My experience to date with the new StudioCat laptop: wow

A few weeks ago I decided to buy a purpose-built computer for making music, as opposed to the general-purpose computers that I've always bought, after about 10 years of working with a Gateway desktop machine that runs on an AMD Athlon x2 4800.  There are a few respected builders operating in this market; after some research, I decided to buy a Studio Pro laptop from Jim Roseberry, the owner/operator of Studio Cat.   The price was about $2000--double what I usually spend on a general-purpose desktop machine.  I decided to get a laptop because I needed something more-portable than a desktop--I work from various locations throughout the year, and I need to take the machine with me wherever I go.
 
The laptop arrived about 3 weeks ago.  In terms of size and weight, it's a monster: it's the biggest and heaviest laptop I've ever seen, much less owned, clearly built to last, with a huge screen.  I spent several days loading my various software and device drivers into it, all of which happened very quickly compared to previous machine transitions; this machine has an Intel i7 processor in it, which is, to put it mildly, a lot more powerful than an Athlon x2 4800.  About 2 weeks ago I did my first recording session with the laptop, and--wow.
 
Until I bought this machine, I hadn't really thought about how much time I spent in every session dealing with the scarce resources of my previous machine.  I realize now that it was a lot.  This thing just runs; I don't have to stop to adjust the machine's performance, or to bounce virtual tracks down to audio, or to wait for samples to load or some process to complete.  I push the button, stuff happens, then and there.  Amazing.

I am now able to consolidate multiple steps in my previous processes--for example, to do much more tuning of the sounds in my pieces much earlier than before.  As a result, my music sounds better, faster.  And I'm enjoying it a hell of a lot more.
 
I spent well over a decade trying to make low-cost general-purpose hardware do my bidding.  Never again.  It was the wrong place to economize.   I'd have been much better off in the near to medium (let alone the long) term saving up for a machine like this one than I was trying to make inexpensive hardware perform.    
 
One relatively minor caveat: this laptop is too big to operate comfortably in an airline seat.  So the comping sessions I used to do in economy class on long flights aren't going to happen anymore.  Alas.  As tradeoffs go, it's an easy one.
 
Short summary: don't waste your time--which is the most limited resource any of us has--trying to make general purpose hardware sing and dance.  Spend the little bit extra upfront that it takes to get a guy like Jim Roseberry to produce a monster machine.  It's worth the money; you can get more money, but you'll never get the time back that you lost trying to make a mediocre computer perform.
 
Regards, lightninrick 
 
 
 
 
 

I moved to an I7 laptop about 2 years ago.  I would never go back to a desktop.  Being able to work on music wherever I feel like sitting has enabled me to be more productive, and I can get 80 percent of the stuff I need to done without being hooked up to the rest of the outboard studio gear.
 
Granted I still use a dedicated studio area with various gear, from keyboards to a sound booth for the microphones, to inputting live drums.  But aside from certain portions of the recording process, I can get a heck a lot of it done just on the laptop.  It's a wonderful thing.  Sonar performs really well on a laptop that has sufficient resources. 
 
I experienced a big boost in satisfaction when I switched to SSD drives.  I have two in my laptop.

Jim helped me with my build. Well worth the consulting fee.