New iMac i3

[garby]

Time to retire my PowerBook G4 and had been looking at the iMac i3 3.06 and wanted to see opinions on how this would work for my situation. I'm only going to be doing personal projects from time to time. Would like to be able to lay down upwards of 20 tracks or more, have a few inserts on the tracks, plus some soft synths once and awhile. Plus be able to use 'living room' for guitar, etc.

I looked into the performance charts when they were released in the summer and between the i3 and i5 there didn't seem to be much difference. I have been using an M-Audio 410 but probably would upgrade to an Apogee Duet, and chain it thru my FW HD.

Is anyone recording with the new i3? Any info is appreciated.

[monkey man]

I'm thinking Firewire/USB external drive. 50-60 tracks no sweat.

The 3GHz+ speed should aid in real-time latency with VIs, which is cool.

I think the main thing will be to budget/plan for at least 2 externals for recording/and or backup. The internal(s) might be OK, but I can already hear folks suggesting this.

IMHO, for your stated purposes you should be fine, garby.

[garby]

Thanks monkey man, that's great to hear. I have my DP7 upgrade ready to go. So some FW hard drives and I should be up and running. I've held off on upgrading my PowerBook as I hadn't been recording for a few years and now it's time to get back to it.

[HCMarkus]

You might want to look into the OWC SSD and eSATA Mods, which are available for the 27" iMacs. For the ultimate iMac DP rig, I'd pull the internal Super Drive, put in in an external firewire or USB2 enclosure, and add an internal SSD and the eSATA port.

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/turnkey/iMac_2010_27

[Dan Walsh]

I just set up a new 21.5 3.06 i3 last week and have been mixing 30 trks with no probs at all. Mine shipped with 8 gigs of RAM and the difference between this and my 2008 2.4 4 gig MacBook Pro is fairly considerable. My CPU in the new one is hitting 10 -20 percent. The MacBook Pro was up around 60-70%.

I started trackin' today, and everything is workin' awesomely so far. I've got 2 externals running. One for audio and the other holds my VI libraries. I'm using USB for those and running my 896 HD thru the firewire 800 port using a firewire 400 adapter.

Awesome so far and no probs at all. I gotta say

"this new system feels real snappier"

[garby]

Thanks for the info. I did update to the 3.06 and it runs great. I haven't had a chance to do to much yet, but it is much more inspiring than my PowerBook set-up.

Right now I only have about 2 more issues to resolve. One is getting new hard drives (any recomendations?), and the other is finding a replacement for Akoustik Piano. (I've tried using Kontakt player).

I probably should post a new topic for those, but I definitely appreciate the feedback on the iMac.

[adriano]

I just set up a new 21.5 3.06 i3 last week and have been mixing 30 trks with no probs at all. Mine shipped with 8 gigs of RAM and the difference between this and my 2008 2.4 4 gig MacBook Pro is fairly considerable. My CPU in the new one is hitting 10 -20 percent. The MacBook Pro was up around 60-70%.

I started trackin' today, and everything is workin' awesomely so far. I've got 2 externals running. One for audio and the other holds my VI libraries. I'm using USB for those and running my 896 HD thru the firewire 800 port using a firewire 400 adapter.

Awesome so far and no probs at all. I gotta say

"this new system feels real snappier"

Hi Dan,
How are the USB HDs, (1 audio and 1 libraries) running for you and how many tracks?
I'm running FW daisy chain and things tend to choke at about 20 Tks, not so bad, but it's there.

Thank you,
Adriano

[Dan Walsh]

Hey Adriano

Most of my stuff is in around 25 to 30 trx and 3-4 VI's (Superior Drummer, Kontakt, SampleTank 2 and sometimes the Ultra Analog VA-1. No probs and no chokes at all. Granted it's not a lot of VI's but certainly an avg amount of trx. I don't chain em' up. They each have their own USB port from the back of the iMac.

I had it saet up the same on my MacBook Pro and never had any probs then either, although I was startin' to max the CPU abit. That one was a 2.4 intel with 4 gigs of Ram

The new one just flies. I really notice it with Pitch Correction. The old one got a little sluggish with alot of pitch correction.

[adriano]

Thank you, Dan.
I may have to go USB also for a while until, I can get a tower.

Thanks again,
Adriano

[mikehalloran]

If you bought the mid-2010 27" iMac (any version), you can have OWC install an eSATA port for $169 including shipping back to you.

eSATA compatible drive enclosures are well under $100 plus the drive. The one I bought also has FW400/800/usb ports as well. I could not believe how fast eSATA is compared to the other interfaces. A 1/2T Time Machine initial backup took 17 minutes.

This option is not available on the 21.5" iMac nor 27" iMacs before mid 2010.

I bought an i7 and like it a lot - showed up in the refurb store and I snagged it. Apple shipped it to OWC and I wound up paying OH sales tax instead of CA. The savings helped pay most of the upgrade.

[adriano]

Hi Mike.
Mine is mid 2009 with 1FW-800 and have checked with OWC a couple of weeks ago and it's a no go for me.

So, I planned for a Mac pro this year. I guess I'll be better off and will use this for email and whatnot.

Thanks for reading,
Adriano

[mikehalloran]

>So, I planned for a Mac pro this year. I guess I'll be better off and will use this for email and whatnot.<

Why? Your i3 will certainly handle a fair load. I would put it to the test and not worry about upgrades unless you hit a performance ceiling that can't be overcome any other way.

Those of us who spent way too many years on a G5 know you have a better machine than we did.

[adriano]

Hello Mike.

I don't have the I3, Dan is.
I will use my iMac for other things once, I get a mac pro.

Adriano