Buying New Mac - Can't Decide

Gabe S. · Post by **Gabe S.** » Sun Feb 06, 2011 9:32 am

In my experience, DP can not only see all 12 cores, but it also seems to understand hyperthreading, so it seems to utilize the "24" cores.

I was messing around a while ago to see what kind of horsepower was there in the 12-core. I was able to load 36 stereo tracks, each track had both an Altiverb and a Waves L316. hehe 36 Altiverbs and 36 L316's is a lot of demand on the cpu. DP handled it with no problems and played it back all cleanly. I could have gone further but I didn't see the point. btw, ProTools 9 could only do 28 tracks with those same plugins and still play cleanly.

Here's a video of that test. You can see DP using over 1100% of CPU, and Activity Monitor is showing fairly equal distribution of work across all the cores:

http://www.epicscore.com/online/DP-24cores-working.mov" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

(the video was done on a 30" monitor, so the screen size of the video is large. On a small monitor, you may have to zoom out to see the whole window. At least I had to, on my laptop.)

My advice is to always buy the fastest, latest machine you can afford. You won't have to upgrade your computer as often, which is always a huge pain in the neck. Honestly, for me, the biggest hold up in DP at this point is it not being 64-bit yet. There's tons of horsepower in today's machines. Now we need access to all the RAM. I truly believe all my crashing issues are related to pushing the current 32-bit RAM limitations too hard. I guess we need the plugin manufacturers to become 64bit as well.

Cheers.
gabe

VitcoMusic · Post by **VitcoMusic** » Tue Mar 08, 2011 3:56 pm

So far the switchover to the Westmere 8 core from the G5 Quad has gone smoothly. After checking a few posts on this topic, I decided to forego Migration Assistant and transfer files manually - drag & drop. It took a while, but running this new MP squeaky clean is an amazing experience. DP has an almost instantaneous feel to it. Other apps (like Mail) launch in about one second. And everything is whisper quiet! With a 64 bit version of DP on the horizon, it's an exciting time to own a new 8 core.

DV

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Killahurts · Post by **Killahurts** » Tue Mar 08, 2011 5:51 pm

Gabe S. wrote:In my experience, DP can not only see all 12 cores, but it also seems to understand hyperthreading, so it seems to utilize the "24" cores.

I was messing around a while ago to see what kind of horsepower was there in the 12-core. I was able to load 36 stereo tracks, each track had both an Altiverb and a Waves L316. hehe 36 Altiverbs and 36 L316's is a lot of demand on the cpu. DP handled it with no problems and played it back all cleanly. I could have gone further but I didn't see the point. btw, ProTools 9 could only do 28 tracks with those same plugins and still play cleanly.

Here's a video of that test. You can see DP using over 1100% of CPU, and Activity Monitor is showing fairly equal distribution of work across all the cores:

http://www.epicscore.com/online/DP-24cores-working.mov" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

(the video was done on a 30" monitor, so the screen size of the video is large. On a small monitor, you may have to zoom out to see the whole window. At least I had to, on my laptop.)

My advice is to always buy the fastest, latest machine you can afford. You won't have to upgrade your computer as often, which is always a huge pain in the neck. Honestly, for me, the biggest hold up in DP at this point is it not being 64-bit yet. There's tons of horsepower in today's machines. Now we need access to all the RAM. I truly believe all my crashing issues are related to pushing the current 32-bit RAM limitations too hard. I guess we need the plugin manufacturers to become 64bit as well.

Cheers.
gabe

Wow that video is outstanding Gabe! I didn't even know about the CPU Usage and CPU floating windows until your video pointed them out to me. Learn something new every day.

Gabe, I know you have a lot of MIDI/VIs going on like I do.. do you use VE Pro or Bidule on that machine? I've been thinking about taking some of the strain off the slave machine/network by putting VE Pro on the master. Like you said, until DP goes 64 bit, I gotta do something or I'm not even touching the CPUs on this new machine.

Even after DP goes 64, unless they put some kind of "bit bridge" in there, I might have to wait because of some VIs and plugs I can't live without.

Killahurts · Post by **Killahurts** » Tue Mar 08, 2011 5:52 pm

VitcoMusic wrote:So far the switchover to the Westmere 8 core from the G5 Quad has gone smoothly. After checking a few posts on this topic, I decided to forego Migration Assistant and transfer files manually - drag & drop. It took a while, but running this new MP squeaky clean is an amazing experience.

Smart move!!

Tim · Post by **Tim** » Tue Mar 08, 2011 8:01 pm

Killahurts wrote:
VitcoMusic wrote:So far the switchover to the Westmere 8 core from the G5 Quad has gone smoothly. After checking a few posts on this topic, I decided to forego Migration Assistant and transfer files manually - drag & drop. It took a while, but running this new MP squeaky clean is an amazing experience.
Smart move!!

I used MA because I had to get back to work fast. I was planning on going back and building from scratch, but all is working great. I'm going to do it though on another internal drive so i can take my time.

Gabe S. · Post by **Gabe S.** » Tue Mar 08, 2011 11:29 pm

Killahurts wrote:Gabe, I know you have a lot of MIDI/VIs going on like I do.. do you use VE Pro or Bidule on that machine? I've been thinking about taking some of the strain off the slave machine/network by putting VE Pro on the master. Like you said, until DP goes 64 bit, I gotta do something or I'm not even touching the CPUs on this new machine.

Even after DP goes 64, unless they put some kind of "bit bridge" in there, I might have to wait because of some VIs and plugs I can't live without.

Yeah, I've been messing around with Bidule for awhile on the Mac. I like it. (I've never tried VEPro.) 64bit Bidule is my host on the pc and it works great. Unfortunately, on Mac, you can't use the 64bit version of Bidule with PLAY, so that presents some hard choices. I can't use PLAY inside DP because it ALWAYS crashes. The only way I can use it is in Bidule on the Mac. But it has to be 32 bit Bidule because 64bit Bidule won't work with 32bit PLAY, so I have to decide if 64bit Kontakt is more important or 32bit PLAY is more important. I have an external 64bit pc, but it's strictly a K4 machine, so I'm mostly covered with Kontakt. But then there's 64bit Spectrasonics which I'd really love to use and keep on my Mac for easier sync, but can't if I'm in 32bitDP and 32bit Bidule.....ARGH! I refuse to even put PLAY on the pc 64bit machine at all because PLAY makes me nervous.

And I just can't get myself to dedicate a whole machine to PLAY....

One day, I'm sure we'll look back on 12 cores and 32 bit software and laugh about how quaint these systems all were.

Cheers.
-gabe

Killahurts · Post by **Killahurts** » Wed Mar 09, 2011 7:12 am

Gabe S. wrote:Yeah, I've been messing around with Bidule for awhile on the Mac. I like it. (I've never tried VEPro.) 64bit Bidule is my host on the pc and it works great. Unfortunately, on Mac, you can't use the 64bit version of Bidule with PLAY, so that presents some hard choices. I can't use PLAY inside DP because it ALWAYS crashes. The only way I can use it is in Bidule on the Mac. But it has to be 32 bit Bidule because 64bit Bidule won't work with 32bit PLAY, so I have to decide if 64bit Kontakt is more important or 32bit PLAY is more important. I have an external 64bit pc, but it's strictly a K4 machine, so I'm mostly covered with Kontakt. But then there's 64bit Spectrasonics which I'd really love to use and keep on my Mac for easier sync, but can't if I'm in 32bitDP and 32bit Bidule.....ARGH! I refuse to even put PLAY on the pc 64bit machine at all because PLAY makes me nervous.

And I just can't get myself to dedicate a whole machine to PLAY....

One day, I'm sure we'll look back on 12 cores and 32 bit software and laugh about how quaint these systems all were.

Cheers.
-gabe

Maybe you should try VE Pro. You can have 32 bit instances and 64 bit at the same time, on the same machine. Play does work in DP for me, but I still need to get it out to take the strain off of DP. My slave machine is a Mac, and I have several 64 instances of VE Pro for Kontakt, and Spectrasonics, and one 32 bit instance for some Korg stuff. I don't have Play running on the slave either. I keep it on the master so I can keep it on a tight leash. I get an eye twitch when I think of Play. When I first started using VE Pro, Play didn't work with it, but it apparently does now.

Sorry to get so off topic guys, maybe we should start a new thread about all this?

intrepritra · Post by **intrepritra** » Wed Mar 09, 2011 8:06 pm

I just built a 12 core hack and can over-clock to 4 Ghz very comfortably.
Apple is just asking way too much for the 12 cores IMHO.
The new laptops are priced more in perspective and hopefully the new Mac Pros will come down in price.
I'm running 2Ghz. ram and the video card is way better than apples offerings too.
I'd rather spend the $$ on conversion.

OTOH... light peak seems very promising but most MOBO manufacturers will implement it soon enough so...

YouTube · Post by **James Steele** » Wed Mar 09, 2011 11:38 pm

intrepritra wrote:I just built a 12 core hack and can over-clock to 4 Ghz very comfortably.
Apple is just asking way too much for the 12 cores IMHO.
The new laptops are priced more in perspective and hopefully the new Mac Pros will come down in price.
I'm running 2Ghz. ram and the video card is way better than apples offerings too.
I'd rather spend the $$ on conversion.
OTOH... light peak seems very promising but most MOBO manufacturers will implement it soon enough so...

So in other words you're violating your OSX license agreement, right?

intrepritra · Post by **intrepritra** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 4:58 pm

James Steele wrote:
intrepritra wrote:I just built a 12 core hack and can over-clock to 4 Ghz very comfortably.
Apple is just asking way too much for the 12 cores IMHO.
The new laptops are priced more in perspective and hopefully the new Mac Pros will come down in price.
I'm running 2Ghz. ram and the video card is way better than apples offerings too.
I'd rather spend the $$ on conversion.
OTOH... light peak seems very promising but most MOBO manufacturers will implement it soon enough so...
So in other words you're violating your OSX license agreement, right?

When I transitioned from analog back in the day, my foundation was DP and have been a dedicated user.
I'm NOT going to JUMP ship on the BEST DAW in the world because Apple sets limits on us with their hardware options! I own BOTH but my hacks run OSX JUST AS STABLE AS MY MACS! If your looking at the monitor all day, what's a box matter!
I'm NOT giving up DP if I need more performance. Clones ARE Macs!
There is nothing but an EFI ROM separating the 2 and the code is executed on an INTEL processor right? But yes..."buy a Mac" is what Apple say's but give the power users options without limits!!!
I own BOTH!

intrepritra · Post by **intrepritra** » Sat Mar 12, 2011 8:46 am

Tim wrote:
Killahurts wrote:
VitcoMusic wrote:So far the switchover to the Westmere 8 core from the G5 Quad has gone smoothly. After checking a few posts on this topic, I decided to forego Migration Assistant and transfer files manually - drag & drop. It took a while, but running this new MP squeaky clean is an amazing experience.
Smart move!!

I used MA because I had to get back to work fast. I was planning on going back and building from scratch, but all is working great. I'm going to do it though on another internal drive so i can take my time.

If you migrate from a good build, there shouldn't be an issue but if you migrate from a box that's hosed up then yes, a fresh install is a necessity. If there's time then fresh builds are the ticket.

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