Building a fast and reliable DAW

[Moon]

There seems to be little information on how to build a fast and reliable DAW. Which components should you combine to build a PC which is fast, reliable en quiet ? Please post your personal recommendations.

[Van Greco]

It's probably pretty obvious, but if your machine is going to be primarily a DAW then you should try and stay away from the high performance video cards, not only are they an expense you can do without, but most of them have monstrous fans on them which make a good deal of noise. Also there is a whole range of cooling fans that are designed to be quiet. I use Vantec Stealth's. Another thing I like is that on my Zalman cpu fan I have a speed controller. This is helpful because it allows you to turn down the fan and thus reduce ambient noise while tracking and then turn it back up again when mixing so as to get less computer noise in the mics.

  RAM is obviously very important, especially if you are using heavy-duty sample based instruments like Kontakt and the like. Get as much Ram as you can afford.

As for cpu, I've had good results with an Athlon 64 3400 and was pretty happy with an 1800 Athlon XP before that. Brand doesn't really matter so much. Both Intel and AMD offer lots of options that will be suitable for a music computer. The only thing that i can think of is to avoid the budget models by either brand as they generally are not suited for music production. Someone said it over at kvr and it bears repeating "friends don't let friends buy Celerons".

 Sound card is your most important add-on if you're going to try and make music on the computer. I have had excellent luck with the Delta line of cards fro M-Audio. I had a 2496 and was always pleased with it. I eventually upgraded to a Delta 1010 because I wanted more inputs. I've never had a single problem with either of these cards. They've been very reliable for me. Again brand probably doesn't matter so much. What you're looking for is a card with ASIO drivers as these will allow you to get low latency which is especially important when playing in live parts. Be aware of how many inputs and outputs you need or think you will need in the near future. There are lots of good options in the lower priced range now as sound card prices have gone down alot recently.

   Lastly, there are quite a few little things you can do to help improve performance when recording. Most of these involve turning off aspects of Windows that you are not really using. There is a whole page full of tweaks, but alas the address escapes me. I'll try to come back add a  link when I am able.

I hope some of this is helpful. 

[kara]

HI VG,

Great to see you here !
I hope you'll keep visiting us and add your knowledge here.

Thanks for been part of the party here

Kara

[Oren]

My "other" computer runs on XP Pro, has a dual core pentium4 chip rated at 2.67gigahertz, and 2 gigabytes of RAM. I have 2 DVD burners installed so it's quick and easy to back up my files to DVD rewritable discs, and the hard drive spins at 10,000rpm.

Lately microsoft has been applying themselves to ongoing support of XP, so I decided to continue running this computer on windows, but the on-board SoundMax audio card is not suitable for serious sound

Yesterday I purchased a used M-Audio Delta 66 audio card http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/Delta66-main.html for $100.00(Canadian) from a local musician who found it too complicated to work with. It was challenging to set up , but everything works as the manual promises. So now I have a second desktop DAW with a pro-audio soundcard.

I will use PowerTracks Pro from PG Music for recording and mixing on this machine, and Audacity for mastering. Schweet! 

[Alienz]

Quadcores will become much cheaper soon i suspect, though some people are already talking about octo-core..
Ram: XP only seems to recognize up to 3 gig
get the ram to perfectly fit your mobo, there are a lot of different Mhz ram
Videocard: like someone said before, those fans can get very loud, get a fanless one if you can. Fanless cards can have huge coolingblocks which can block some of your pci-ports though
M-Audio cards are ok, just as EMU but the patchmixrouting etc can be difficult to understand but it gives a LOT of options. I have EMU 0404 myself but in hindsight i kick myself for not buying the bigger one (1212?1616?) at only 50-75 euros more than the 0404. The other ones have better converters etc.

[kara]

To be clear 
Windows XP 32-bit edition can address up to 4GB of RAM.
Windows XP Professional 64-bit edition, on the other hand, supports up to 128GB of physical RAM and 16TB (terabytes) of virtual memory.

k

[Alienz]

To be clear 
Windows XP 32-bit edition can address up to 4GB of RAM.
Windows XP Professional 64-bit edition, on the other hand, supports up to 128GB of physical RAM and 16TB (terabytes) of virtual memory.

k

Hmm dont know where I got that idea from then, maybe that was true on win98/2000?  Or am I just getting old?

[elwoodblues1969]

As I am in the process of familiarizing myself with the functionality of pc's with DAW,I read through some interesting info in reference to my HP Pavilion a6528p & Propellerhead Reason 4.
Reason is renown for offering quite a bundle of advanced features,but without going overboard by moderating certain levels of functionality-for instance,the amount polyphony used,so as to not be overbearing on a pc's cpu.

This is of course,a tantalizing feature for me,being a newbie in this area & being easily concerned about overpowering my pc with a DAW program.
I was especially pleased to learn that the system requirements for Reason 4 is a recommendation of 1GB ram, & Pentium 4 processor/AMD Athlon XP.

According some user reviews,a pc with a reasonable amount of power can handle Reason 4 well(right out of the box).
However though,once you utilize Reason 4's fullest potential,it can become a strain on the cpu-especially so,once you add more upgrades.

Since my pc did not come with a manual,I discovered info on my particular pc with regard to maximizing my RAM memory on www.memory4all.com

As it is now,my pc has 3GB of RAM & a dual core,with a 2.20Ghz processor & is expandable to 4GB of RAM.

A bit of advice that I had found to be very useful,is a user review of Reason 4,explained that this particular DAW does not support direct audio importing-which he finds to be a good thing,as Cubase had a tendency to freeze up his pc.

Of course though,I don't know the power of his pc,but nevertheless,keeping your external audio separate,seems like a smart thing to do,provided that you don't mind the inconvenience of it, such as for those that want absolutely everything within one program to work from.
Since I prefer to only have one computer in my studio & since I have a hard disk recorder to record vocals on,the Reason 4 is perfect for my situation-especially so,since this DAW is also known for being a stable program,which is an absolute dream for a hardware gear guy like myself!

-Thom

[Oren]

Thom,

I'm sure your 3 gigabytes of RAM and dual processor chip can easily manage "Reason". I just wish I knew more about the program and whether it will fill your recording needs.

[elwoodblues1969]

Oren,

Yeah,I'm confident my pc can handle Reason 4 also,but perhaps at some point-like say, I decide to use all of Reason's upgrades,then maybe an upgrade to 4 GB of RAM might be prudent at some point.
I think I'll be smart though,& only upgrade what I need,rather than to just have the novelty of having a huge collection of sounds.
From what I've read & seen with this software package,I probably won't want or need of any additional sounds for years to come!

If you want to know more about Reason 4,just go to Propellerhead's website....their product info on their site is the most comprehensive & revealing I have ever seen...trust me,it's all their for the asking....a wonderful website!

http://www.propellerheads.se/products/reason/index.cfm?fuseaction=get_article&article=what-is-it

-Thom

[Oren]

Looks (and sounds) good!

I'm not clear how you intend to integrate your vocal(digital audio) tracks with Reason's synth tracks, and mix/master the combination.

[elwoodblues1969]

Oren,

I'll just burn whatever I do on Reason 4 to cd,then playback the cd to rip it onto my Zoom 8HD...I like to keep things simple,if I can.

There's no sense in letting my collection of hardware go to waste.

-Thom

[kara]

Oren,

I'll just burn whatever I do on Reason 4 to cd,then playback the cd to rip it onto my Zoom 8HD...I like to keep things simple,if I can.

There's no sense in letting my collection of hardware go to waste.

-Thom

If you use it that way you won't be disappointed, Reason is a great sound machine but bad integration with other DAW's (beside rewire) but you won't have that problem

k

[Wyatt]

Heya Thom..glad I spotted this thread.

ReWire is disappointing with Adobe Audition3.

Reason will export a song or track or selected clip
as audio, (.wav), and that works fine for me.



Wyatt

[folderol]

Heya Thom..glad I spotted this thread.

ReWire is disappointing with Adobe Audition3.

Reason will export a song or track or selected clip
as audio, (.wav), and that works fine for me.



Wyatt

I think we are getting dangerously close to 'What's the best way to change a light bulb' 

The answer of course is, whatever way you find easiest