Live 7 on my PC runs faster than my boyfriends Macbook..why?

aniajudie · Post by **aniajudie** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 9:00 am

I have a Acer Aspire 3610 laptop and I opened a song set and got an aveage cpu of 12-14 %. When I did the same on his Macbook 2.0 (1 gb ram) and Live 7 demo, it gave me 14-16%. I would have thought the Mac would have scored better on cpu concidering it is a newer Intel Core Duo and faster cpu and mine is a older (slower??) Celleron procesor. Ah, we also did the same test on Windows side on his Macbook and running the same song set and Live 7 demo and got a little worse stats (15-17%)..
weird & why?

aniajudie · Post by **aniajudie** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 2:28 pm

anyone have any ideas? weird..maybe pc is faster?

dysanfel · Post by **dysanfel** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 2:42 pm

The meter in Live is not 100% dead accurate. Try firing up the test session that is floating on this board and see then.

stew · Post by **stew** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 3:35 pm

If it runs too slow, turn up the BPM

ernene · Post by **ernene** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 3:36 pm

It could depend on how the system preferences are configured, and 1 gb ram is not that much for a new macbook... at least you'll need 2 gb to be fine... and then it always depends... I have 2 macs and both are safe and stable (yes, mine are...) and even if a pc could run a bit faster, I'll prefer to use one of my macs (even the older one) but feel safe... well, just a matter of taste...
Repaired permissions lastly? lot of things to consider...

Tone Deft · Post by **Tone Deft** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 3:42 pm

a few % difference doesn't seem news worthy, IMO.

Sales Dude McBoob · Post by **Sales Dude McBoob** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 4:00 pm

ernene wrote:I have 2 macs and both are safe and stable (yes, mine are...) and even if a pc could run a bit faster, I'll prefer to use one of my macs (even the older one) but feel safe... well, just a matter of taste...

Screw that man. Run out now and go buy yourself an Acer! Why cheat yourself out of 3%?

Seriously though... my PC here at work does some things blazingly faster than my Macs. But then again, XP will often blue screen when I insert a jump drive. And I just love the dialog boxes that tell me to consult my IT person. You need a staff to run Windows.

I am considering getting a PC or running Bootcamp in the future for mastering. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Bias Peak simply does not function. I currently have no reliable way to finish projects.

icedsushi · Post by **icedsushi** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 4:15 pm

I think it was Takerith and others who have already done tests on this. Do a search.

I believe they found that the percentage will show 2% or whatever small percentage higher on mac, but the Max CPU ceiling where you start to hear crackling is 2% or whatever percentage higher also, so it's the same thing.

beats me · Post by **beats me** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 4:26 pm

6 months ago I switched from 1% milk to 2% milk and now I'm a tumblard who has to buy 2 tickets for just myself when I fly coach.

aniajudie · Post by **aniajudie** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 5:52 pm

I am more puzzled about the power between the computers. Maybe I can do some other cpu test (anyone know of a test?). My PC is a year old Acer 1.6 mgz Celleron and not even an Intel and scores faster than his new Macbook which is newer Intel Core 2 duo and 2.0 cpu.. I dunno but weird.

ernene · Post by **ernene** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 5:58 pm

Sales Dude McBoob wrote:
ernene wrote:I have 2 macs and both are safe and stable (yes, mine are...) and even if a pc could run a bit faster, I'll prefer to use one of my macs (even the older one) but feel safe... well, just a matter of taste...
Screw that man. Run out now and go buy yourself an Acer! Why cheat yourself out of 3%?

Seriously though... my PC here at work does some things blazingly faster than my Macs. But then again, XP will often blue screen when I insert a jump drive. And I just love the dialog boxes that tell me to consult my IT person. You need a staff to run Windows.

I am considering getting a PC or running Bootcamp in the future for mastering. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Bias Peak simply does not function. I currently have no reliable way to finish projects.

and for mastering... have to agree with you... Actually I'm mastering on a friend's old pc with wavelab, and, well, he's an audio engineer by the way...

Tarekith · Post by **Tarekith** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 6:06 pm

Yes, we looked into this earlier, and the main concensus was that while PC's tend to show lower CPU readings compared to Mac's, the PC's also tend to get audio drop outs at lower percentage readings as well. So for instance the PC might read 12% on average and stop working at 70%, while the Mac might read 14% on average and stop working at 72%. So in the end you get the same juice from both, it's just down to the differences in the way the different OS's report CPU useage most likely.

Also, most laptops running OSX employ speedstepping (or whatever it's called by OSX, I forgot right now), so even though the Mac is more powerful, it might not be using it's full processing power until needed, thus the lower than expected reading. PCs actually do this too, it's just a way to save battery power, and since each OS has diferent ways of handling this, it's very hard to make direct comparisons until both machines are running close to flat out.

aniajudie · Post by **aniajudie** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 6:42 pm

ernene wrote:
Sales Dude McBoob wrote:
ernene wrote:I have 2
and for mastering... have to agree with you... Actually I'm mastering on a friend's old pc with wavelab, and, well, he's an audio engineer by the way...

Why is Wavelab-Soundforge? so good?
I tried this and did not see anything so great..explain why better than BIAS?

aniajudie · Post by **aniajudie** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 6:44 pm

I just find this a little off.. 1.6 to 2.0 mgz is a difference alone, but the processors are quite diff..So if I had a Intel Core 2 duo in my Acer, would the stats kill this Macbook?

LJN · Post by **LJN** » Fri Jan 04, 2008 7:10 pm

Leave it. My two year old Acer (travelmate) is faster runnig Live than my musician's friends's Macbook even though the Acer has only one gig of ram as compared to the Mac's two. But then creativity isn't about speed or percentages. If you're fine with the Acer, stick with it.