buy, Guitar Center (insert chain store here) and expect sales people to be informed or to have any opinions on anything you plan to buy that will be any way relevant to you. You really have to kinda know what it is you're going to there to buy before you go there. With that in mind, I shopped systems on the net at various local places before actually buying so my only experience with the "sales people" there was to have them unlock the cage and get the box out for me, and ring it up. ;)

 

I don't generally shop at Best Buy (or GC) because the people there are helpful, I shop there because they have lots of choices. It's up to me as a educated consumer to decide what it is I want to buy and their only job is to type some numbers in the cash register. The times I have been curious about something during a random stop there I'd be more inclined to pull out my iPhone and surf the MFG website for details than to ask some part time employee about things they know nothing about.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

So I voted with my dollars; Barbs Computers (Cedar Rapids) got them instead.

 

:thu:

Barb knows computers and what a multi-tasker! She can be building a computer while talking to customers on her headset telephone and directing other employees at the same time!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • CMS Author

stores. There are 3 in Cedar Rapids.

We used to have several, and that's how I got my first 3 or 4 computers. They all just seemed to dissolve, though, at least the ones I used to know have.

 

Individuals who build a lot of computers, maybe even as few as one or two a year, seem to be happy ordering parts on line but I just hate to do that, particularly when parts are coming from different places. But since I get a new computer maybe every 3-5 years (I was running the same computer in the studio for 10 years before replacing it a little more than a year ago with one of those Dell refrubs) it's way too hard to figure out what I should get. There's no such thing as a 3 GHz Pentium any more. You got your dual cores at the bottom and 4 and 8 cores at the top, and I just want to edit stereo files. ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • CMS Author

I guess it depends what you're used to, but to me, getting rid of all that crap takes longer than putting a new system together from scratch.
:D
And I am NOT a hardware geek.

I don't think there's much hardware crap on a boxed computer, all the crap is with the software. I suppose that if you have your own Windows installation disk that can be authorized, you can just wipe out what's there and install the software as if you were doing it on a computer that you assembled yourself.

 

I don't know if it's still something to fear, but I was always concerned that without the original motherboard installation disk, there might be something for which the standard Windows driver doesn't work. I don't know if these refurbished Dells that I have are using anything other than what was on the Windows installation disk that they came with. The only thing I added to them was a Firewire card and that just found what it needed and worked. I guess that makes me an expert. ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I used to have my computers custom built for music..... compared to off the shelf, they were very expensive. Well that business went belly-up so I started looking for alternatives. I went into Best Buy and they were all over me. Answered all of my questions and looked up the one they couldn't answer on-the-spot. I think (IMHO) that we are a little past the day when the DAW/computer interface was unbelievably touchy. (I remember when an early version of Sonar would crash the computer.... because GASP--I had the WRONG video card in...don't hear about that much anymore.) I plan to do a little more shopping, but am looking for something that is good with music and photo editing. Compared to what I used to pay, $999 isn't much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

OK, so, I had a bit of an adventure getting everything running. The biggest hurdle was installing the 64 bit driver for my Audio Interface. Windows refused to do it. After a couple hours scouring various Win7 forums, and finding a lot of solutions that don't work, I found one that does.

 

So, here is the way to disable 'Required Digitally Signed Drivers' in Windows 7 (Premium Home Edition, but I have good reason to suspect it'll work on the other versions as well. Just follow the procedure below, substituting your driver filenames & paths for the ones I have listed. This may not work for driver installers that run as a Setup.EXE - - you have to get hold of and manipulate the driver files before Win 7 actually installs them.

 

To hopefully save some of you the grief I went through to make it work, here is a copy of my notes that I made for future reference, and to help the other 1 or 2 people in the world who use a Terratec EWS88 MT audio interface (man, am I ever lucky terratec updated the driver!):

 

To Install EWS88D_MT_App_Drv_2000_XP_XPx64_5.4 on Win 7 Premium Home Edition

=======================================

Download the 64 bit driver from:

http://ftp.terratec.de/Audio/EWS/88MT/Update/EWS88D_MT_App_Drv_2000_XP_XPx64_5.47.exe

 

Download the Certificate Generator from:

http://www.ngohq.com/home.php?page=dseo

 

Run EWS88D_MT_App_Drv_2000_XP_XPx64_5.47 & extract files (they go to C:TerraTec)

 

Rightclick dseo13b & run as administrator

Enable Test Mode->Next->Reboot

 

Rightclick dseo13b & run as administrator

Sign A System File ->Next

Copy & Paste these files & Paths into the window, and click OK, one at a time:

 

C:TerraTecEWS88 D_MTWindows 2000_XP_XPx64Driver 5.47Asio88mt.dll

C:TerraTecEWS88 D_MTWindows 2000_XP_XPx64Driver 5.47ews88wdm.inf

C:TerraTecEWS88 D_MTWindows 2000_XP_XPx64Driver 5.47ews88wdm.sys

C:TerraTecEWS88 D_MTWindows 2000_XP_XPx64Driver 5.47ews88wdm64.sys

 

Reboot.

WindowsKey-Break

Device Manager->Sound,Video and game controllers

Then Update Drivers->Browse My Computer for Driver Software

Browse to C:TerraTecEWS88 D_MTWindows 2000_XP_XPx64Driver 5.47

Reboot again a couple times (else the ASIO hooks won't show up in your DAW)

 

Note:

=====

If there was an attempt to install unsigned versions of these drivers, uninstall them by:

 

WindowsKey-Break

Device Manager->Sound,Video and game controllers

RightClick AudioSystem EWS88 MT->Uninstall->Delete Driver Softwawre for this Device

Then Update Drivers->Browse My Computer for Driver Software

Browse to C:TerraTecEWS88 D_MTWindows 2000_XP_XPx64Driver 5.47

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

But you should know by now that everybody lives at least 250 miles from a dealer (of anything) so they have to shop on line. For people like that, there are companies like Rain Computing, ADK, and even big music dealers like Sweetwater who have built plenty of computers optimized for audio. It'll cost more than a Compaq at Best Buy and may or may not work better, but you'll have a good feeling that someone who knows what you're going to use the computer for put it together and tested it before putting it on the truck.


I have a local Micro Center store. The last two computers I've bought, including one for the studio, have been refurbished Dells from Micro Center. These had WinXP on them (my choice, still do) and the refurbisher loads on a special version (CD included) for refurbished machines that doesn't have a lot of useless (to us) stuff on it. Cleanup was pretty quick, though I did install a second hard drive, leaving the original (and fairly small) one for the operating system, and added more memory.

 

That's what I'd have steered him towards as well. The 8-core Dell Precisions from 3 or 4 years ago can be had for $600-$700 on eBay, fully refurb'd and often with new hard drives. As far as CPU benchmarking they are still doing better than some of the current Core i7's - wow.

 

One of the things that I think fuels the fire of the "Mac vs. PC for pro audio" debate is that people don't go apples to apples (pardon the pun). Mac Pros are workstation-class machines, yet people put them up against Best Buy gaming rigs all the time. Mac Pros have Intel Xeon processors and error-checking RAM - this is server class stuff and I believe it contributes greatly to the stability of some of the Mac platforms I've used, so I went out and found a PC with the same stuff!:p

 

Other nice things about Dell Precisions:

 

-tons of internal drive bays, PCI slots, etc

-generally very roomy and clean inside the case; easy to crack open and work on

-certified by tons of ISV's (Independent Software Vendors) including Avid last I checked

-almost always have TI Firewire chipset already on the motherboard

-server / workstation class processors and ram

-very clean Windows installs with little if any bloatware

 

Anyway, best of luck with the custom built one - let's see a spec list when you get the chance!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • CMS Author

The 8-core Dell Precisions from 3 or 4 years ago can be had for $600-$700 on eBay, fully refurb'd and often with new hard drives.

3-4 year old 8-core computers? My, has time slipped by me fast. Two years ago I felt like I was getting a good buy on a Pentium 4 for about $300 and I don't think I'd even heard that there was an 8-core.

 

I'm sure some of those are being sold by legitimate refurbishment shops just using eBay as a storefront, but I just feel kind of creepy about buying a computer through an eBay seller. But then I feel creepy about buying anything through eBay, though I recognize that it's a way of life for some people. At least I'm buying from a real store. I probably pay more than I could (r get less computer than I could get for the same price) but I just feel more comfortable that way.

One of the things that I think fuels the fire of the "Mac vs. PC for pro audio" debate is that people don't go apples to apples (pardon the pun). Mac Pros are workstation-class machines, yet people put them up against Best Buy gaming rigs all the time. Mac Pros have Intel Xeon processors and error-checking RAM - this is server class stuff and I believe it contributes greatly to the stability of some of the Mac platforms I've used, so I went out and found a PC with the same stuff!
:p

I know even less about Apple computers than about PCs, but I know that there's a big break when they changed to Intel processors. Apples that were the top of the line for music workstations (G5?) are now going for peanuts and the current OS, required by all new Mac DAW software, won't run on them. At least if I have to move to Windows 7, I can do it on the Pentium 4s that I have now. They'll easily last me at least another 5 years.

 

Other nice things about Dell Precisions:

-tons of internal drive bays, PCI slots, etc

-generally very roomy and clean inside the case; easy to crack open and work on

-certified by tons of ISV's (Independent Software Vendors) including Avid last I checked

-almost always have TI Firewire chipset already on the motherboard

-server / workstation class processors and ram

-very clean Windows installs with little if any bloatware

I guess you're talking about new ones. I like my Dell cases - plenty of space and they're easy to get into. It's harder to get my computer off the floor and up on a bench than it is to replace a card or disk drive inside the case. ;)

 

I did run into an unexpected problem with the last new Dell I bought (and subsequently swapped for an older refurbished Dell). It had a pile of USB ports, but no conventional serial or parallel ports, nor PS/2 mouse and keyboard ports. No matter the combination of adapters, I couldn't get the computer and my Mackie HDR24/96 to share the same keyboard, mouse, and monitor through my KVM switch. I finally traced it to the USB adapter not passing on the "Hey! I just work up!" signal to the switch. Also, I have an old copy of Sequoia that uses a parallel port dongle. I put a serial/parallel card in the computer but the parallel port came out as a number (LPT4, I think) that the dongle software didn't recognize. I was aware of the shortage of "old" ports and thought I could deal with it, but I couldn't.

 

Musicians who want to use a computer for recording shouldn't have to deal with these problems, but we have to when trying to span a couple of eras. Those who buy a new computer and a new copy of Pro Tools (or Reaper or Logic) will have something that will work pretty much out of the box, at least until they decide to upgrade the second or third time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

So... Here's what I got:

 

Asus M4N68T-M V2 Mobo

AMD X3 445 3.1 GHz CPU, triple core

460W Power supply

4 GB DDR3 1600 MHz RAM

(2) 500 GB WD5000aakx hard drives

Radeon HD5450 dual head video card

24X DVD/CD burner

Case

Win 7 Home Premium 64 bit

1 year parts & labor warranty

 

What I forgot:

Memory Card reader (I guess the USB ones run about 10 or 12 bucks, not too serious)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...