Latest Sonar + New PC Build

Hi...when the next Sonar comes out...maybe Sonar 9, I want to upgrade to it and at the same time upgrade my PC. Right now my PC is one I built back in about '04 or '05. It's a good machine. Anyway...I don't know where to start looking at components. I know where to get them...I just dont know what to buy.

I want the PC to be super fast for audio I suppose and my budget is...I dunno...$1000. I need the following:

Mobo
CPU
Ram
PSU
Hard Drive

I have everything else.

I've had a basic look around and have come up with this:


Mobo:
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=2
Gigabyte GA-785GMT-USB3 AM3 SB710 DDR3 PCI-E D-Sub DVI HDMI GLAN SATA RAID ATA
 CPU:
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=2
AMD Phenom II AM3 955 Black Edition (3.2Ghz) 64-Bit Quad-Core CPU
 Ram:
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=2
Corsair TW3X4G1333C9DHX 4GB (2x XMS3 2GB) PC-10600 (1333MHz) XMP DDR3 RAM
 Hard Drive:
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=2
Seagate 1TB SV35 7200.5 SATA 32MB
 PSU
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=2
Antec 850W CP850 ATX PSU For TWELVE-HUNDRED P183 P193 CP850

Is it any good?

Any advice?

(I'm likely to be running XP Home)

thanks

Yeah fair point....

As for W7...is it a flash in the pan? Or something with longevity? Hard to say I suppose...I don't know much about it...seemed like some kind of Windows Me type thing...something a bit transient...

Anyway...these 'are these specs ok to build a PC' type threads inherently suck...too many variables.

I dunno why I posted it...thinking out loud I suppose

montezuma, if you want your new PC to be super fast you will want the option of running 64-bit at some point, at least if you use samples, cos 64-bit systems can use more memory. If you want to go 64-bit these days, that's Win7, flash-in-the-pan or no.
If you want to wait for Sonar 9 to upgrade, don't buy the H/W yet, cos there will definitely be some sort of shift between now and then. If my old system had held out just 6 more months the HT quads would have been out...OTOH, it might not be a bad idea to build a new system before your old one dies, and then you will have a backup system...

I see. I was planning on updating the old PC in about 2 weeks. Maybe I'll hold out a bit longer then.

So this Windows 7...gee, anyway just seems like there's going to be a few potholes and rocks in and on the road as some kind of standard/ accepted OS emerges.

So Windows Vista is a bit of a white elephant is it?

LOL +1

well it did get its act together right before its death.

lets put it this way
if you are buying/building a new system now there is only 1 OS worth considering and its NOT XP.
Win7
and no reason to not go 64 bit.

being able to say that is such a breath of fresh air vs what i had to post last yr!

And you can get something like W7 Ultimate right...that can mimic XP or something so that all the swathes of programs you have for XP can run on W7...am I right?

montezuma


And you can get something like W7 Ultimate right...that can mimic XP or something so that all the swathes of programs you have for XP can run on W7...am I right?

this just does not work for audio.
 
and not needed as mentioned. Sonar bitbridge is improved in 8.5 and Vienna Ensemble pro or Jbridge takes care of the rest.
 

montezuma


I don't understand any of the terminology. I have to continue the research

 
OK, let's try a simplified explanation.  For the most part, your Windows programs that you currently run will run just fine on 64-bit W7, once the OS and drivers are installed.  Installing the OS may in fact get you most of the way there with driver installation.  I haven't gone through this exercise so I can't say for sure.  For your sound card, you might need to visit the vendor's web site and download the 64-bit drivers for that.
 
W7 can run 32-bit software and it can run 64-bit software, but it can't do both in one "job".  If a bunch of software "modules" are executing together ... say like Sonar and plug-ins, they all have to be 32-bit or all 64-bit.
 
Now, say you've got 64-bit W7 up and running and you install 64-bit Sonar but have some older 32-bit plugs.  Are you out of luck?  No, but there needs to be something to allow the 64-bit software and the 32-bit software to interact.  That's what bitbridge is.  Your 32-bit plugs run in a different "job" than the Sonar "job", and bitbridge provides an interface between the two "jobs".  I'm using "job" as a substitute for the proper terms "process" and/or "address space".  Just think of "job" as being associated with something you click on in the Windows start menu.  Make sense?
 
Apart from Sonar, it's unlikely you'll have to contend with this issue in any other software you run.  But anything that executes with software components from multiple vendors, such as we might be doing with Sonar and 3rd party plugs, it can become an issue.  If you do graphics work, you might be in the same situation.  Most of the software run all run is not of that type, though, and this is mostly something you needn't worry about.

montezuma

Is it kind of a physical impossibility for a 64bit machine to naturally run 32bit stuff? Couldn't they just make 64bit machines execute 32bit stuff with no problems? If 64bit is so powerful why don't they just make it run 32bit software as well? Then there would be no need for all this bitbridge. Or....is it kind of an impossibility....therefore the need for some kind of interface (bitbridge) between the two of them?

Again, there's no problem for 64-bit hardware and OS to run 32-bit software.  What cannot be done is intermixing 32-bit and 64-bit software in the same process.  I suspect (but am not dead on100% certain) that this is a hardware limitation, not a software/OS limitation.
  
Most software that most folks run does not present that problem.  64-bit Sonar with 32-bit plugs does, however.  That's not CW's fault, nor Microsoft's fault.  In any case, it's my understating that Sonar figures out automatically for you when to bring BitBridge into the picture.  There are reported cases where 32-bit plugs are not compatible, and that's unfortunate, but mostly this is transparent to you.
 
To the extent that it's a PITA though, well, that's just the price of progress.