A G4 laptop or a Centrino Laptop???

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.
detroitechno
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Post by detroitechno » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:03 am

AdamJay wrote:apple markets to the creative professional, simply because that is where their products beat the competition.
apple hasn't come close to beating a pc in any way except looks. you can easily find tons of reviews and side by side comparison's between the two clearly showing real world speeds. You may say the reviews between the two only apply for office processing and stuff like that, but I'm talking about audio reviews... Here is some proof. A $950.00 pc vs. a $1800 mac.
His results were:
1) G5 = 17 tracks. Screen updates were horrible.
2) AMD = 32 tracks + 18 aux. Screen updates were very snappy.

And his conclusion was:
The Mac G5 1.6 was completed unusable and has been replaced by a very fast machine that has upgrade potential. I saved ~$1400 by not buying a new dual Mac. I know I will be able to squeeze out another 10 tracks in the DaveC test after the Athlon system is optimized and overclocked.

While on this topic, this thread is dedicated to maximizing the performance of a pc for under $1000. As quoted from the thread:
'The new AMD processors have achieved over 100% better performance than Mac G4 and PIII systems and 50% better than Mac G5 systems. With rock solid stability, they easily push past the 32 track/160 effects limit.
the most durable laptops with the best battery life on the market.
my ibook G3 is in for repairs for the 4th time in 1 year. and on it's 2nd motherboard. It never leaves my house, and has somehow "broke" itself each time. A friend of mine is on his 3rd powerbook also. Video card fry'd, then his screen had huge lines running through it, and now his dvd-cdrw doesn't work.
As for battery life, this is taken from apples site:
A rechargeable lithium ion battery that provides up to 5 hours (12-inch PowerBook) or 4.5 hours (15-inch and 17-inch PowerBook)
This is taken from cnet (ibm x31 review)
Mfr estimated battery life 6 hour(s)

and I'm sure there are a ton of pc laptops that can go much further than 6 hours. My new compaq is getting around 3.5-4 hours and it's a desktop replacement. The fujitsu P series comes to mind, I think they hit 10 hour battery life.
you can't just look at Megahertz... what good is 3ghz if the OS can't take advantage of larger amounts of ram?
a 32-bit pc is capable of taking full advantage of up to 4gb of ram. if you need more than 4gb of ram, then you should be running an earth simulator.
a 64-bit pc is capable 16gb of ram. why anyone would need 16gb of ram is beyond me. But, if you do need more than 3ghz, and more than 16gb of ram, you can always buy this. Then you can have over 10ghz, 32gb of ram and over a terabite of space. Something a mac will not be capable of for probably another 3-5 years.
what good is 3ghz when you are running an OS that is the target of every worm/virus/spyware?
In my last 4-5 years of using my pc's I have not had 1 virus, worm, or spyware. If you know how to maintain your computer, you will not get any of the above.
so i gotta bounce a couple VSTi's down... at least i am doing it on a carefree machine.
you shouldn't have to bounce down any vsti's after spending $2000+ for a machine.
as with all things in life, you get what you pay for.
for some reason, this doesn't seem valid after reading the above post.
Intel's performance has increased 12.5% in the last year, where as the G5 has jumped 25%.
what good is that increase of % when the pc's are still far ahead. The only reason apples % jumped 25 was because the G4 was so damn slow, if they didn't jump the 25% the G5 would have been equal to a PIII chip.
sure you can say that you won't have a G5 in a laptop any time soon, but neither will you see Intel's 3.6ghz.
nope, but you will see Intel's P4 HT 3.4ghz in a laptop here.
G5 iMacs will most likely be out in September, and OSX 10.4 will come one year before Longhorn... thats going to be huge!
This is the only thing apple has going for itself. It's os. OSX is amazing, I will totally agree with that. Is it amazing enough to make me use it on a slow computer? Definitly not. I love it for surfing the net, reading email, chatting on AIM, stuff like that. But when it comes to power, it feels like the engine died. There's just no power in there...
getting a PC now would be like catching the dying tail of an era, before they start the 64-bit era.
I'm writting this post in 64 bit windows, and am also running live in 64 bit also. the 64 bit era is sitting in front of me as I type.
just my opinion, and why i decided to stick with mac.
And all of the above is why I decided to stick with a pc.
A bunch of gear, cords, and a computer...

Guest

Post by Guest » Thu Jul 08, 2004 10:46 am

I'm writting this post in 64 bit windows, and am also running live in 64 bit also. the 64 bit era is sitting in front of me as I type.
Unless you're privvy to 64 bit versions of Windows and Live that we're not, you're really not running at "64 bit".

Same goes with G5's so this ain't an ill Mac vs. PC response - just an FYI.

Guest

Post by Guest » Thu Jul 08, 2004 5:37 pm

Unless you're privvy to 64 bit versions of Windows and Live that we're not, you're really not running at "64 bit".
No, live is not coded in 64 bit. But it is running in a 64 bit OS, but in 32 bit format. Yes, there is a full 64 bit os, and if you have a 64 bit processor, you can download it here.

r-H
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Re: A G4 laptop or a Centrino Laptop???

Post by r-H » Thu Jul 08, 2004 5:43 pm

I know that the Mac get's hot real quick (long term effects on wrist and palms can not be ignored!).

I have also been advised that the Centrino is a chip to avoid.

You can not go wrong w a Mac in terms of performance but I must add that with a PC, costs are a lot less. Ignore if money is not an issue.

I currently use a Desktop/Laptop and am having a lot of trouble w latency and crackling depite a good reading on the buffer parameters. I assume this is alien to the Mac...so like you, I might get a Mac.

r-H

marcelus

centrino

Post by marcelus » Thu Jul 08, 2004 7:52 pm

centrino . a chip to avoid ???

could you please elaborate ?

i have a P4M 1.7Ghz (thinkpad A31) and a centrino 1.7Ghz (Sony Vaio Z1) and the Sony Vaio gives me TWICE the processing power in Live (i'm talking number of fx) and Reaktor

centrino processors are incredibly powerful for audio apps and, as an added bonus, they don't get very hot so fan noise is much less of an issue when compared to P4 "desktop replacement" laptops. Don't get fooled by mhz numbers

detroitechno
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Re: A G4 laptop or a Centrino Laptop???

Post by detroitechno » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:04 pm

I have also been advised that the Centrino is a chip to avoid.
I have no clue who would have told you this, but the centrino is probably the most efficient cpu ever made to date. It's so efficient, intel is considering basing there future cpu's on it. The dell 8600 notebook has beaten the dual 2ghz G5 in nearly all tests in audio. 4ghz mac vs. 1.7ghz intel M.
You can not go wrong w a Mac in terms of performance
the last thing you should buy a mac for, is performance. It's the slowest machine you can buy, also with the highest price! See the links I posted in my above post for proof in real world tests.
I currently use a Desktop/Laptop and am having a lot of trouble w latency and crackling depite a good reading on the buffer parameters. I assume this is alien to the Mac...so like you, I might get a Mac.
Running ableton live in on my friends Dual 1.8ghz G5, crackling started at anything below 1024 buffer. Which was around 10+10ms in/out. My $900 pc is currently running 128 buffer, at 96k with 1+1ms latency with no crackling what so ever. Along with the lowest buffer allowed, my cpu is sitting at 1%.
A bunch of gear, cords, and a computer...

Guest

Post by Guest » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:27 pm

Anonymous wrote:
Unless you're privvy to 64 bit versions of Windows and Live that we're not, you're really not running at "64 bit".
No, live is not coded in 64 bit. But it is running in a 64 bit OS, but in 32 bit format. Yes, there is a full 64 bit os, and if you have a 64 bit processor, you can download it here.
From what I understand, that is a beta/demo. 64 bit Windows XP 2003 is only available to OEM's for Itanium processor workstations and if you are a MSDN Developer. There are no plans to release a retail version of a 64 bit MS desktop OS until Longhorn (2007-ish). Plus, 32 bit apps run into a 32-bit compatibility mode, much akin to 16bit apps on 32bit OS's, thus taking a performance hit.

I really don't understand why anyone would want to run this 64 bit XP version with 32 bit apps....

helen

Post by helen » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:30 pm

mac are awesome for Photoshop
PC are best for Music apps

Mbazzy
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Post by Mbazzy » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:51 pm

If I read these discussions I often wonder who of you guys would still be able to make music if electricity fell out for a few years ...
http://www.mbazzy.tk -
Mbazzy's "The dysfunctional playground, a scrapbook a bout the shape of useless things" now OUT on Retinascan - http://www.retinascan.de

forge
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Post by forge » Fri Jul 09, 2004 12:23 am

Mbazzy wrote:If I read these discussions I often wonder who of you guys would still be able to make music if electricity fell out for a few years ...

totally!!

My sister just bought A howlin wolf CD and I've been REALLY getting into it and getting so much from getting back into music like this.

House music doesn't do that for me any more, it feels to me like time for the next step in music.

I'm really massively getting into the kinds of music that got me started in the first place on the guitar years ago

what's this whole thing with track count?? Jesus - get a vibe, bounce down if you have to but don't lose the real focus - in the early early days of the Blues highway as people started to move into the cities, there were stories of people who used to play the blues on a bit of wire tied to a nail in the side of their houses.

I can say I myself have been caught up in the technology trap until quite recently and it almost killed my music because I've lost so much inspiration - too many effects and not enough soul......

FaX-01
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Post by FaX-01 » Fri Jul 09, 2004 1:11 am

My reply is neither ....
If your budget can extend far enough look at something like an IBM T42P
Dothan (next gen-centrino) up to 2ghz with a 2meg cache.
Would give you very long (around 10 hours worth) of battery life.
And spew out enough audio tracks to keep you busy for a very very long time.
My aren't the wings of butterflies beautiful and do they not make wonderful perturbations.....

Guitarman

Post by Guitarman » Fri Jul 09, 2004 1:13 am

Well I wrote the original post, and thanks to the replies so far.
I will go for a centrino. Yesterday I bought a magazine here in Holland that compared the performance of various laptops which also helped me make up my mind. Included in the review was an ibook laptop (ok , I know not the same as a powerbook- I found out that a powerbook has a "bit" more power than an ibook, but not significantly more). The centrinos walked all over the ibooks. Almost double the power. I know the powerbooks are not double the power of an ibook.

To answer Mbazzy:
If I read these discussions I often wonder who of you guys would still be able to make music if electricity fell out for a few years ...
Well, I will still be able to make music without electricity. I am a fairly reasonable guitarist. Even if i do say so myself.

Again thanks to everyone who has responded so far.

dirtybomb
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Post by dirtybomb » Fri Jul 09, 2004 1:58 am

Get one of the IBM T-Series. You won't save any money though. They are probably almost as expensive as a powerbook. But damn they are a complete joy.

Find some reviews. Theres a couple on the T40 at tomshardware.com & anandtech.com

Plus 3 year standard waranty!

drumroll57
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The truth so far....

Post by drumroll57 » Fri Jul 09, 2004 2:59 am

Have this really great session in Live 3.04

8 tracks with effects. Loaded it into both machines.

On the Mac >> 75% of processor. Gets very sluggish on the re-draws.
( 1 GHz Powerbook G4 - 1 Gig RAM - OS-X 10.3.4) 'Top' shows 0% clock cycles available.

On the PC >> 18% of processor. Snappy as anything.
(Dell Latitude 800 1.8 GHz Centrino - 1 Gig RAM - Win XP SP1)

Any questions? Sad truth is I prefer the Mac, but the PC beats it by so much..... Let's see what the Live 4.0 optimization brings. 8O

D
stay groovy!

smutek
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Post by smutek » Fri Jul 09, 2004 4:45 am

Image

snore.

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