Which Mac?

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Sebastian
Posts: 1092
Joined: Fri Jan 07, 2005 4:39 am

Which Mac?

Post by Sebastian » Sat Feb 27, 2021 10:42 pm

Hi all,

My old MPB died a while back, need to figure out what to get next and looking to understand what specs I need from new Mac. Ableton 9.

I think my old 2010 MBP had 4GB RAM and 1TB storage which I configured. I saved all projects in the MBP plus back up to external drive and a cloud backup of both.

Wondering if moving all projects to be saved to external.....does Ableton play nice with this?

All my existing Ableton projects are saved on an external drive. Wondering how will Ableton react to finding and reorganizing/re-index? projects on external vs new Mac.

Would one of the new Mac Airs be good enough?
https://www.apple.com/macbook-air/specs/

---

I'm not a recording studio or anything. For audio, I record my voice, guitar, bass. Sometimes I record with both mics.

Gear:
-Interface: RME Fireface 800 (Firewire). https://archiv.rme-audio.de/en/products ... ce_800.php
-Native MKII Midi Keyboard (USB) w/ entire suite of plugins (in my setup I had the plug-ins living in an external drive).
-Tons of Acid and MIDI loops
-EZ Drummer +Collections
-Ableton Packs

-Line 6 Guitar POD
-Zoom Bass Pod
-Microphones: SM58 Mic + Condenser Mix (both XLR)
-Headphone monitor station (forgot name)
-Electric Guitar
-Bass Guitar

polygenic
Posts: 3
Joined: Sun Feb 28, 2021 12:17 pm

Re: Which Mac?

Post by polygenic » Sun Feb 28, 2021 12:29 pm

Did I read that you use Live 9? The last supported macOS version for Live 9 was Catalina, and I'm not sure how nicely Live 9 will work with the Big Sur. You would have to use the 64 bit version as Catalina officially dropped 32 bit support. This means that any plugins that you might have used in the past won't work now, unless the developers ported it to 64 bit. Honestly, it might just be worth upgrading to Live 11 if you are buying a new M1 or Intel mac.

Just so that you are aware, Ableton has not yet released support for Apple Silicon Macs. It works via Rosetta 2 emulation, and works quite nicely, but you may run into issues.

In response to your question about external media, I store all my projects and samples on an external SSD and it works fine. If Ableton gets a bit confused when samples are 'missing', it's easy to restore them if you store all your samples in one place. https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/artic ... edia-files

I have the MacBook Pro M1, and it is brilliant. Probably one of the best machines Apple has released in a long time. But like I said earlier, Rosetta emulation isn't perfect. Expect higher CPU usage in Ableton and, in some cases, higher memory usage. The Air and Pro M1 are virtually identical in terms of performance, apart from a tiny bit of thermal throttling under sustained load as there's no fans in the Air.

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EDIT: Also storing your plugins on an external drive isn't a good practice. If you ever start a Mac from fresh, you might come across a few issues as plugins often store their content on your internal drive. Some plugins you might be able to get away with (if you can choose where the libraries are stored), but I wouldn't recommend it.

gbert
Posts: 66
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2018 6:02 am

Re: Which Mac?

Post by gbert » Sun Feb 28, 2021 4:16 pm

I would get Live 11 if you are venturing into a new M1 Mac running Big Sur. Those are two factors that may be an issue with Live 9, and will be compatible with Live 11. I’m running an M1 with Live 11 and it is good so far. I expect it will only get better when native M1 support is in.

If you have been fine with the performance with 4GB you will probably be ok with 8GB. That said, if you are planning on keeping the machine for a long time before upgrading again, I would configure it with 16GB. As for drive space, it depends on what you need. If you’ve been using 1TB so far then it would be good to have the same space. But you can run Live fine by having your projects on an external drive.

There are a couple of other things to do on a Mac to maximize available space on your internal drive. A big one is to move any iPhone/iPad backups to an external drive. Google for the steps. It involves going into the terminal and using the ln command to redirect the location. Another is to move your Photos library if you have one to an external drive. That can be done from within that program.

Bottom line, go for an M1. Any of them are excellent for Live. But upgrade to Live 11 to ensure it will actually work with the M1 and Big Sur.

jestermgee
Posts: 4500
Joined: Mon Apr 26, 2010 6:38 am

Re: Which Mac?

Post by jestermgee » Sun Feb 28, 2021 5:57 pm

Pc will run any version of live, no need to worry about processors or os updates ever. I doubt that’s a consideration for you, but it’s an option that will prob cost less investment than replacing everything you own every 10 years.

Sebastian
Posts: 1092
Joined: Fri Jan 07, 2005 4:39 am

Re: Which Mac?

Post by Sebastian » Wed Mar 10, 2021 7:13 pm

Thank you gbert!!

Sebastian
Posts: 1092
Joined: Fri Jan 07, 2005 4:39 am

Re: Which Mac?

Post by Sebastian » Wed Mar 10, 2021 7:16 pm

Do you guys have a separate computer to make music vs for your day job/work?

Ive always had a laptop for office job /work and a laptop for music.

Wondering if I should just have one laptop for everything.....but that would mean connecting and disconnecting gear back and forth....

gbert
Posts: 66
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2018 6:02 am

Re: Which Mac?

Post by gbert » Wed Mar 10, 2021 11:09 pm

I always use a separate machine for work. Often IT for the company has rights to install spyware or other junk that will slow your machine down. In some companies, they also have rights to wipe your machine clean remotely at any time. If you work for yourself that's a different matter, and you can do whatever you want. If you work for a company as an employee, keep your personal music production on a separate machine.

jestermgee
Posts: 4500
Joined: Mon Apr 26, 2010 6:38 am

Re: Which Mac?

Post by jestermgee » Thu Mar 11, 2021 1:09 am

When I ran Windows 7 years ago I had an SSD hot-swap caddy in the front of the machine and had a separate install for my production system and another for my "every day / gaming" system because Win7 did have issues with performance over time when you had extra clutter but with Win10 and a good SSD, I have never needed this and found having a dual system difficult to manage as many of the things I do cross between work and play sometimes, like video editing or even just some basic production stuff, it is a hassle switching between systems.

However, I have a macbook pro that is purely just for testing/development which I don't care what happens on it because I just wipe it. I don't use it for production work and I also have an ASUS laptop that is purely dedicated for my DJ system but isn't capable of production all that much, just runs Serato and that's it so I do have dedicated systems for different jobs but the main system I use has everything from music production, development environment, games, internet.... It's where I live so it has everything on it and runs like a champ even at 7 years old now but has been well maintained, upgraded and overclocked as much as I dare to now.

miyaru
Posts: 1267
Joined: Tue Jan 10, 2017 12:08 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Which Mac?

Post by miyaru » Thu Mar 11, 2021 11:13 am

Yes I have a seperate PC for music only.
It is build in a sturdy 19 inch 4HE housing, bolted in my rack.

I don't want to mix music and office things on one PC.....
Greetings from Miyaru.
Prodaw i7-7700, 16Gb Ram, Focusrite Scarlett 18i20 3rd gen, ESI M4U eX, Reason 12, Live Suit 10, Push2, Presonus Eris E8 and Monitor Station V2, Lexicon MPX1,
Korg N1, Yamaha RM1x :mrgreen:

Mark Williams
Posts: 898
Joined: Sun Aug 10, 2014 2:43 pm
Location: Kent

Re: Which Mac?

Post by Mark Williams » Thu Mar 11, 2021 12:55 pm

As above, I have a dedicated PC desktop for music production only.
Live 11, M1 Mac Mini, Push 2, Scarlett 18i20 & ADA8200, Softube Console 1 Mk2, Deepmind12, Hydrasynth, Cobalt 8M, Moog Subsequent 25, IK Uno Synth Pro, Plethora X3, Nord Drum 3P

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