Fleer
And all of my five M-Audio controllers work fine with my Macs. Eat that!

LOL! My original Oxygen 8 won't.  I doubt the earlier Axions wont either. They will if you skip the USB port.

kennywtelejazz
...even an Apple refurbish may work in my case

I’ve a 15.3” mid 2014 i7 Retina MacBook Pro I got around Easter 2015 as an Apple refurb. Came in “as new” packaging with “as new” warranty and Applecare availability and it looked immaculate. Not a mark on it.

Keeping an eye on Apple’s refurb offers is a good idea if you’re in the market for a new Mac anything. The money saved compared to brand new isn’t that much, but it all helps.

tlw

kennywtelejazz
...even an Apple refurbish may work in my case

I’ve a 15.3” mid 2014 i7 Retina MacBook Pro I got around Easter 2015 as an Apple refurb. Came in “as new” packaging with “as new” warranty and Applecare availability and it looked immaculate. Not a mark on it.

Keeping an eye on Apple’s refurb offers is a good idea if you’re in the market for a new Mac anything. The money saved compared to brand new isn’t that much, but it all helps.

 
Hi tlw ,
 
I would love to get a 15 MackBook Pro from that era .
Right now I could probably swing a refub MacBook Pro  13 or a refurb i Mac  w Apple Care .
Now with all that has happened here regarding Cakewalk I have to step back and really consider what I want to do .... Yeah  .... When it Rains it pours
all the best......
 

abacab

kennywtelejazz
 
Hi abacab,
 
I guess you busted me  ,

 

 

I have  14 out of the top 20 DAW's that show up in the polls from that online music site that always does DAW polls ...
So Yes,  I guess I'm a combination of a DAW whore , a plugin addict and a prepper

 

Sheesh even when my dog Duke howls my name he calls me Jack sometimes because I'm a Jack of all these DAW's and a master on none . .... that's how it feels someday s

 
Duke knows his s h i t !!!
 

Yeah man Tracktion Waveform 8 w all the Air stuff is freaking awesome  ..Super potent combo for very little money.

I'm even happier now that I pulled the trigger on Tracktion this year!
 
In hindsight, I believe I saw the writing on the wall when Cakewalk tried, and failed, with their Sonar cross-platform attempt with the Mac version.  I believe that is a prerequisite for a successful audio application today. 
 
The collaboration aspect is key, as well as the mind-share of the creative users on both platforms.  I personally will only buy cross-platform software going forward. 
 
At the same time I will ensure that I always have a Windows OS installed somewhere that can run Platinum, and Project 5 for many more years to come. 

+1 abacab !
I love Tracktion Waveform 8
I'm still learning my way around it . I find it totally enjoyable to use and I have used it for a number of my recent songs postings ..
Interestingly enough I would start out a song in SPlat and keep it there for the early stages ..
Depending on what worked out best within Splat,  I would then export all my individual tracks , create a Waveform  project out of my SONAR exports and then bring that Waveform project over from Windows as a self contained Waveform project over to my i Mac ...once I had it over there I would then create a working stereo mix of my tune for Logic .
The nice thing about doing that was Logic does come with some very good sounding instruments and plugs ...
In my mind it was the best of both worlds I would lay down new parts using Logic because all the cool stuff that Logic comes with is locked down to the Logic DAW ...then when I had the sounds and layers I wanted I would take all the individual tracks one at a time and add them to my Waveform Project
All that may seem like a lot of work , in truth it wasn't....because I would have a fully working DUAL OS version of my Waveform project .....Mac or PC it longer mattered once it was a Waveform Project w assets  ...
Then I would bring my Tracktion project back over to Windows and work some more ...you know mix , and do a social media mastering thing for my tune ....
I happen to love object orienting style editing and mixing . Tracktion and Waveform  is so underrated when it comes to that work flow ...it is super fast to get very good results  it is much faster and easier to work that way than Samplitude is...
 
Anyway , I had no idea about Cakewalks possible future problems when I got Tracktion and Waveform ...
That type of thing was the furthest from my mind ...I like to keep my mind occupied w learning and music so I thought Waveform may turn out to be a fun Playground to create music in ...so far it seems to be a good fit 
I'm also very happy that I was able to go from free to the whole top of the line version over the course of a year. my wallet was certainly happy that I didn't have to place it in the ICU under Life Support 
 
I'm not anti Win ...I have a whole bunch of DAW programs that are tied to Windows only ....
It's all Sort of like a time capsule in the regard of having upgraded various versions of SONY , Cakewalk , Magix
BIAB  and a bunch of other software Jazz over the years ...it's all good man ...
I still run P 5 VIVA P 5 you can take that out of my cold dead grimy Paws
 
all the best to you ,
 
Kenny
 
 
 
 

You're lucky you got that laptop when you did. Sold out now. Good luck with it!

Thanks the Maartian and Kenny! 
 
They delivered this thing fast. I didn't pay for 2 day delivery, but it was on my doorstep the very next day.
So far I am impressed. I loaded Ableton for windows on it. Ableton has a very nice set of tutorials to get you started on that program. I'm already up to speed on the the basic operation of it and ready to start building backing tracks on my desktop PC. I build a prog rock Christmas kind of backing track in Mixcraft 8 Pro and played it this past Sunday. No click. I wrote it as a wav to a usb drive and played it through my Juno stage which has a usb stick song player. All went off without a hitch. With the Juno you can switch sounds while the track is playing. 
 
I'm glad I went with Ableton. I might even compose in it, but right now I'm thinking I'll use something else and import the files. Chop them up into sections and fire them off with my controller. Sonar is still wonderful for putting compos together.
 
The computer is still a novelty for me. It feels odd sitting in the living room when I'm so used to being in the studio working on stuff :). So far I love it all round'.
 
I hope you guys had a nice holiday and I'm wishing you all a happy new year!
 
 
 

My sister bought me an iPod nano when they first came out, it was great, but soon after I put iTunes on my PC I noticed it was a troublemaker on my computer.  I spent about 2 years having iTunes for this ONE DEVICE on my computer, and finally decided to purge it from my system.  What I found was any music that I bought through Apple was unsalvageable, unless I put a ridiculous amount of work (or money) into transferring it to MP3.  Settings were not very customizable... Apple doesn't like not being in control!  That seems to be the theme with Apple, they take a LOT of control out of the users' hands so you can't make personal modifications to your system.  They may make very high quality gear, but it's never really yours, is it?  You may own the hardware it's on, but the Software is still under the control of the giant corporation.  Windows has kind of gone that way, but ultimately, their OS still has ways that you can make very specific modifications IF YOU KNOW HOW TO.  Your PC is yours to do with as you please.  You want to majorly screw it up, you have that right.

It's the control-thing I have a big problem with when it comes to Apple... not the quality of their stuff.

You may try to run MainStage on your PC: https://www.macworld.co.u...s-on-pc-3632329/ 

One of my work colleagues uses both Logic and Cubase on the Mac, and he's always complaining that every time Apple releases an OS update it ends up breaking either Logic or Cubase, and it takes up to a month before they sort it out.
 
He says he rarely uses Cubase on his PC because it crashes too much... the only time Sonar crashes on me is when I forget to close down OneDrive.
 
Also, Mac's seem to slow down over time for no apparent reason - and even a clean install of the OS makes no difference (I've heard some people say Apple do this deliberately to try to get you to upgrade your Mac, but I'm slightly dubious about this).
 
My Mac Mini is an Intel Core Duo running at 2.4 GHz with 8Gb RAM, and my old Dell Core Duo @ 2Ghz laptop with 4Gb Ram wipes the floor with it (both on Windows and Ubuntu). I recently put an SSD in my Mac with a clean install of High Sierra, and although the boot time improved significantly, it's still slow as hell doing anything else.
 
The worst I've ever seen on a PC is Windows Update messing around with drivers - re-installing the drivers has fixed things.
 
Nowadays the only thing I use my Mac for is backing up my iPhone and running Visual Studio for cross-platform Xamarin projects.
 
So in conclusion, it seems to me that Mac users have exactly the same issues some PC users have (although if anything, it's worse if things just stop working altogether). And they're paying 3 times as much for the pleasure. 
 
All the Mac users I've spoken to say they just don't bother with updates unless they have to in order to keep their system stable... so no difference from PC users then!
 
M.

msmcleod
One of my work colleagues uses both Logic and Cubase on the Mac, and he's always complaining that every time Apple releases an OS update it ends up breaking either Logic or Cubase, and it takes up to a month before they sort it out.
 

Really? I keep seeing these claims, but can’t say I’ve ever seen that, nor has anyone I know who uses Macs for audio or video work. Sometimes it takes hardware manufacturers a few weeks to get out a driver, but that’s the same for WIndows as well. Or in M-Audio’s case anything up to a couple of years.

msmcleod
Also, Mac's seem to slow down over time for no apparent reason - and even a clean install of the OS makes no difference (I've heard some people say Apple do this deliberately to try to get you to upgrade your Mac, but I'm slightly dubious about this).
 

 
There’s a function in some of the phones to slow them down if the battery is low or aging and no longer delivering full current to avoid the phone shutting down due to not enough power left. Not in Macs though, especially ones that don’t even have a battery. If Macbooks have a battery life problem it’s that the i7 ones drain the battery fairly quickly if pushed hard, say around 8 hours life compared to around 10 if used for less demanding stuff. They’re more of a portable computer than a “use it all day” laptop.

msmcleod
My Mac Mini is an Intel Core Duo running at 2.4 GHz with 8Gb RAM, and my old Dell Core Duo @ 2Ghz laptop with 4Gb Ram wipes the floor with it (both on Windows and Ubuntu). I recently put an SSD in my Mac with a clean install of High Sierra, and although the boot time improved significantly, it's still slow as hell doing anything else.

The mini’s OK for what it’s intended to do - as a media server, file server, internet browser or for office work. For DAW work it’s not so good. As for SSDs they improve file access times and drive throughput and also speed up paging to the swap file, but that’s it. They’re also impervious to shock damage and draw little power which makes them good options in laptops and being silent makes them useful in DAWs.

msmcleod 
The worst I've ever seen on a PC is Windows Update messing around with drivers - re-installing the drivers has fixed things.

I could give you a list of the problems I’ve found with Windows from 3.11 onwards, including quite expensive software becoming unusable, but it would be a long list....

msmcleod
All the Mac users I've spoken to say they just don't bother with updates unless they have to in order to keep their system stable... so no difference from PC users then!

I’ve never seen any problems caused by Mac updates between the roughly annual major OS updates, and the big ones usually only have problems while some third-party hardware people catch up. I generally install the updates between those as they turn up, though I check what they are doing first to be on the safe side. In the commercial world it’s quite common to be using very old OS releases simply because there’s been the time to thoroughly check them for potiential issues and the fear of custom business-critical software becoming unusable is very real.

Setting time aside to train people in a new OS of software version is also a factor, as is how long it takes users to get up to speed on the new stuff. All of which has cost implications. In the audio world the cost in downtime when switching software is one reason Pro Tools became the “industry standard”.

The downside of that approach is things like a major UK government department’s central office being massively hit by the Blaster worm three years after MS released the fix for it. Which is why MS took to giving very extended security issue support to old versions of Windows it you’re a large-scale commercial license customer.

I'm a bit of a bargain hunter. If I happen to come across a used Apple spec'd fairly well. I might bite. Why would I do that? Because I can. To me this would be a value. I won't buy a new Apple unless the price goes WAY down.