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henryf
12-02-2007, 02:00 PM
I'm doing some research for a friend who is looking for a PC based DAW. He's not going to be doing crazy things with it maybe 15 tracks at most at a time but he is also going to use it for some work work. emails word docs and connecting to the internet. I know DAW's are usually dedicated machines to do music but what would you recommend on getting a DAW that can do both when he needs to. A prebuilt DAW would be what I am looking at. Money would be in the 3K range.
itsplayed
12-02-2007, 07:14 PM
Welcome to the forums henryf,
Since your friend won't be doing the build, I would suggest having your friend either look at Macs or a custom PC from a DAW builder.
Sweetwater sells music workstations and I would also look at www.adkproaudio.com (http://www.adkproaudio.com) and www.shop-sonica.com (http://www.shop-sonica.com).
henryf
12-02-2007, 07:37 PM
can you tell me if a quad core will really do much better then a core 2 duo chip? i mean yes you do get the quad cores but it's at a lower clock speed then the core 2 chips. if we add more ram wouldn't it be better for the audio?
itsplayed
12-02-2007, 09:12 PM
can you tell me if a quad core will really do much better then a core 2 duo chip? i mean yes you do get the quad cores but it's at a lower clock speed then the core 2 chips. if we add more ram wouldn't it be better for the audio?

Yes, the quad cores will give you a substantial performance increase. However, if your needs are not great, the added expense is not worth it and at 15 to 20 tracks the Core2Duo is more than adequate for the job. My advice is to just get a system that is capable of the upgrade to a quad in the future and use the savings for a better audio interface, monitors, room treatment, etc.. Do you have a music app. in mind?
Fleghand
12-16-2007, 05:37 AM
ADKproaudio.com has Macs as well, and customizable, and for good prices. They seem to be the best way to go, and I've been looking for a while.

You can try this link as well:
http://www.cakewalk.com/PCResource/Default.asp


Does anyone know what hardware actually does what? For instance, if you want live monitoring of more VST's, do you need to increase the RAM, clock speed, or processor cache? That is a nice a list I haven't seen yet.