how should i optimize my g3?

ovalroaster · Post by **ovalroaster** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 3:49 am

i am a new user with i have a g3 400 powerbook, 192 MB ram, OSX.2, core audio.

probably not surprisingly i'm getting a lot of audio dropouts after activating around 7 tracks.

i'm wondering what would be the single most effective way of increasing performance: better card? more RAM? faster processor?

thanks

Alex Reynolds · Post by **Alex Reynolds** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 3:53 am

Buy a Windows laptop or wait to see if the audio engine in the Mac version of Live v2 fixes these bugs.

-Alex

Kodama · Post by **Kodama** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 5:13 am

Did you try increasing your output latency in Live?

Also, make sure you have plenty of ram!

globalgoon · Post by **globalgoon** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 10:36 am

crappy but, try going back to os9.2- i have a similar setup and can have more tracks than that

also ive got an m-audio quattro which i can run at 22kHz thus halving the processor drain - crummy drop in sound quality, but is ok some times

more ram will help - i was on 192mb up to a few weeks ago, bought 256mb for £55 to take it up to 384mb - notice a big difference in UI speed (screen updates etc) when using rewire

overclock to 500 (i havent done this cos you need to do soldering)

get one of dem upgrades to a g4 500 $300 - i think thats in america only

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 10:46 am

ovalroaster wrote:i am a new user with i have a g3 400 powerbook, 192 MB ram, OSX.2, core audio.

probably not surprisingly i'm getting a lot of audio dropouts after activating around 7 tracks.

i'm wondering what would be the single most effective way of increasing performance: better card? more RAM? faster processor?

If your dropouts are the result of slow streaming from the hard
disk, you should be able to increase the number of tracks you
can play back by setting up a modest sized ramdisk and streaming
your shorter sound material (such as loops) from it.

Setting up a ramdisk under OS9 was simply a matter of checking
a box in the memory control panel. In OSX it is somewhat more
complicated. I have not tried doing it, but here is a link that describes two ways to do so:

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php? ... 0084607311

(I suppose you should be careful under OSX to set up a ramdisk which
allows you plenty of ram leftover for the program and OS, because otherwise, if the latter two begin to swap to disk, things may slow down quite a bit.)

Not sure this will solve your problem, but it is cheaper (free, depending on which ramdisk method you choose) than the other options you mentioned, so worth a try.

yon / ableton

ipimps 'n' ibitches · Post by **ipimps 'n' ibitches** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 10:50 am

Yo Mr. Reynolds, whatup with your frequent change of opinion?
can't remember your own postings?

dirtystudios · Post by **dirtystudios** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 8:34 pm

i agree with globalgoon on the matter of os 9. i went to x on my tibook 400 for a while, and my performance in live was just crumby. as cool as x is, i'll only be using 9 on this machine. it's stable enough so long as you find the bugs (usually plugins) and remove the problems or work around them. besides, i still got live to crash a few times in x, and i even crashed the system once. so it may be more stable, but it isn't as bulletproof as everyone says. if i can get two or three times as much stuff going in os 9, that's a good enough reason for me to stay behind.

k

scott · Post by **scott** » Tue Nov 12, 2002 8:57 pm

Since I'm a big Propellerheads user, there's no reason for me to move to OS X until ReBirth and Recycle are native to that platform. Sure, it's cool to be able to run Apache and PHP on my iBook, but I do my development work on servers anyway, which Nifty Telnet accesses just fine.

I'm going to wait a year, then spring for a powerbook. Hopefully my favorite apps will be OS X-ready by then.

/S

how should i optimize my g3?

how should i optimize my g3?

Re: how should i optimize my g3?

MR. REYNOLDS can't decide