Laptop recommendations?

[devouredremains]

So hobbyists should get everything handed to them? I don't care if you use pirated software, thats your prerogative. But I do understand the frustration of frequently spending a good chunk of cash on audio related purchases and reading posts like this. Just rethink your statements if you would like to maintain a level of respect here. There are lots that frown upon this behavior.

Haooy Recording/Learning

 

[devouredremains]

Yes im sure there are plenty of plugins that are worth every penny but i would also say that a majority of people myself included are not quite at the stage that they would really notice the difference between one eq or compressor or know when best to use a certain one to acheive a certain effect know Mr.sneap certainly knows excatly when to use a certain plugin and how to apply it, I dont think i should pay 300$ to try to figure that stuff out when i could get it for free.

If you can't tell the difference between eq's and compressors then why do you need anything more than freeware? Maybe find a cheaper hobby?

 

[LydonB]

If you can't tell the difference between eq's and compressors then why do you need anything more than freeware? Maybe find a cheaper hobby?

I think he meant that he could not tell the difference between different EQ's and different compressor's.

 

[SM1214]

I'm using the dv9000 series HP. I've owned 3 and all have served me well. The best thing is that some models are available with dual SATA hard drives. It's given me alot more tracking ability. They aren't expensive comparative to most either. Look around and there are deals to be had.

 

[devouredremains]

I think he meant that he could not tell the difference between different EQ's and different compressor's.

I understood that much. It was a typing error on my behalf. What I said still stands either way.

 

[devouredremains]

Hey guys, I'm getting to the point where I'll want a new laptop (AND NOT A MAC, thanks), and I was wondering if you all had any recommendations. I'm not really too picky; I guess my only criteria would be preferably 15.4" widescreen (rather than 17", which kinda defeats the portability aspect, but I'm flexible on that), preferably a 7200 RPM HDD, and a firewire port (naturally). I was looking at Alienware, but their 17" is ironically about half the price of their 15.4", which sucks the nuts for me, cuz under $2000 when fully spec'ed is a must. Oh, and I HATE DELL. So no way on that.

Thanks a lot guys!

I would purchase/build your PC around whatever interface you plan on using for the long haul. It seems that most interfaces have their own ideas as to what computer you should have.

If your using RME products this won't matter as much. Excellent drivers from what I've seen!

 

[greyskull]

say no to Crac[k] air and h20.
theres plenty of freeware out there.
use that; or use the plugins included in your daw until you can afford something else.
You will never properly appreciate or understand your plugins if you have hundreds of them.

Other than the ones in tools and the bundle that comes with it ( bomb factory stuff - sansamp etc.
I only really have a few plugins on top of that namely - Mh channelstrip, sonnox eq, Smack! tl space,Melodyne and the other stuff that comes with music production toolkit, and some other FREE ones like Bittersweet which is ace!,bxsolo; which is cool, Vinyl which is also free.

And you know what... I couldn't be happier; I know each plugin inside and out and know what would be best suited for each source because ive spent time with them because they're all i have. Don't get me wrong i love to demo stuff too; the waves ssl suite is infuckingcredible and pretty high on the shopping list. But you have no right to rob these companies of their potential revenue by stealing their product. Save your money, BUY something and you will feel so much better about using it.

 

[garry666]

I understood that much. It was a typing error on my behalf. What I said still stands either way.

my point basically was how are you gona know when and how to use a certain type of eq if you dont have one? and dude if i could play you piece of audio an you could tell me what kind of eq i used on it then shit youve probally got the best ears ever. anyways sorry about going so far off topic

 

[Metaltastic]

Well just to chime in once again, DSS3, you're right, MH Channel Strip may be an amazing bargain, and I have every intent of getting it regardless of what platform I get - but what about other stuff? I'm planning on going to Reaper cuz of the price (or lack thereof), and after the hell I've gone through trying to get a working convolution plugin for either VST or RTAS on a Mac - no way Jose, I'll definitely admit that Mac's are more stable, but you get what you pay for, I suppose, and I'm not willing to pay that much (I've been wrangling PC's since Windows 3.1, so I can handle it!).

 

[devouredremains]

my point basically was how are you gona know when and how to use a certain type of eq if you dont have one? and dude if i could play you piece of audio an you could tell me what kind of eq i used on it then shit youve probally got the best ears ever. anyways sorry about going so far off topic

If you want an emulated ssl sound go for the Waves SSL bundle etc... I have made nice mixes using one channel strip per channel, and to truly get the "sound" of that eq or strip you will need multiple instances summed in your daw. A little of this eq/comp here and a little of that there will not give you a particular sound. You gotta stack that shit on every channel or at least every channel in a particular buss.

There are no laws or rules concerning what to use and where to use it. Just use what sounds good. You plainly said that YOU didn't know what to use on particular tracks. And please direct me to where I said that I could pick out what eq was used on what track! I did not say that.

To top it off you truly don't NEED different eq's. It's easily possible to record/mix 100 different albums with one EQ. Tons of plugins and racks upon racks of outboard have only become popular in the last 30 years. Many albums have been recorded with what was available on the console that was being used. Just because some people are plugin whores and use a different eq for each individual track does not mean that it's the correct way to go.

You are truly starting to confuse me.

 

[JeffTD]

Well just to chime in once again, DSS3, you're right, MH Channel Strip may be an amazing bargain, and I have every intent of getting it regardless of what platform I get - but what about other stuff? I'm planning on going to Reaper cuz of the price (or lack thereof), and after the hell I've gone through trying to get a working convolution plugin for either VST or RTAS on a Mac - no way Jose, I'll definitely admit that Mac's are more stable, but you get what you pay for, I suppose, and I'm not willing to pay that much (I've been wrangling PC's since Windows 3.1, so I can handle it!).

MHCS is Mac only.

I've had convo reverb/self-loadable impulse plugins working on VST on Mac with no issues, and Voxengo is working on getting all of their plugins ported over to OS X in the near future, AFAIK.

How much are you planning on spending on the laptop? Regardless of platform, your comments about Mac pricing being THAT much higher than PC in this department makes me think you're looking at machines on the PC side that wouldn't be all that great to begin with.

 

[AdamWathan]

Whaaat that sucks I didn't know that... I was planning on picking that up eventually

It's getting harder and harder to fight the part of me that wants to buy a Mac and suck it up and switch to Logic despite my overflowing love for Reaper...

 

[JBroll]

Okay, enough of the ripper bashing. Stealing software is for people who rape babies, mug old ladies, and listen to Michael Bolton. Fuck that shit. Piracy fucking sucks, regardless of your circumstances, end of discussion... now can we get back to the original topic?

I'd look into Thinkpads for reliability purposes, and I've always loved my Gateway (two-year-old tablet PC, still runs like a beast and it didn't even set me back $1500 with a gig of RAM and a damn nice video card... we're talking HL2-with-everything-maxed damn nice), so that's what I'd recommend. Again, if you need to PM or IM me over computer stuff my time is free - I'll be driving for a good while tonight but I should be off-and-on the whole week.

Jeff

 

[Metaltastic]

God fucking dammit, I didn't realize that about Mac-only Metric Halo - and now that I look, I'm amazed at how cheap Macbooks are, I thought they were over 2 grand. Ok, I guess I'm warming up to the idea of a mac, but I have a few questions. First, what DAW options do I have on a Mac? I really don't like the idea of going Logic because of what I've heard about its interface and the fact that it's plugin-format is AU only. So I guess I'd have to go Cubase, cuz there's no way I'm getting an interface to go PT. Second, how do you use impulses DSS3? I haven't had any luck finding any working free VST plugins. And can't I dual boot too so I could still run my old PC stuff?

EDIT: Also, now that I'm looking, what's the difference between Cubase 4 and Cubase Studio 4? I can get Cubase 4 for $400 (educational baby!) and Studio 4 for $200, so what does the former offer that the latter doesn't?

 

[ochants76]

ok dude im not usingthe product comercially im not making money off it im just trying to learn how to do this shit an i dont think 300$ is a fair price for some of this shit, now if i was making money of it i would have absolutley no problem with paying money where it is due i just personally feel like they should charge based on whether its your home recordings or profesional shit not just murder everyone for the us of a fukin eq. And seriously dude having an opinion does not make someone an idiot going with the flow and believing that macs are better because steve jobs says they are is.

I am going to steal all of your instruments...but it is ok because I don't plan on using them to make money.

 

[ochants76]

Ok, I guess I'm warming up to the idea of a mac

Glad to hear that.

 

[LydonB]

God fucking dammit, I didn't realize that about Mac-only Metric Halo - and now that I look, I'm amazed at how cheap Macbooks are, I thought they were over 2 grand. Ok, I guess I'm warming up to the idea of a mac, but I have a few questions. First, what DAW options do I have on a Mac? I really don't like the idea of going Logic because of what I've heard about its interface and the fact that it's plugin-format is AU only. So I guess I'd have to go Cubase, cuz there's no way I'm getting an interface to go PT. Second, how do you use impulses DSS3? I haven't had any luck finding any working free VST plugins. And can't I dual boot too so I could still run my old PC stuff?

EDIT: Also, now that I'm looking, what's the difference between Cubase 4 and Cubase Studio 4? I can get Cubase 4 for $400 (educational baby!) and Studio 4 for $200, so what does the former offer that the latter doesn't?

You have pretty much everything as an option on a Mac minus Reaper (for now at least) and Sonar. I don't think there is anything else.

Cubase Studio 4 is a "light" version of Cubase 4. It is still a pretty nice program.

 

[Damian B]

I've had a lot of luck with the HPs. You can find a pretty nice one for around $1200-$1500. Then I would replace the HD with a 7200rpm drive, versus the 5400rpm ones that come standard. Get one with a Core2Duo processor, and 2gb of RAM.

 

[greyskull]

the macbook is genius

 

[JeffTD]

God fucking dammit, I didn't realize that about Mac-only Metric Halo - and now that I look, I'm amazed at how cheap Macbooks are, I thought they were over 2 grand. Ok, I guess I'm warming up to the idea of a mac, but I have a few questions. First, what DAW options do I have on a Mac? I really don't like the idea of going Logic because of what I've heard about its interface and the fact that it's plugin-format is AU only. So I guess I'd have to go Cubase, cuz there's no way I'm getting an interface to go PT. Second, how do you use impulses DSS3? I haven't had any luck finding any working free VST plugins. And can't I dual boot too so I could still run my old PC stuff?

EDIT: Also, now that I'm looking, what's the difference between Cubase 4 and Cubase Studio 4? I can get Cubase 4 for $400 (educational baby!) and Studio 4 for $200, so what does the former offer that the latter doesn't?

The MBPs are just at 2 grand (1800 base price with educational discount).

DAW options: PT, Logic, Cubase 4/4 Studio, a few other random ones but that's really it.

I'll dig up the name of the plugin I used for impulses - it was super simple, IIRC.

And yes, you can dual boot, and the Mac will run XP better than your PC.

Diff between Studio and just Cubase 4 is an internal MP3 export, some different cuemix options (for alternate mixes to seperate outputs than your main, headphone mixes and whatnot), a softsynth or two IIRC, the ability to control the panning/volume on seperate sides of a stereo mix (Brett found this to be a problem, I just seperate stereo recordings into two tracks anyways), a few other things that I never found a use for. I didn't think it was worth the cost for the standard version, especially since they released a $20 patch to let it export as an mp3 internally.