Music Machines and the Internet

Moody · Post by **Moody** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 3:56 pm

I was curious to know how many people connect to the internet on there primary music machines. I personally do not connect any of my primary music computers to the internet and never will. This has eliminated the topic of Windows has more viruses and this and that.... I use both platforms and neither of them touch the wire. How about you?

Nick Maxwell · Post by **Nick Maxwell** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 4:30 pm

I am just the opposite. I swear by having net access while composing music. I will sit and get ideas for a track I currently have open in Live while browsing various sites. I run Spybot and AVG Antivirus and never have problems with virii and adware. Just keep your software up to date and you should be fine, but to each his/her own!

- Nick

divonic · Post by **divonic** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 5:24 pm

I would love to have a dedicated music computer. but I don't. even if I did I would still have to be conected to the net. I colaborate with one friend alot we send stuff back and forth via the internet (and bigger stuff using thumb drives). he makes loops in Reason and I make them with hardware then we each work on a tracks in live. We are eventually going to have a ftp site for our loops and songs.

When I first got my current computer I tried to keep my old one as my internet computer and the new one as a music workstation but that didn't work. cause the reason that I got my new computer wa that the old one was getting flaky eventually it just stopped working and I had one computer again.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 5:47 pm

That seems to be a particularly PC based form of paranoia. I've never understood why people think that having a simple browser installed on their machine will cause instability. Or why they take for granted that their music software is so unstable that no other software can be installed on the same machine for fear of incompatibilities. I remember having these kinds of problems on the old mac OS 8 with weird extensions conflicts and stuff like that. But these days I happily use one machine for music, graphic design, web use, organizing digital photos, etc. and never run into any problems or incompatibilities.

forge · Post by **forge** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 6:41 pm

In an ideal world maybe, but after working in a commercial studio for 2 years where all the studio machines are online and have few problems (and one of them is a PIII 1gHz) I got over it - I don't have any problems really. I do tend to try and use the mac for internet more, but I don't really have any probs on the PC.

that's what virus scanners are for I do think alot of these types of 'computer music magazine - 20 tips on the perfect music machine' type guides that say never put your music machine online are largely a thing of the past

One of my mates has a 'PC world' P4 1.8ghz laptop that's so clogged full of porn and games and god knows what else, it's a spliff rolling surface and it looks like it's doubled as a door stop or frisbee and he has more commercial releases of his tracks on vinyl than everyone else I know put together.

These type of things are often unnecessary distractions these days, WIN XP and OSX are really solid and most new machines are too.

Per Boysen · Post by **Per Boysen** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 9:47 pm

The only virus I evere catched was on ATARI!!!!!! That happened in the days before the Internet and it made the left mouse button act as the right mouse button and the right mouse button act as the left mouse button. We were working fulltime on an album and after three days my brain had switched so I was up to speed again, but then my buddy came one morning with a virus fix on a floppy. We fixed the virus and then the only problem in that studio was my brain working in reverse mode. Maye that's why the album flopped?

Anyway, on all PC's and Mac's I have never had any virus problems, really. But on PC I always pay for the symantec virus protection, registration and continous update.

anti-banausic · Post by **anti-banausic** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 9:53 pm

Firefox, adaware, avast anti-virus, and smart web-searching so far has kept my music comp very clean (and by smart web-searching I mean music only sites, no clicking on links etc...).

Firefox is awesome. I used to find a few malware using adaware when I was using IE as my browser, ever since the switch I don't think adaware has caught anything, and yes, I keep it very up-to-date.

suburbanbather · Post by **suburbanbather** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 10:06 pm

"KeepItSimpleStupid" and no problem. Always stay up to date with your virus scanner, avoid shady plugin downloads, stick with what you know is reliable like Ohm, PSP, etc.... and perform diskcleanup along with defrag to keep your hdd from cluttering up with waste of space offline files from using the internet.

detroitechno · Post by **detroitechno** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 5:45 am

people are so paranoid about internet and daw's. go ahead, but your daw on the net, pc or mac. doesn't matter. follow the rules, and nothing will ever happen.
DON'T:
-go to crack sites
-download anything but windows updates and updates for legit programs from the actual vendors sites.
-virus scan ANYTHING downloaded, but do not run autoprotect on your virus scanner, it will bog down your system. Just manually scan things after downloaded just to make sure. (this is freak security and not really needed, just an extra step)
-do not have any chat programs
-do not use ANY p2p software

DO's:
-buy a router with built in firewall.
-encript any wireless you have along with mac filtering, and preferably wpa.
-disable your net connection when working with any audio.
-defrag your computer often.
-install ONLY needed software. no junk allowed.
-keep everything up to date security wise (windows update)
-visit only trusted known sites.

like someone above said 'keepitsimplestupid'.

follow the simple rules, and you will be fine. my dedicated daw in the studio has been on the net wirelessly for 4 years now. it has NEVER had any problem at all. Follow the simple rules, and nothing will ever happen. Just use common sence.

Komplex · Post by **Komplex** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 5:52 am

I have a dual boot and seperate partitions.

One for internet and general shit, one for Music.

Very stable with the only problems being caused by dodgy software which I shouldn't have installed.

AdamJay · Post by **AdamJay** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 6:51 am

on the mac, i dont even think about security, i dont have to.

on the PC, i use Mozilla Firefox instead of Internet Explorer (which is a gaping whole for Adware/Spyware), AVG Free Antivirus, which scans twice a day.
I do use p2p, but everything gets scanned. all incoming media (CDR's, floppies) gets scanned. i do use messaging programs and p2p's, all downloads from those get scanned as well.
also, i use CasperXP to ghost my drive to an external firewire drive every night, so that i can always go back a step if the PC gets attacked.

and i do NOT look at porn on the PC, thats a mac thing for sure.

Lucid · Post by **Lucid** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 8:58 am

I connect on my DAWs but remember there's potentially always a virus around the corner that might beat the anti-V update to your system and take you out. To think that you are safe behind your firewall: you are wrong. They are coming to get you and steal your shit and crash your HD! Relentless worship at the altar of Microsoft is your only defense.

Lucid · Post by **Lucid** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 9:00 am

forge wrote:
One of my mates has a 'PC world' P4 1.8ghz laptop that's so clogged full of porn and games and god knows what else, it's a spliff rolling surface and it looks like it's doubled as a door stop or frisbee and he has more commercial releases of his tracks on vinyl than everyone else I know put together.

Hmm, maybe I need to download more porn, play more video games, and smoke some more spliffs. Could be the secret to his success.

forge · Post by **forge** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 10:56 am

Lucid wrote:
forge wrote:
One of my mates has a 'PC world' P4 1.8ghz laptop that's so clogged full of porn and games and god knows what else, it's a spliff rolling surface and it looks like it's doubled as a door stop or frisbee and he has more commercial releases of his tracks on vinyl than everyone else I know put together.

Hmm, maybe I need to download more porn, play more video games, and smoke some more spliffs. Could be the secret to his success.

he he - probably not far wrong

kinda like the whole Monica Lewinsky/Clinton thing - the man's gonna do a better job if he's getting a good polish now and then.

Lucid · Post by **Lucid** » Tue Jul 20, 2004 5:38 pm

It's kind of a zenesque method of purification for modern man - porn to burn off sexual tension, video games to vent aggression and need for social structure and tribal order, and spliffs to keep it all in perspective.

Music Machines and the Internet

Do you connect your music computer to the internet?

Music Machines and the Internet