how come all the big named dj's use macs?

quandry · Post by **quandry** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 12:52 am

elementv wrote:The os is SO MUCH BETTER than windows, and no viruses!

what makes it so much better, lets say when you are actually running live--the only difference I've noticed between the two is lack of power to do what I want on tibooks--ie 12-14 tracks and about 40 effects, 4 sends. When the application is up and running, be it Live, Photoshop, whatever, there really isn't much to say about the difference in OS's other than performance, or did I miss something?

drumroll57 · Post by **drumroll57** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 1:20 am

I have both. For studio and home, I love the PC's lightning fast performance.

But here's a good example.

When using a Mac, Firewire works right out of the box, either FW400 or FW800. I have a souped-up Dell Latitude D-800 with mega-RAM and maxed out everything. Cannot get the @#% thing to stream out decent audio from an external Firewire drive with a top-flight audio interface, this since SP2. Yes, I could spend another 50 hours trying different hacks, (I only spent 25 fixing half of it, gave up and use USB 2.0 instead, fine...) but because it had such glitches, will never feel entirely comfortable, whereas the Mac laptops I use never even gave me such weird OS-related problems.

Yes, the Mac is more than a wee bit slower. But there is no question that by limiting the number of variables in the hardware side of components/architecture, it does yield a much smoother and predictable result, and that when you are on stage facing 8,000 people who will really not give 2 damns if it was a low-level driver issue that caused your audio to stutter, it will be safer to trust the Apple product....

YMMV!...

D.

Johnisfaster · Post by **Johnisfaster** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 1:52 am

PC's have to have faster processors because the operating system and all the software and virus and spyware slow it down that it needs the extra speed just to keep hobbling around

I'm a long time pc and mac user. I like them both. but the mac has never given me trouble and the specs on both machines I have are almost identicle.

sweetjesus · Post by **sweetjesus** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 1:56 am

coz people need something interesting to look at

robtronik · Post by **robtronik** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 1:57 am

Do you guys REALLY think that anyone gives a rats ass about whether you have a PC or Mac on stage?

No one has EVER said anything to me about that. Ever. My experience is that they don't give a shit. If your music is good, they like you. If it isn't then they don't. But having a certain type of computer has never entered in the equation as far as I know...

rob.

12micsn1 · Post by **12micsn1** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 2:00 am

quandry wrote:
elementv wrote:The os is SO MUCH BETTER than windows, and no viruses!
what makes it so much better, lets say when you are actually running live--the only difference I've noticed between the two is lack of power to do what I want on tibooks--ie 12-14 tracks and about 40 effects, 4 sends. When the application is up and running, be it Live, Photoshop, whatever, there really isn't much to say about the difference in OS's other than performance, or did I miss something?

if the problem with Apple is a performance issue then your absolutely right. Apple seems to be headed in the right direction to fixing that problem by switching over to intel. According to a recent story OSX is blazingly faster with a intel processor. i just hope software will be converted an my pocketbook not hurt.

Johnisfaster · Post by **Johnisfaster** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 2:03 am

how do you know whats going on in their heads subconciously? people make all sorts of subconcious decisions about things based on appearance and scent and name brands and endless amounts of other input. people are going to look at you differently depending on every variable you throw at them including what kind of computer you're using. they will never say anything about it cause they aren't really aware of how they decided.

then again I could just be playing devils advocate.

robtronik · Post by **robtronik** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 2:13 am

Johnisfaster wrote:how do you know whats going on in their heads subconciously? people make all sorts of subconcious decisions about things based on appearance and scent and name brands and endless amounts of other input. people are going to look at you differently depending on every variable you throw at them including what kind of computer you're using. they will never say anything about it cause they aren't really aware of how they decided.

then again I could just be playing devils advocate.

Right. This is why letting Apple have their glowing logo (which is cool, no denying) is a missed opportunity for branding yourself instead of the computer maker. This is what all aspiring (or established) DJs should do with their laptops. Get it custom with your design... here:

http://www.polygfx.com/

I'm making mine right now - custom cool design w/ Robtronik branding...

rob.

quandry · Post by **quandry** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 2:26 am

drumroll57 wrote:I have a souped-up Dell Latitude D-800 with mega-RAM and maxed out everything. Cannot get the @#% thing to stream out decent audio from an external Firewire drive with a top-flight audio interface, this since SP2. Yes, I could spend another 50 hours trying different hacks, (I only spent 25 fixing half of it, gave up and use USB 2.0 instead, fine...) but because it had such glitches, will never feel entirely comfortable, whereas the Mac laptops I use never even gave me such weird OS-related problems.
D.

Did the firewire drive work okay on other computers? Were you trying to power it via 6 pin, if so, did you try it out with an adaper? Definitely no probs with my four pin firewire and a WD external FW drive here. sound like maybe a bunk firewire card/port? Sucks that you had the problem, but in all fairness macs can have hardware faults too--my boss's has tibook has been sent back 3 times in as many years--thanks for applecare I guess.

smutek · Post by **smutek** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 2:38 am

This is going a bit off topic and speaking more to why I personally do not like windows.

5 years ago I knew absolutely nothing about computers. When I started school, studying graphic design, I had a crappy old pc running 95. I knew I needed a new computer and when I asked what kind of computer I should get every one told me to get a mac. So I did.

I still am far from a tech geek but I do know I will never switch back.

At my day job I work in photoshop all day, 40-50 hours a week, on a windows machine. By 12:00 my machine is so sluggish that it takes 30 seconds to run a simple shadow/highlight filter. Sometimes I have to restart twice a day. Sometimes my video driver crashes and I have to restart. This computer has recovered from a serious error or some message like that. Sometimes photoshop will not launch and often times my machine can not keep up with my pace. I run firefox, photoshop, and itunes at the same time, occasionally a little ftp app to up images to our website. But I have to be very carefull how many apps I run at once. Despite a gig of ram I am always "low on virtual memory" by noon. I have to run adaware, virus scan, and defrag regularly. It gives me nothing but problems.

I hate that computer.

At home I do freelance design, I can run photoshop, indesign, illustrator, itunes, safari, and whatever else all at once with no problems. My mac always works, it works well, it is fast, and it never crashes. End of story for me.

I know this has nothing to do with performing live music, but that is why I love my macs. I don't think my computer is better, I just know that there is nothing anyone could ever say to make me switch to pc.

quandry · Post by **quandry** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 2:54 am

smutek wrote:This is going a bit off topic and speaking more to why I personally do not like windows.

5 years ago I knew absolutely nothing about computers. When I started school, studying graphic design, I had a crappy old pc running 95. I knew I needed a new computer and when I asked what kind of computer I should get every one told me to get a mac. So I did.

I still am far from a tech geek but I do know I will never switch back.

At my day job I work in photoshop all day, 40-50 hours a week, on a windows machine. By 12:00 my machine is so sluggish that it takes 30 seconds to run a simple shadow/highlight filter. Sometimes I have to restart twice a day. Sometimes my video driver crashes and I have to restart. This computer has recovered from a serious error or some message like that. Sometimes photoshop will not launch and often times my machine can not keep up with my pace. I run firefox, photoshop, and itunes at the same time, occasionally a little ftp app to up images to our website. But I have to be very carefull how many apps I run at once. Despite a gig of ram I am always "low on virtual memory" by noon. I have to run adaware, virus scan, and defrag regularly. It gives me nothing but problems.

I hate that computer.

At home I do freelance design, I can run photoshop, indesign, illustrator, itunes, safari, and whatever else all at once with no problems. My mac always works, it works well, it is fast, and it never crashes. End of story for me.

I know this has nothing to do with performing live music, but that is why I love my macs. I don't think my computer is better, I just know that there is nothing anyone could ever say to make me switch to pc.

sure you know this, but for Photoshop it helps to have your scratch disk(s) be on seperate drives from the application (in preferences, makes a big difference for me). It also seems to accumulate things in RAM (at least on windows machines)--i.e. if you open and work on a big ol 400 MB file, then save and close the file, you RAM doesn't drop like it should. I make it a habit to simply quit Photoshop when it starts taking up more than 700 MB of my RAM (seen in taskmanager), then my RAM drops back to normal 150ish, then I reopen Pshop and get back to business. Bit of a pain, but it works.

Ryan

forge · Post by **forge** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 4:24 am

Oh God. here we go again.

do a search on "pc vs mac" and you will find about 750 thousand million billion posts on the topic

smutek · Post by **smutek** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 4:33 am

quandry wrote: I make it a habit to simply quit Photoshop when it starts taking up more than 700 MB of my RAM (seen in taskmanager), then my RAM drops back to normal 150ish, then I reopen Pshop and get back to business. Bit of a pain, but it works.

Ryan

Thanks Ryan, I will try that tomorrow.

Machinesworking · Post by **Machinesworking** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 4:49 am

quandry wrote:what makes it so much better, lets say when you are actually running live--the only difference I've noticed between the two is lack of power to do what I want on tibooks--ie 12-14 tracks and about 40 effects, 4 sends. When the application is up and running, be it Live, Photoshop, whatever, there really isn't much to say about the difference in OS's other than performance, or did I miss something?

Well for one, windows audio drivers aren't half as integrated into the OS, they work just fine, sure, but there are far less problems with OSX drivers... I think PC is great if you manage your OS well, I'm just far too sloppy to deal, that's all. I don't want to have to worry about viruses, and spyware, and whether the particular combination of hardware and OS is safe for Live.

In every day use, OSX is a lot more flexible of an OS, the browsing options are better, the fact that the OS itself has a spell check built in, that there are Network MIDI drivers for ethernet MIDI between macs, that Inter Application MIDI is built in to the OS, that Core Audio is built in, no third party audio drivers like ASIO etc.
I know you can add all this functionality to a PC, but it's pretty dammed cool to see the makers of the OS actually take the time to code a solid core to build off of.

i'll never deny that PC's are good for audio, or that they aren't cheaper in general, but it just makes a certain amount of sense to trust that your experience with using a laptop as a tool to ply your craft be left up to a manufacturer that actually seems to care about your particular niche. Apple are actively involved in audio, Microsoft aren't really that concerned with it from what I can tell.

That said, by the end of 06, I'm sure I'll have a PC set up for audio work, why not? XP isn't that bad compared to earlier windows OS, but I know that I'm going to keep using powerbooks for music, simply because the OS, the hardware and the drivers are all made by the same people, and I'm pretty dammed sure this reasoning is exactly why you see a large percentage of "pros" using powerbooks when you could easily get double the track count on a Centrino laptop.

OK now slam away, call me a pussy mac user etc..

Oh wait! wrong response..... here you go!

OH GAWD!! ANOTHER PC VS MAC THREAD, OH LAWD! WHY ISN'T THERE MODS TO CLOSE THESE AWFULL THREADS??

MrYellow · Post by **MrYellow** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 8:34 am

Why do so many runners wear Nike.

-Ben

how come all the big named dj's use macs?

without getting into a flame war....

Re: without getting into a flame war....