Recording computer specs

[Bad Disciple]

Hi there all!

...hectic time, but technology and science go constantly ahead...

I've got some questions before I build my next computer.
I'll use it for recording and processing music, using Cubase SX3.
I'll be thankful for all the feedback.

ABOUT PROCESSORS:
I've opted to chose between these Intel models:
Core 2 Duo E6850 3.0GHz
(Socket 775 - 3.0GHz - Bus 1333 MHz - 65 nm - 4MB L2 cache - Intel
Virtualization Technology)
or
Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz
(Socket 775 - 2.4GHz - Bus 1066 MHz - 65 nm - 8MB L2 cache - Intel
Virtualization Technology)?

Is there a big advantage of Quad over Dual cores, now that we're only few
months from the Quad core release ? (And how it comes the higher and newer
Quad Q6600 be slightly cheaper than the older and lower Duo E6850?)

ABOUT SPEED AND CORES:
-Finally... does the dilemma 'more cores, or more clock speed' really exist?
In other words, does a Dual Core with 3.0GH clock speed work 2x3.0GH
for each core which will result in a double summary clock speed =6.0GH?
Or is it that each of the cores works in 3.0GH, thus working separately on
different tasks, which just augments the overall processing speed ?

ABOUT OS AND SOFTWARE:
-Will Windows XP Pro and my software, especially CUBASE SX3 (!)
support and function with the so called Thread-Level-Parallelism (TLP) or
Hyper-Thread technology, or Simultaneous Multi-threading Technology (SMT)
which is required by the Dual or Quad cores?

ABOUT MOTHERBOARDS:
I must chose between the following:
=>Asus P5K
(Socket 775 - Intel® P35 chipset ICH9R - Intel® CoreT2 Quad / CoreT2 Extreme
/ CoreT2 Duo / Pentium® Extreme / Pentium® D / Pentium® 4 Processors -
Dual-channel
DDR2 1066/800/667 MHz - 4*SATA/1*SATA on the Go/ 1394 - Gigabit LAN -
8-channel
HD Audio)

=>Asus P5KC
(Socket 775 - Intel® P35 chipset ICH9R - Intel® CoreT2 Quad / CoreT2 Extreme
/ CoreT2 Duo / Pentium® Extreme / Pentium® D / Pentium® 4 Processors -
Dual-channel
DDR2 1066/800/667 MHz or DDR3 1333/1066/800 - 2x1394 - 12xUSB 2.0 - Gigabit
LAN -8-channel HD Audio)

=>Asus P5W DH Deluxe (this one doesn't support the Quad Core or further)

=>Asus P5N32-E SLI
(Socket 775 - NVIDIA SLI Technology - NVIDIA Quad-SLIT Ready - NVIDIA
nForce® 680i SLIT - Dual-channel DDR2 800/667/533 - Support Intel® next
generation
45nm Multi-core CPU - Intel® Quad-core CPU Ready - Intel® CoreT2
Extreme/CoreT2 Duo
Ready - 1333**/1066/800/533MHz - 8 Phase Power Design SATA Raid - External
SATA - Dual Gigabit Lan - Audio 8 channels - IEEE 1394 - Fanless Design)

(Does the symbol 'P5' for the mothers stand for Pentium 5 ?)

ABOUT MEMORY:
-Can I use my previous computer's stick of (1GB) DDR 400MH memory
together with new DDR2 1066/800/667MH memory sticks in the other slots,
or it's a crap idea?
-With Double channel architecture, can I leave one pair of slots with
only one stick, or I must always put two sticks?

ABOUT HDs:
I plan to make a RAID0 configuration for faster, fastest... at
7200 (or 10,000 rpm but they're more noisy and heat up).
Top brands are Western Digital and Seagate of what I hear.
But what about Maxtor which is manifactured by Seagate?
And is Samsung also ok, I heard they're silent ?

Huh.... lot of questions... anyway thanks a lot to those who'll have
the courage for feedback.

Bad Disciple
'EN EIDA OTI OYDEN EIDA'
'One thing I know is that nothing I know'. (Sokrates)

Globalization, climate changes, disasters, illnesses, terrorism, wars, famine...
all and more frequent and intensive, drive the humanity to more hectic time,
but technology and science go constantly ahead. Will this help us to avoid
the end? Or will we perish, holding the mouse and the keyboard of our
many-core-brains-almost-reaching-human-intelligence computer, all sinking
in the abyss?

[IonMan]

Hi there all!

...hectic time, but technology and science go constantly ahead...

I've got some questions before I build my next computer.
I'll use it for recording and processing music, using Cubase SX3.
I'll be thankful for all the feedback.

ABOUT PROCESSORS:
I've opted to chose between these Intel models:
Core 2 Duo E6850 3.0GHz
(Socket 775 - 3.0GHz - Bus 1333 MHz - 65 nm - 4MB L2 cache - Intel
Virtualization Technology)
or
Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz
(Socket 775 - 2.4GHz - Bus 1066 MHz - 65 nm - 8MB L2 cache - Intel
Virtualization Technology)?

Is there a big advantage of Quad over Dual cores, now that we're only few
months from the Quad core release ? (And how it comes the higher and newer
Quad Q6600 be slightly cheaper than the older and lower Duo E6850?)

Hi D,

I am a programmer and I come from an electronics background, but I ignore all the ins and outs of PC hardware until I need to upgrade or build a new PC. And I tell you, since I last built a PC things have gotten a little more complicated. So since my PC recently died, I have been relearning it all myself. So here's some stuff for you.

The 3.0 GHz clock rate and the value given as Front Side Bus (ie 1333 MHz) are all "slight of hand" figures. The FSB speed is not 1333, but a quarter of that-333MHz. But lets start with DDR memory.

DDR means Double Data Rate (also known as double pumped, dual-pumped, and double transition) and what that means is that they do a tricky little thing that allows data to be transferred "twice" for every Bus Clock cycle. DDR2 memory is even slicker and allows the memory to run at twice that speed again. Remember all this and we will return to it.

This number 1333 MHz is actually what is known as the MegaTransfer rate and is the number of data transfers made on a bus in one second. This tells you how fast your computer is capable of actually working. It could be argued that it is really quite irrelevant what the actual CPU clock speed is as long as the M/T is high (like 1333.)

To get rates that high, two clocks are used out of phase (which means there are actually 4 transitions (ons and offs) every "normal clock" cycle and data is transferrred onto the FSB (Front Side Bus) 4 times faster. This is called "Quad-Pumped." The Core 2 family are all quad pumped (check that) and that means that the ACTUAL FSB speed is 1333 divided by 4 = 333 MHz.

The FSB speed is not 1333, it is actually 333, quad-pumped.

While I am here, I will telll you that your DDR2 memory will be running at DDR of 667 MHz, so you can choose RAM that will suit, ie PC2-5300 (DDR2-667) as Dual channel (so you need 2 sticks, or double sided sticks) or PC3-10600 (DDR3-1333) as single channel (1 stick).

I will explain Dual channel another time if you want to know how that works - but it relates to that "even slicker" thing I mentioned previously (which doubles, the Double Data Rate - So I suppose you can think of it as trickilly making Quad Data Rate by slight of hand - like a magician pulling a rabbit out of his motherboard, lol.)

I looked at comparison tables between processors and realized that I would be getting as big bang for my buck by choosing an E6550. The FSB speed is 333MHz, quad-pumped (1333MT/s FSB) which is the same as the 6850. It also has 4MB cache.

As far as the Quad Cores are concered, I rejected those because most software doesnt yet take advantage of them and the Q6600 will be dirt cheep by the time software does take advantage of quad cores. Why pay the extra $100.00 if it will give you nothing extra? (IMHO)

Each core is a separate CPU in effect, so that doubles, or quadruples (in the case of a quad core) the amount of processing a CPU can do. Intel and others did that because they were having trouble shrinking transistors and components enough to make any big difference.

ABOUT SPEED AND CORES:
-Finally... does the dilemma 'more cores, or more clock speed' really exist?
In other words, does a Dual Core with 3.0GH clock speed work 2x3.0GH
for each core which will result in a double summary clock speed =6.0GH?
Or is it that each of the cores works in 3.0GH, thus working separately on
different tasks, which just augments the overall processing speed ?

Think of it this way ... the FSB data transfer rate is how fast a CPU can get and put data to the other devices .. memory, hard drive etc. The internal clock is how fast the CPU can crunch its programmed code. There is so much memory access needed with most audio programs (I am thinking of the processor code and the type of processing it needs to do .. say transposing a track to a different key or something) that I think the FSB speed is far more of a concern than the processor frequency. I doubt you would notice the difference between a 2.0 GHz processor and a 3.0 GHz one in your music recording and production.
Note: I used to program the Motorola 6800 and dabbled with the 68000, so I know what goes on in machine code and there is lots of memory access all the time.
Note2: It just occurred to me that onboard cache will be used for the above. Notwithstanding, I still think you should save your bickes (money.)

ABOUT OS AND SOFTWARE:
-Will Windows XP Pro and my software, especially CUBASE SX3 (!)
support and function with the so called Thread-Level-Parallelism (TLP) or
Hyper-Thread technology, or Simultaneous Multi-threading Technology (SMT)
which is required by the Dual or Quad cores?

As I stated. I am pretty sure Quad technology will not have been implemented in those programs. However, there is another issue when running different applications. Quad core may be more efficient when you are running multiple applications at once. But more investigation would need to be done on the app's you intend to run to know for sure.

continued ....

[IonMan]

ABOUT MOTHERBOARDS:
I must chose between the following:
=>Asus P5K
(Socket 775 - Intel® P35 chipset ICH9R - Intel® CoreT2 Quad / CoreT2 Extreme
/ CoreT2 Duo / Pentium® Extreme / Pentium® D / Pentium® 4 Processors -
Dual-channel
DDR2 1066/800/667 MHz - 4*SATA/1*SATA on the Go/ 1394 - Gigabit LAN -
8-channel
HD Audio)

=>Asus P5KC
(Socket 775 - Intel® P35 chipset ICH9R - Intel® CoreT2 Quad / CoreT2 Extreme
/ CoreT2 Duo / Pentium® Extreme / Pentium® D / Pentium® 4 Processors -
Dual-channel
DDR2 1066/800/667 MHz or DDR3 1333/1066/800 - 2x1394 - 12xUSB 2.0 - Gigabit
LAN -8-channel HD Audio)

=>Asus P5W DH Deluxe (this one doesn't support the Quad Core or further)

=>Asus P5N32-E SLI
(Socket 775 - NVIDIA SLI Technology - NVIDIA Quad-SLIT Ready - NVIDIA
nForce® 680i SLIT - Dual-channel DDR2 800/667/533 - Support Intel® next
generation
45nm Multi-core CPU - Intel® Quad-core CPU Ready - Intel® CoreT2
Extreme/CoreT2 Duo
Ready - 1333**/1066/800/533MHz - 8 Phase Power Design SATA Raid - External
SATA - Dual Gigabit Lan - Audio 8 channels - IEEE 1394 - Fanless Design)

(Does the symbol 'P5' for the mothers stand for Pentium 5 ?)

I have the P5K, the only annoyance for me was that it hasnt got on-board video, so I have to purchase another PCI-Express card .. which wastes a slot I suppose.
You don't want a mobo that won't support Quad-Core, so if I were you I would remove P5W from your list.

P5K Deluxe over P5KC
================
The P5KC uses the Intel ICH9 and a JMicron as the SATA controllers:
-4 Internal SATA on the ICH9
-2 (1 Internal/1 External) on the JMicron.

The P5K Deluxe has 6 on the Intel ICH9R:
-4 internal controllers.
-2 external controllers.

The Deluxe offers more RAID options (0/1/0+1/5).
The P5KC only offers 2 RAID options 0/1 (2 ports).

The Deluxe has an extra PCIe 1x slot
The Deluxe uses the ADI AD1988B chip for Audio.

The P5KC uses the Realtek ALC883 chip for Audio.

The Deluxe also has 6 USB headers.
The P5KC also has 3 USB headers.

The Deluxe has Wi-Fi capabilities.

The Deluxe supports Dual Gigabit LAN.
The P5KC only supports Single Gigabit LAN.

The Deluxe has improved cooling for the SB/NB/Mosfets/VRM.

ABOUT MEMORY:
-Can I use my previous computer's stick of (1GB) DDR 400MH memory
together with new DDR2 1066/800/667MH memory sticks in the other slots,
or it's a crap idea?
-With Double channel architecture, can I leave one pair of slots with
only one stick, or I must always put two sticks?

It is not a crap idea .. it just won't work, lol. I had exactly the same issue. Just get either DDR2-667 (PC2-5300) (Dual Channel would be twice as nice)
or DDR2-800 (PC2-6400.) They are the sticks that complement the boards you are selecting from. DDR2-1066 is not necessary ... remember this:

FSB speed 333MHz, quad pumped (1333MHz FSB in MT/s)
This means:
DDR2 Ram that runs at 2 x 333 = 667 (don't quibble with the extra 1) or higher (PC2-5300, or PC2-6400.)

Double Channel is that slight of hand that "Doubles" DDR2 speed - it uses 2 lots of ram as one - they ghost each other I suppose, so you get like quad-pumped 4 * 333 = 1333.
In the words that Sean Connery NEVER said - "There must always be TWO!"

ABOUT HDs:
I plan to make a RAID0 configuration for faster, fastest... at
7200 (or 10,000 rpm but they're more noisy and heat up).
Top brands are Western Digital and Seagate of what I hear.
But what about Maxtor which is manifactured by Seagate?
And is Samsung also ok, I heard they're silent ?

I personally think you don't need 10,000 any more ... with SATA II and if you have a dedicated music data drive.
Just keep it defragged and make sure you create at least two partitions. Always use the first partition for your music data and the others for whatever you want.

I got seagate, but I used to hate them. They seem to be better now. I lost a WD the other day. Lucky I believe in back ups. Having said that I lost 3 pages of the book im writing .
Check out other users of for their experiences, but remember, all companies drives fail eventually. Just keep backups.

Huh.... lot of questions... anyway thanks a lot to those who'll have
the courage for feedback.

Globalization, climate changes, disasters, illnesses, terrorism, wars, famine...
all and more frequent and intensive, drive the humanity to more hectic time,
but technology and science go constantly ahead. Will this help us to avoid
the end? Or will we perish, holding the mouse and the keyboard of our
many-core-brains-almost-reaching-human-intelligence computer, all sinking
in the abyss?

It makes me feel all gooey inside when I help people, because people help me and I appreciate it so much. It is a pleasure to reply to you.
I hope I don't meet those fishy water aliens when I sink into the abyss ... unless my last recording session was a good one.
Good luck with your choices.

Ian

[Bad Disciple]

Hi back Jan (after such a long time).

Last summer I posted questions about building a computer myself.
I received a lot of feedback - yours especially estimated, thank you!
(Your answer to me is there: http://forum.recordingreview.com/f9/...240/#post20675)
Meanwhile, a serious health problem in the family occurred and
prevented me from continuing. Now that things are gladly under control,
I come back to my computer issue.

So I posted a new post for final fixing my decision - it’s there:
Building a new computer myself

But after carefully reading your explanations, I have some puzzling.
(Even though I became a musician, first I had engineering studies, so I have
quite a tech-oriented mind.) Here I’d ask you to clear it please for me.

ABOUT PROCESSOR:
The Front Side Bus -FSB- speed (i.e. 1333 MHz) is the Transfer rate
(1/4 of it, quad-pumped). The Internal Clock speed is the Processor frequency
(e.g. 2.0GHz, 3.0GHz…) Is that gotten right?
From this point it seems that for audio processing, the concern is FSB speed
more than the processor frequency. Also, the memory cache (like 8MB, 16MB)
is the other importance. (And of course as much RAM memory as possible.)

ABOUT MOTHERS:
Thanks for the comparison for the two Asus mothers P5K Deluxe and P5KC.
I still hesitate what to chose between these:
Asus P5K Deluxe
(Socket 775 - Intel® P35 chipset ICH9R - Intel® CoreT2 Quad / CoreT2 Extreme
/ CoreT2 Duo / Pentium® Extreme / Pentium® D / Pentium® 4 Processors -
Dual-channel DDR2 1066/800/667 MHz - 4*SATA/1*SATA on the Go/ 1394 - Gigabit LAN -
8-channel HD Audio)
or
Asus P5PK-V
(Socket 775 - Support Intel® next generation 45nm Multi-core CPU - Intel® G33 chipset
- Dual-channel DDR2 1066/800/667 MHz - Heat Pipe - Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 3100 integrated - 2x1394 - 12xUSB 2.0 - Gigabit LAN - 8-channel HD Audio)
or
Gigabyte GA-P35-DQ6
or
Intel D975XBX2KR Bad Axe 2 (wich I'm not sure if it supports Quad CPUs
and/or 45nm technology)

(By the way, is there any problem with the Realtek chip for Audio? I’ve got it on
my notebook and it has a weird behavior - very low volume in some applications,
ok with other ones.)

ABOUT HARD DISCS:
1. Now that S-ATA drives came, is it still worthy putting 2 HDs in a RAID 0
(for OS and programs) with a separate HD for data saving, and expect that
RAID 0 will speed operations up? (And backup the RAID 0 discs so I can
restore my OS and programs if any crash occurs?)
2. Is it helping speed wise if I use one physical drive only for my Windows OS,
a 2nd physical drive for my Program Files and a 3d physical drive for my Data saving?

ABOUT OS and PROGRAMS:
It’s too bad that now is the switch period to Quad or Multicore are, while
many of us still have expensive older applications and Windos XP that can’t
take advantage of it!

Thank you again for you feedback, it’s well appreciated!
I don’t know when my last recording session will be, but I sincerely would prefer
a forever-going one than a ‘last’ one!
Photis Ognen Photiou
also known as
Bad Disciple

[brandondrury]

I will explain Dual channel another time if you want to know how that works

Please do. I'm curious about this stuff.


I want to point out something. There is nothing wrong with researching computer parts, but don't waste too much time. If the goal is to build the fastest computer in the world, knock yourself out with computer research. If your goal is to record music, control your computer research because you have too many battles to fight. The motherboard is a tiny facet in a tiny facet of a tiny link in the recording chain.

At the moment, I'm still using my trusty Athlon 64 2800 for all my recording needs. I have ran out of power a few times, but not that many times. There are times when I woud probably prefer to use a few CPU hog plugins I have and settle for my old Waves plugins, but that's about the extent of the problem for me. 99.5% of the the time, my computer's lack of speed is a non-issue.

At this point, upgrading my computer is probably #5 (maybe even #10) on my wish list of upgrades and I already have most of my basis covered.

Food for thought.

Brandon

[IonMan]

Please do. I'm curious about this stuff.


I want to point out something. There is nothing wrong with researching computer parts, but don't waste too much time. If the goal is to build the fastest computer in the world, knock yourself out with computer research. If your goal is to record music, control your computer research because you have too many battles to fight. The motherboard is a tiny facet in a tiny facet of a tiny link in the recording chain.

At the moment, I'm still using my trusty Athlon 64 2800 for all my recording needs. I have ran out of power a few times, but not that many times. There are times when I woud probably prefer to use a few CPU hog plugins I have and settle for my old Waves plugins, but that's about the extent of the problem for me. 99.5% of the the time, my computer's lack of speed is a non-issue.

At this point, upgrading my computer is probably #5 (maybe even #10) on my wish list of upgrades and I already have most of my basis covered.

Food for thought.

Brandon

I agree with Brandon, except i would add that it is very impportant to get your head around it before you do buy. At least to avoid makinga booboo .. cos there are booboo's to be made a-plenty.

I purchased a P5K Deluxe with 3 SATAII drives. Drive 0 (the first one) is dual bootable - both Windows XP - so that at start up I can choose whether I intend to do some WORK (I am an Analyst Programmer) or do some PLAY (record music.) The other 2 drives are for my music data .. one for projects, the other for ghosting.

I made sure that my DAW configuration had the least additional software necessary and I dont seem to have any problems at all to date. I havent yet recorded more than 10 tracks as I am still figuring out how I want to use my system, but processing power doesnt seem to be an issue at all.

I am using a Duel Core processor (Pentium D 925, 3.0 GHz LGA 775 800FSB) as this was reasonably priced and I can upgrade if and only if it is necessary - really dont think it is.

I have 1GB DDR2 800MHz Ram.

I did lots of research and chose a good combination and then promptly forgot everything .. to many other fun things to do than retain computer hardware info that will be outdated in 2 months.

I am very pleased with my systems power and dont see a need to upgrade at all ... EXCEPT ......

I also purchased a good quality power suppy so that I would decrease the chances of have a power issue .. and guess what ... The fan lasted about 3 months before sounding like a DC10. My next spend will be a replacement fan for the power supply.

Another issue is the general noise of the PC. My gorgeous, expensive, Condensor Mic picks up my Italian neighbours chatting all the way down their back yard ... And also .. my computer .. hard drives, fans ... This is definitely an issue that requires great thought. I am currently building a cabinet for it at the moment ... something I really wish I didnt have to do, but ...


As brandon has stated, do your research and then make your choice and forget about it all for a while. There are lots of other issues to deal with aside from hardware.

P.S. Still love my firestudio .... Think I need 2 monitors

[midKnight]

Hey Guys,

I just have a couple of questions in regards to this subject, and I probably shouldn't post this till I have looked at my machine specs at home but anyhoo, here goes.

Last year I built myself a nice fire-breathing pc (good for all sorts of uses) and however this year as I'm really using it mostly for audio recording, I'm encountering a lot of limitations when doing multi-tracking stuff.

Here's a quick rundown of my machine specs (from memory, so this is far from complete)

Amd 64 X2 5000+ (2 or 2.4ghz, can't remember at the moment)
Asus N32SLI motherboard (don't remember the exact model)
2gb 6400 1024 ram (corsair optimized for gaming)
Nvidia Geforce 8600 GT SLI video card
500gb Sata HD (might be Sata II, can't remember at moment)
m-audio 24/96 card (hold over from previous system).
Windows XP SP2
Sonar 7PE

Here's my problem. This system rocks for most tasks, however, as I'm doing all of my audio work at 24bit/96k, after about 10 or 15 mono tracks in a file, Sonar starts crackling and dropping out like a mofo. The problem only gets worse if I start using track effects, etc.

Since my average projects runs in the 25-35 track range, and I realize this system might not be able to handle that, it seems to me that I should be able to get more performance out what I've got, or perhaps I need to change out some stuff to deal with 24/96 better?

Perhaps I'm expecting too much? How many tracks can you guys comfortably run and have it be a decent environment to work in? (no dropouts, crackling, etc.)

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

-thanks!
-Nick

[brandondrury]

My rig is a Athlon 64 2800 wit 2GB ram etc. I can do 30 tracks in a typical mix without much problem. However, I do not track at 96Khz. I don't see the point especially since I mix in the box. I would have to resample and that would be a terrible thing.

I'm not sure what plugins you are using, but it needs to be said that it takes over double the processing power to handle 96K as it does 44.1k.

If you really want to use 96K that is your business. At the Michael Wagener Recording Workshop he even used 48K. He said it sounded better to him than 96K. I thought that was interesting. (He wasn't mixing in the box).

Brandon

[midKnight]

My rig is a Athlon 64 2800 wit 2GB ram etc. I can do 30 tracks in a typical mix without much problem. However, I do not track at 96Khz. I don't see the point especially since I mix in the box. I would have to resample and that would be a terrible thing.

Brandon

Interesting. Help me to understand. With computing power as cheap as it is today, why *wouldn't* you work at 24/96k?

I mix in the box as well, but I *definitely* notice a lot of difference between 16/44 and 24/96 recordings in terms of quality. Since I record everything at 24/96, there's no resampling going on, (except when I downsample to 16/44 for a final mix type thing.)

However if there is a compelling reason to work at 48k I'll happily switch, I'm just trying to wrap my head around it.

-Nick

[IonMan]

hi Nick,

because I have a lot of issues (carpal tunnel being the main one) I have not yet done enough to hit my limit yet. Perhaps I should just do a quickie to see what that limit is ...

Just the same a few things did occur to me.

I have configured my machine as a duel boot. So when I boot up for music recording, there's minimal software loaded .. only the necessary stuff. It could be that you have a bunch of background programs running that you may not be aware of .. just a thought.

I would also ensure that your network or internet connection is disable. You could disable your firewall etc .. minimise other work ur PC needs to do.

Sata II may make a difference, check to see if yours is SATA II.

Your sound card! Does it process on board, or does your CPU have to do all the processing .. that is .. how much work does your sound card do for you?


Do you regularly defragment your music data disk?

Oh and thats a good one ... have you separated your music data disk from your music program disk? I have a separate disk for the operating system and cubase etc etc. And stand alone disks for music data only (actually I use only the first partition of the data disks for music data ...

I have 2 x 280 GB, each one is partitioned into two partitions. I use the first partition for music and the second partition for other files ... Archive etc.

More memory may help, but I would look at the previous suggestions first.

ahhh have you got the compatible memory configuration for your bus speed???

hope this give u some ideas, mate,

cheers,
Ian

[midKnight]

hi Nick,
It could be that you have a bunch of background programs running that you may not be aware of .. just a thought.

Probably. I use this machine for a lot of other stuff as well, so I most definitely have AV/AS software running all the time. Plus it's always connected to the net, so I may start disabling some of these other things and turn it solely into a music machine.

Sata II may make a difference, check to see if yours is SATA II.

I will definitely do that.

Your sound card! Does it process on board, or does your CPU have to do all the processing .. that is .. how much work does your sound card do for you?

I.. have no idea. I have the m-audio 24/96 card (lowest end of the m-audio line), so I have no idea how much processing on board it does. I have been thinking about upgrading it for a long time now, however as I usually only record 1 instrument at a time, I'm thinking the money might be better spent in acoustic room treatment.

Do you regularly defragment your music data disk?

All the time, and like Brandon, I reformat my machine pretty frequently.

Oh and thats a good one ... have you separated your music data disk from your music program disk? I have a separate disk for the operating system and cubase etc etc. And stand alone disks for music data only (actually I use only the first partition of the data disks for music data ...

I have 2 x 280 GB, each one is partitioned into two partitions. I use the first partition for music and the second partition for other files ... Archive etc.

Actually I don't. I have 1 500gb drive in the system, with everything on it. Granted, that's probably not the best way to go, so I should probably toss another 500gb in there and move all the music files to it.

ahhh have you got the compatible memory configuration for your bus speed???

I believe so. I have some really nice memory in the system (for gaming), however that doesn't necessarily mean it's the best choice for music production.

hope this give u some ideas, mate,

cheers,
Ian

Thanks Ian, appreciate your thoughts, it's good to have some other opinions, to get my thinking going on what I need to do to improve the performance.

-Nick

[IonMan]

Probably. I use this machine for a lot of other stuff as well, so I most definitely have AV/AS software running all the time. Plus it's always connected to the net, so I may start disabling some of these other things and turn it solely into a music machine.
-Nick

As I stated, my machine is duel boot. I created separate boot partitions and loaded XP Pro onto it twice. At startup I am given a choice which partition I want to boot from. My choices are "Office" for my IT and other general work and "DAW" for my music work. When I boot up as "DAW", nothing from the other partition is known by my computer (other than I can physically look at the drives.) There are no programs running from my "Office" partition. This enables me to have complete control over the system and fine tune it without affecting my other work. It's a good option and is worth looking at.

I.. have no idea. I have the m-audio 24/96 card (lowest end of the m-audio line), so I have no idea how much processing on board it does. I have been thinking about upgrading it for a long time now, however as I usually only record 1 instrument at a time, I'm thinking the money might be better spent in acoustic room treatment.
-Nick

You could look at what the processor is doing as you do different things with your M-Audio card.

You probably know this, but plug-ins and so on can eat into your CPU time significantly, and that is especially important if your cards doesnt do a lot of processing for you.

All the time, and like Brandon, I reformat my machine pretty frequently.
-Nick

Very good practice

Actually I don't. I have 1 500gb drive in the system, with everything on it. Granted, that's probably not the best way to go, so I should probably toss another 500gb in there and move all the music files to it.
-Nick

As far as disk access is concerned, it takes longer for the heads to find data on the inside tracks, so some "experts" suggest partitioning drives and using the first partition (outside tracks) for your music data. This makes sense, but I question how that works with multiple platters (in the drives.) My guess is that all platters are used up at the same time, sharing data across them (ignore this if it makes no sense, i'm just blurting - but I just piqued my own interest now ....)

Anyway, that's exactly how I have approcahed it. I created 2 partitions on each drive and use the first partition on each drive as my data stream target.

I believe so. I have some really nice memory in the system (for gaming), however that doesn't necessarily mean it's the best choice for music production.
-Nick

I was going to explain how memory works, but it is so complicated it needs a separate thread of its own ... not only is the memory speed important, but so are the latency figures (ie DDR-800 can be supplied with different timings)

I might see what else is on this site first.

Send me the details of your system and I will calculate it for you ( I mean what memory you have, your FSB speed and processor speed. I have used a program called CPU-Z to investigate my system - however I dont really know how safe it is with regards PC security (silly me)

Thanks Ian, appreciate your thoughts, it's good to have some other opinions, to get my thinking going on what I need to do to improve the performance.
-Nick

[moonunit7]

maybe we can all make a contribution by telling DELL or any other company for that matter that we want a laptop or desktop optimized for recording multi-track audio.

Help by going here: Audio Recording - Dell IdeaStorm
and promote the idea!