New Computer Recommendation

[timsmolens]

I have been out of music production for awhile. I am considering buying an 3.5GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5 apple. I do projects that are 50-100 tracks with use of 10-20 softsynths (spectrasonics, komplete, etc). I want to be able to run computer at a low buffer of at least 256 so I don't get too much latency when tracking keys, but I don't want to have to render them as audio but rather keep them as live soft synths. is this computer an overkill for my needs and if so, what mac that is less expensive would get the job done for me?

thanks for any help

[mikehalloran]

Using DP 9.13 over Sierra, this should not be a problem.

I don't run nearly as many tracks but am comfortable running a 128k buffer (not possible for me with 9.12 or earlier) on an iMac with about 60% the horsepower you're contemplating. You should consider 32G RAM but that's available from OWC and other 3rd party vendors.

Can you do what you want on an iMac? Perhaps. There are a few of us using them but I don't know who might be running similar projects to what you have in mind. With an iMac, spend the extra $ for the i7—its integrated FPU makes a big difference with many tasks in DP.

There are versions of Mac Pro 5.1 with all the power that you need and a 4.1 can be upgraded—a few threads on that around here.