Help me make a decision - Computer upgrades

[Josh M.]

EDIT: I've realised my question was pretty long and hard to understand.

Basically I'm getting a Macbook Pro soon to replace my current laptop. At the moment I also have a desktop PC which I use purely as my DAW. I want to know whether I should sell my desktop and upgrade the laptop (to have a better spec than my desktop) and use this as my DAW or keep the desktop and just get a baseline model of the MBP.

The real question lies in whether or not a laptop is suitable for multi-track recording and mixing. Assuming that the laptop was more powerful than the desktop in terms of specs, would the desktop have any advantage over the laptop? I would imagine that desktops might be a bit more stable on the power supply side of things, but I just want to know what the best option is for me.

The specs of my current desktop are:
Intel Core 2 Quad 9400 @ 2.66Ghz
4GB DDR2 RAM
500 GB 5400 RPM HDD
1 TB 7400 RPM HDD
nVidia 8600 GT 512 MB

Upgraded MBP specs:
2.7GHz Dual-core Intel Core i7
8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM — 2x4GB
500GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm
SuperDrive 8x (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)

I intend to use this with a Profire 2626 and of course would use an external hard drive to record to.

And I know that the 15" has a quad-core but I want to get the 13 because it's super portable.

Thanks

 

[Scottxx]

Hd must be 7.200 RPM.

 

[Josh M.]

It doesn't appear to have the option for 7200 RPM, next thing up is the SSD and that's an extra 250 dollars. I'd definitely be using a 7200 to record to though.

 

[jherman]

if you can't get a SSD get a 6GBS sata drive.

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

External USB or Firewire hard drives are good enough to record a full band with pretty much any laptop computer as long as you don't overload the DAW with plugins and virtual instruments.

 

[Josh M.]

External USB or Firewire hard drives are good enough to record a full band with pretty much any laptop computer as long as you don't overload the DAW with plugins and virtual instruments.

Ah right, so I guess that means no proper mixing then? Or do you mean just during tracking?

I get fairly good performance on the desktop at the moment so shouldn't I expect to see better performance on a hyper-threaded i5?

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

I think I would get the baseline MBP, and upgrade the desktop (for mixing) instead with the money

 

[Josh M.]

Ok then, thanks.

Really appreciated man!