The battle of Desktop vs. Laptop for home recording – please Help!!

[rbracch]

Hi there,

I was wondering if anyone has advice regarding the pros and cons of Desktop PC vs. Laptop PC for home recording. Seems that the laptops these days are coming equipped with some mighty powerful features - which makes me wonder why I would even considering getting a desktop. Please help!

Right now, I am leaning toward purchasing a Laptop PC for the advantages of portability and smaller size, however, I don’t want to “jump the gun” before I research whether or not this is a good idea.

Here are the details of my other gear and my recording objectives:

1.) Before I buy a PC, I plan on purchasing the PreSonus FireStudio Project Audio Interface. Can this interface easily connect to a Laptop, and are there any other obvious issues that I should be aware of?

2.) My goal is to create home demos of my rock-based original songs – I usually build the demos track by track while playing all of the instruments myself. I typically use between 10 to 15 “tracks” (on the software) per song. I don’t intend to record the “final” versions of the songs with the new gear - for that, I intend on booking a fully-equipped professional recording studio.

3.) And lastly, if I do buy a laptop, I would much prefer to use the large flatscreen monitor that I already own when I’m in my basement studio –the reason being is that it allows for much better for viewing long “tracks” on the audio editing software. Would I be able to bypass the laptop’s screen and connect into the back of my large flatscreen monitor

Thanks much, I would appreciate any advice on all or any of the above points.

Take care,
RB

[bozmillar]

really the only difference performance wise is that for the same money, you can get better performance from a desktop than a laptop. With a laptop, you get portability, which can be a huge advantage.

Laptops today are more than capable of recording and mixing audio. However, base completely on price, $1000 will get you better stuff if you get a desktop over a laptop. But then again, you can get a pretty descent laptop for $1000 that should be able to treat you pretty well.

[tacman7]

I hate laptops so I "MAY" be biased.

Never seen one that runs at the same speed as a desktop.
So if it was a 133, my desktop 133 seemed a lot faster etc.

Guess if you have to have portability a laptop is the way to go.

I like having the freedom to do what I want with the computer, add hard drives, cards etc.

[String7th]

Laptops can perform as well as most desktops. For both, the more power, the higher the price. If you were to get the most powerfull laptop in an average computer store, it could probably handle 26 channel tracking and 100+ plug ins, just like a desktop with quad core and 8 gigs of RAM. Laptops have a cap on how powerfull it can because you just can't fit tripple CPUs, 128 gigs of RAM, and 16 PCI slots in there. But we're talking HD movie editing there.

Since there's no difference there, it comes down to budget and portability needs. Laptops will be more expensive. For PC's and Mac, no matter what. And upgrading/physical repair may require pro-help in some cases. So if you absolutely require your laptop to be portable, you have to pay more. It's really that simple. If you don;t need it to be portable, you can get more for your money in a desktop.

[j03]

Another thing to watch out for is the firewire port - many laptops have cheap firewire ports that dont work with many audio interfaces. Any may still not work if you upgrade with a new card. I would do a lot of research on what firewire ports are compatible.

[String7th]

Originally Posted by j03

Another thing to watch out for is the firewire port -

A valid point, but not a dealbreaker in the least. I've acually worked a Firepod into a laptop with only a 4-circuit FW-mini connection available. Only needed a $15 adapter. The manual actually states there's no loss of quality too, because 2 of the 6-circuit connectors supply power if needed. data only moves through the other 4.

And if there's no FW port at all, both are cheap solutions. A FW PCI card for desktops cost less than $30. And the Laptop cards are around $50.
Check it out

[Husky Band]

I have a Firestudio 2626 and the biggest problems I had with it was finding a Fire Wire interface that worked with it. So I'm a sort of an expert by trial and error on FW cards for laptops. Some FW ports on laptops will work and some won't. I have a Dell 1525 with a built in and it works OK. I bought a SIIG FW express card (it has the recommended TI chip set) and inserted it in the 1525 and it seems to perform a little better. I also have use of a HP laptop with built in FW and it doesn't work at all. With it I use a Cool Gear FW card bus adapter (TI chip set again) and it works fine. If you go the laptop rout be sure to get one with a Core2 Duo or equivalent processor. Also get as much ram as you can afford. Last but not least, get an external hard drive (preferable one made for audio recording and not just back up) to use for recording your files. Laptop drives are pretty slow and might have trouble keeping up with the demands of multi track recording. This is the recommended HD setup for desktops as well. This has been my experience. I use a laptop for the portability. I have a rack with the FireStudio and 2 Digimax's a head phone amp and a rack mount HD and a power strip. 24 tracks. I sit the laptop on top of the rack, plug in the computer and Firewire and I'm ready to go. Laptops are for portability. I think you can get better performance for less money with a desktop.