Crosstalk #31 - Mac vs. PC

[mathew]

Further to the discussion generated from viewer mail about mac vs. PC, I was interested in hearing more of the debate.

I'm in the market for a new laptop and I'm comparing a Mac Book (2.16GH CPU, 2gb RAM) with the Dell XPS 1210.

I've been making music on the PC for a number of years now (Reason, Soundforge, Ableton, Cool Edit Pro) - and the best point I think that was made (episode #31) was about availability of software on PC. Having said this, I am very interested in trying out the stability of a UNIX based platform for audio creation.

Of course I would dual boot with a stripped down version of XP so that I wasn't limiting myself on software options. It goes without saying that Vista is not an option I would consider on either setup.

What do people think?

[abarnett]

I think that mac is the best way to go if you don't want to learn anything about computers (but you are not guaranteed to have zero problems)

Otherwise you will always get more for your money with a pc. XP and Ubuntu Linux in a partition drive is working great for me. There is also some info on the Ardour site about setting up the foreign plugins on Linux.

[neal79]

I would go the PC route myself mostly because of money and the fact I like to use Sonar but I would call first and make sure the laptop can run XP. I did some research on a Vista dual boot for a friend and it seems that quite a few newer Dell and HP laptops have problems running XP. A lot of the newer hardware doesn't have XP drivers. I'm going to try doing one next week so I'll let you know how that goes.

The other half of me does think Mac. I would think that if MS doesn't fix this thing they call Vista there will be no hardware that will work properly for it. After that it would follow that there would be little software as well. Since eventually XP will not be supported this would effectively kill the PC as a recording platform if they let it go that route.

The sad thing is the DRM that is causing most of these problems has already been hacked and now does absolutely nothing to prevent copying. I think it took about 3 days for it to happen. Now all that is left is a big inconvenience to users. The industry has been trending slightly away from DRM recently so maybe that will make this go away.

Right now seems to be a crappy time to be getting into PC recording it seems between the UB stuff on the Mac and all the problems with Vista.

[mathew]

Thanks for your thoughts guys.

The benefits I can see with the mac laptop is that I have the option of XP, OSX and Ubuntu (triple boot). After comparing the specs for the mac and the dell, the mac comes out cheaper (student discount). As you point out though, you have to consider the expense in the long run with the ability to upgrade/customise...

Dell gives you the option of XP or Vista pre-installed with the XPS, but for how much longer? Right now if I had to make a decision about a commercial OS for the future (post-XP) then I would have to say OSX. I haven't had heaps of exposure to Vista, but aside from the hardware compatability issues, what I've read suggests that all the security means that the performance is not even that much better than with XP. If more people are switching away from Vista, then surely they'll have to sort out the lack of software for mac.

I haven't spent heaps of time trying to configure Jack and Ardour, but if nothing else I think the future for Linux recording looks promising.

[smopo24]

After having used both, for strictly audio, I'd go with a Mac. As far as support goes, I think they are total rips, but for the amount of recording software available, ease of use, layout, and ubiquity in studios (just in case you wanted to bring your tracks into the studio for mixing and/or mastering). Nearly anything else, I'd go PC.

[dolivas]

I'd go for a Mac in terms of Audio or reliability. I've hardly ever had to deal with programs not working for no reason or deal with setup issues. Pretty much what gets opened or plugged into a Mac works. Searching for samples, slogging through program windows is a lot easier on a Mac because of Expose and some other Mac-OS based features. Plus it has Plogue's Bidule and TimeWarp and Musolomo's stuff which is Mac only. A lot of the eye candy stuff isn't super-taxing on the computer either. I own an XP machine and a Mac, the Mac is the cpu I use 95% of the time now.

[SorenP]

I think if you're set on a laptop go with a mac. I think there isn't a windows based laptop out there that can touch a powerbook. Plus PC laptops (and desktops, but not so much) come with 20348 programs you're just going to delete and re-format right away anyways.
For desktops I use a PC that I have been upgrading over the years that I love. I haven't built a mac (if thats even possible) but with PC's if you ever played with legos you can upgrade ram/cpu/cards totally on your own. XP is pretty stable if you don't do anything stupid with it.. stay off the porn sites. as hard as that may be.

[mathew]

Thanks for your thoughts guys. I got my new macbook about a week ago, and am totally stoked.

Boot camp works fine for any Windows only programs I can't live without or don't have access to for mac yet.

[FRETPICK]

I just bought a Intel Core 2...... 2.16ghz T7400 Dell 6400. 2 gig slow ram & slow Harddrive. Vista prem on it.
Couple of things to sort out on it but Cubase 4 + updates is ready to go. I've over the moon. I've never been a mobile musician before.
If I don't get on with this I'll but mac stuff on it or maybe even dual boot. After all friends have there uses.

This is buy far the most luxury bit of kit I've had to date.