computers for sound

[timtheenchanteruk]

OK, ive finally decided to look into getting a comp for my sound system,

 

Apart from the software, which im already checking demo versions of

 

what kind of hardware would I need eg processor spec, amount of RAM etc, and would it be a good idea to be running software for outboard equip thru midi eg. my feedback destroyer, or just keep it for playback, the last thing I want is a skip in playback as other sortware refreshes etc.

 

Suggestions of a reasonable sound card, internal or external please

 

one last thing, which version of windows would be most suitable, I would run bare bones of whatever, but I already have 95, 98 and 98SE, and XP shortly

 

thanx in advance

[Bobbsy]

It depends a bit on what you will be doing with it.

 

In my experience, the spec for a playback only computer doesn't need to be overly high. Most of them run happily on a pretty meek and mild machine.

 

However, if you want to edit cues, music or effects, then it's worth going fairly high spec. The newest version of Adobe Audition (which is what I use) recommends a 3 gig P4 processor, 1 gig of RAM, and as speedy a drive as you can get. Assuming you want the ability to record and edit, I'd be driven by the spec for THAT software, and your playback application will likely be happy.

 

As for the OS, I'd go with XP, preferably the pro edition. It's a good solid system and, in any case, Microsoft has/is withdrawing support for the earlier stuff.

 

The area I'd spend most attention on is getting a decent sound card, either stereo or multichannel as required. The noise floor of inbuilts or Soundblaster stuff is pretty poor...and a better once doesn't add that much to the cost.

 

Bob

[Ben Lawrance]

I'm not sure if there is a "Standard" spec, but I would be tempted to go for a rather healthy machine with a reasonably quick processor, loads of RAM is a must for audio (I run 2Gb of DDR400)

 

Make sure the HDD has lots of cache (8Mb is ok) and a low seek time

 

As for soundcard. There are hundreds to choose from. Try and get one with balanced outputs.

 

Try and keep the case temperature down aswell, so use lots of fans (quiet ones) and exhausts are good.

 

Last but not least. DO NOT CONNECT IT TO THE INTERNET!!!!

[Tomo]

That's excessive for an audio beast - you've just specced a video editing machine.

 

1GB of RAM is plenty, preferably with an AMD processor set to dual-channel DDR mode - Intel don't do this yet unfortunately, and there is a significant gain for no outlay.

 

The CPU is pretty irrelevant - anything better than an AthlonXP 3000 will be excellent.

 

Hard disk speed is pretty irrelevant, just don't go for the slowest.

This is basically because any hard disk that can stream uncompressed video can stream a LOT of uncompressed audio.

I'd suggest using IDE (PATA) HDDs, simply because they are cheaper than SATA.

 

If it's a fixed system, get a physically large case as it helps cooling and also damps down the noise of the drives. Plus it's harder for low-lifes to steal!

 

An extremely cheap graphics card - you need nothing here.

 

DVD burner - You'll need to back everything up, and DVD Rs are the most cost-effective medium-term backup at the moment.

 

You want no fans at all if you can manage it - if you're editing, you don't want to have the hum of fans in the background of your headphones.

There are a lot of passive heatsinks available for CPUs, and the price isn't much higher than a good fan cooler.

 

Nice external soundcard, Firewire or USB as it makes very little difference. You want an external unit to avoid interference from the computer itself.

Spend more on the sound card.

PCs can be easily and cheaply upgraded, if you start dealing with video and need more oomph, but that sound card determines how good your sound will be.

 

Put this way - the spec I've given is higher than my desktop, which will happily play 3D games while iTunes plays back in shuffle mode, and Audacity runs fast enough that effects take almost no time at all.

[Bobbsy]

Mainly good advice Tomo, but I'll take very minor issue with a couple of things.

 

First, the disk speed can become an issue if you're doing multitrack mixing. I'm not talking anything exotic, but results when you get up above 16 tracks or so are patch if your disk isn't at least a 7200 rpm one. I don't know about the OP's needs, but when making up sound effect beds I often have that many or more tracks in the mix. Certainly the slower disks common in laptops are a major limiting factor.

 

Second, it's not essential to go for an external sound card. Any of the better quality PCI ones are absolutely fine and interference free. I'm thinking of things like the Echo Layla but there are lots of others around. If you do go external, I'd shoot for firewire rather than USB. USB2 may be okay, but USB1 can run out of bandwidth for multitrack work. Obviously this is not an issue with simple stereo, but depending on what you want to do this can be limiting. Certainly for theatre SFX I'm using more and more discrete channels these days.

 

Otherwise, you make some very good points.

 

Bob

[Rob_Beech]

USB2 has always been fine with me.

 

I'll second the internet thing.

Unfortunatly I have this computer, which is used for everything. 2 and a half years old now wihtout any major upgrades, its fine for audio and video recording but it certainly knows about it with over 16 tracks simultaniously recording!

 

its a P4 2.8 (2mb cache)

2gig DDR

120gig and 2 external 250gig USB2 HD which I use for archive stuff rather than stuff I'm currently working on.

I use an audigy 2 platinum ex. at the time it was good. its on tthe list to upgrade although most of the stuff I do is via ADAT (3 cards in the back) from a HD24XR. I'm still in th learning process with the link and editing part. ... I'm a live engineer its all too complicated all this computer stuff, all those buttons, give me a PM5D and a 16 piece band with monitors from FOH anyday..

 

 

Rob

[mac.calder]

If it is playback - often having a good deal of ram is a great thing - For example, it is not unusual to have in excess of a gig of sound files - for good speed, preloading it all into ram is often very useful.

 

Make sure the sound card you choose has multiple channel output so that you can shove each channel through your mixer if you so desire, or to make use of outboard effects.

 

Unfortunatly, show control (and multimedia in general) is underpowered under most alternative ix86 operating systems - OSX being the only real exception there.

 

Make sure which ever sound card/output device you choose has either a joystick port or an inbuilt midi controller too.

 

If you do not encode (which is advisable, raw formats are much better), your processor is not really taxed in audio. It is the encoding/decoding that really requires the grunt - and any modern processor is able to handle the requirements of most codecs.

 

I would go for a computer with Serial ATA and use a pair of SATA drives set to mirror, about 100gb should be fine.

 

DVD burners are cheap and so is the media, you can back up entire shows to DVD with extream ease and you can (as is good practice) create multiple backup copies for little cost.

 

Something like that would probably cost less than AU$800 (with a fairly decent sound card taking up the majority of the budget) if you were to buy the parts and build yourself and the data should be able to survive anything short of a nuclear bomb (mirrored SATA provides level 1 backup, combined with a comprehensive backup schedule to (for example) 2 separate sites, one removed from the premisis) even if one HDD goes caput, the show can still go on, and if the whole PC dies, you still have the files on DVD.

 

Now that the hardware is covered - some advice about software:

 

Starting with windows XP:

* Strip everything that is not essential out. That includes paint, notepad, games, everything. Disable any unnecessary services, get rid of all the eye candy, so that you have a really plain system with none of the frills.

 

* Next: If it is going to be on a network - Anti Virus software is a must - there are some good, free (or even cheap) ones out there

 

* Install required software

 

* Use something like clonezilla (if you have a network that can run a backup server or if your organisation already does (like ghost) use that) or The ultimate boot CD which has a range of hard disk tools, to create an image of the system and store in a couple of places (since windows has been stripped down it is now quite small, recovery time can become minutes instead of hours, and the chance that you need to use it is also severly reduced)

 

And voila. A bloody stable system which can be recovered extreamly quickly.

[dbuckley]

Whereas echoing then general statement that "more is better", some software seems much more capable of using a machine frugally than others.

 

I've done lots of shows on my laptop, which is 1.2GHz, 512MB, and usually use a desktop of similar capability, with as many as six sound channels, show control, and 70 channels of DMX including layered fades and chases. Its not underpowered, the lighting load is under 5%, and total machine load for running shows never gets anywhere near the top.

 

For editing I use GoldWave, for multitrack work I use Cakewalk Home Studio, and for playback / show control / lights I use PCStage, with MidiOx to manage the MIDI stuff, and use ZeusEdit to text edit the script. I dont run the packages all simultaneously, if I'm running a show I'm unlikley to be multitrack editing, though during rehearsals I'll often have GoldWave and PCStage loaded together, as I swap tracks between them for editing and running. The only thing that is a problem is some software synths, but others are OK. Having said that, most sound effects playback and editing doesnt involve software synths. My needs are fairly modest, my hardware similarly.

[back_ache]

I would suggest running the machine as a dual-boot, one partition the stripped-back play-back build and the other a normal build for preparing the audio and mucking about in general.

 

For creating the SB-PB build I would suggest using http://www.litepc.com/ it allows you strip the operating system down to only the componants you want, at it's most extreme it, can result in windows starting in three seconds flat!

[MattCasson]

To be honest, the spec isnt overly important, a decent sound card and clean pc are the most important I have found. Make sure nothing else is running on your laptop or pc, even Antivirus. When I used to run Norton it had a habbit of 8pm Friday nite starting a virus scan. Caught me out on one show. So make sure you do a clean install or just shut everything down. Then you want a decent sound card, with output thats you can put into an amp or desk. If your running of a laptop go for an external sound card, and im almost tempted to say actually even if your running a pc go external, means you can have it on your desk. No fiddling around at the back of the pc. The only other thing as people have mentioned, is lots of disk space for sfx, and a decent bit of RAM. Processor speed isnt a major factor as long as your pc isnt really slow and a bit laggy.

 

Hope this helps anyway.

 

Matt

[timtheenchanteruk]

Wow, lots on info there, cheers,

I would use a bare system, with no internet or network connection, all my editing would still be done on my home pc, burnt to disk and loaded up, so it really would only be playback, and not multi channel, but I would look at soundcards for it, may as well spec for what I might need if theres not much cost differance.

 

What does any one think of my other point, of running software for outboard equipment, ie my fbx, and one of my reverb/effects boxes can be used via midi, this would mean I wouldnt necceserily hve to have my outboard rack accessible for adjustments, but is it a good idea

[Tomo]

Personally I hate feedback exterminators with a vengeance.

Simply due to the way they work, they always make things sound odd.

You're better off with a graphic EQ and running manually.

 

Also, in a pure playback or pure recording situation, you CANNOT get feedback anyway.

You only get feedback in sound reinforcement, when it's much better to ring out the venue and understand the causes of the feedback than to rely on a box to do the job for you.

 

Other than that - there's no reason why you can't run anything that takes MIDI control from the PC - I believe PCStage does this natively anyway.

 

The only question is whether that will be useful.

Only you can decide, and the answer may be different for every production.

[mac.calder]

Re antivirus - If you are using a doze box with any disk drive, AV is a must. Whilst viruses that travel via removable media are not as prevalent as they used to be, they still exist, and a properly configured virus scan will never interupt the work you do. At 3am, it is doubtful that you will still be running a show for example.

 

and not multi channel, but I would look at soundcards for it, may as well spec for what I might need if theres not much cost differance.

 

Good idea. There would be nothing worse than finding out 6 months down the track that it does not do everything you need it to do.

 

What does any one think of my other point, of running software for outboard equipment, ie my fbx, and one of my reverb/effects boxes can be used via midi, this would mean I wouldnt necceserily hve to have my outboard rack accessible for adjustments, but is it a good idea

 

It depends on how easy they are to control through midi. Often the midi control for those things are used when you are either automating a show or using outboard efffects on the output and when 'composing' the audio file, you place a midi control track in it. I cannot (off the top of my head) think of an application which provides a real time interface for outboard off the top of my head.

[ljstevens]

Hi Mate

 

I have just brought a PC for SFX, I went for an Athlon64 4400, 2Gb RAM, 2x250GB harddrives in an RAID array format, 1xDVD rewritable, 1x DVD rom and 1xEcho gina! SFX software with Adobe Audition 2, Reason, and Ableton Live!

 

There is a great company on ebay shops called Cube who are really great and helpful and very cheap!

[J Pearce]

I have just bought a new PC, with a high spec. (Athlon 3300, 2GB DDR400, 300GB of storage)

However this for multichannel playback with real-time fx, and running soft synths.

 

For straight stereo playback you don't need anything high spec. Just clear all the other rubbish off the PC and you'll be fine.