Should I make one of my Macs a slave?

[rickorick]

I already bought a new 424 PCIe card from MOTU so I'm good. And the VE Pro quote said no
additional audio interface needed. So I'm hoping that's right because that way I could run both the Mac Pro and iMac right off the bat if I want to set it up that way.

[Dan Worley]

Bottom line, try slamming that new CPU with your heaviest workload and see how it performs. That method has worked well for me in determining what I need.

Yep... that's what I figured. Just you can't help staring at a MacPro being underutilized and not wonder if you can't do something with it...

Yeah, I use my 1,1 (with screen sharing) for FCP7 and DVDSP, and a few other apps that don't run well (or at all) in Mavericks. I really like FCPX on the 5,1, but I have tons of projects that I still need to get to in FCP7. There is no replacement for DVDSP, so I'll try to keep it going as long as I can, or as long as I need DVD authoring.

I also keep Adobe CS4 Suite on the 1,1. I have it on the the 5,1 as well, but it's unsupported in Mavericks and it could break at any time.

I'm happy my 1,1 is not just collecting dust. It's been a great Mac.

[Shooshie]

You know, I just do rock stuff and I probably don't NEED to use a VEP (Vienna Ensemble Pro) setup with a slave machine, but I do have a MacPro 1,1 just sitting around not being utilized much after I upgraded to my MacPro 4,1. (Hat tip to HCMarkus for hipping me to this and to Shooshie for also giving me some advice behind the scenes with my transition).

It just occurred to me after I stuffed 24GB of RAM into my new 4,1 that when you consider the reasoning behind having a slave machine, then does it stand to reason that my more powerful machine (the 4,1) should actually be the *slave* hosting VIs and the weaker machine (the 4,1) should continue to be the master? Isn't the VI slave doing the real heavy lifting? If I unburden the master from VI duties it's simply doing audio playback and MIDI sequencer duties.

Now that I put 24GB into the 4,1 I will rationalize keeping it as my master. Besides, I like to do track comping with the Comp Tool and that can be very CPU intensive, so for speed of editing tasks, etc. I can easily make an argument for have a powerful main machine. But food for thought. I should maybe consider pressing my 1,1 into work for MachFive3 perhaps etc. However, from what I read, DP/VEP have some communication issues which means I can't simply load a project on my main and have it seamlessly open the right thing on VEP can I? Also, bounce downs have to be in realtime? (The latter isn't that much of an issue for me personally considering I tend to only work on 3-4 min rock songs and that's who we all did it "back in the day"—absent having 2-3 pairs of hands doing the 'fader dance" on the mixing board as it was recording to a 1/2" 2 track machine. Sigh.)

It seems like we ought to be able to put these old devices to use and get some benefit from them, doesn't it? At one point I was attempting to create a universal orchestral template, similar to what you see in Mike Patti's videos (years before I saw those), I got to a workable level so that I could try out what I was working toward, and what I found was that I simply don't think in terms of big orchestras 99% of the time. I like cozy little chamber pieces and odd synth combos. Neither of those requires a big template, so what I was going for was overkill for what I really like to do. I don't score for films, and I have no real intention of doing that (unless they want the kind of thing I like to do). So, I just stopped thinking about slave units and big templates, and now I'm fine with that.

I've seen and heard proof-of-concept templates in which someone mocked up Rite of Spring or any of a number of huge symphonic works. The fact is, once you get over the fact that it's a sampled mock-up, nearly all of those sound like... sampled mock-ups. I get more joy in creating performances of small works where the focus is on the performance, not the orchestration. I also enjoy recording such groups. I mean actual ensembles, of course.

So, while there is satisfaction to be had from building something big and massive, and having so much control at your fingertips, in the end we do best what we love to do. In your case, James, and mine, I think we have all we need! Geez, the songs you post now and then, whether your tribute to Nigel Tufnel or Santa Claus, the result is always first rate and (obviously) memorable. No heavy lifting required.

Shooshie

[James Steele]

Thanks so much Shoosh! Well, all of them (so far) are here:

http://www.jamessteele.com/music.html

I'm having a meeting with a guy who wants to help out with manager duties and help me focus. I've deviated WAY off course left to my own devices.