Nuclear Vampire
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Opinions on a PC for Sonar
Hey all,
Haven't posted here in a few years, but my old custom built Win Vista PC is getting a little long in the tooth, so I think it's time for a new system before I have a major hardware failure. Also going to upgrade from Sonar 6 (yes, I still rock the 6!) to Sonar Pro.
I built the last PC back in 2008 based on what was the best recommended hardware at the time. I seem to think this little puppy may be a perfect off the shelf replacement.
I'm thinking it will need a dedicated audio card to replace the onboard one. The old PC has an M-Audio 192 card that my mixer runs into (I am sort of a one man band so I typically just record one instrument at a time), and I may try swapping it in to the new PC. Any thoughts on the PC in the link or an audio card that might suit my needs if the M-Audio doesn't work out?
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Nuclear Vampire
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/28 16:04:41
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Ok I guess links don't work here. Anyways, its a Lenovo S510 10KY002AUS with a Core i3-6100 and 4 gigs of RAM. A 500GB HD and Win 10 Pro. Empty PCIe slot too.
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rivers88
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/28 17:43:45
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If possible, increase the RAM to at least 8 GB, better yet 16 GB if you can swing it.
4 GB With Windows 10 and Sonar Pro isn't going to give you a lot of operating room.
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abacab
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/28 23:06:25
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Nuclear Vampire
Hey all,
Haven't posted here in a few years, but my old custom built Win Vista PC is getting a little long in the tooth, so I think it's time for a new system before I have a major hardware failure. Also going to upgrade from Sonar 6 (yes, I still rock the 6!) to Sonar Pro.
I built the last PC back in 2008 based on what was the best recommended hardware at the time. I seem to think this little puppy may be a perfect off the shelf replacement.
I'm thinking it will need a dedicated audio card to replace the onboard one. The old PC has an M-Audio 192 card that my mixer runs into (I am sort of a one man band so I typically just record one instrument at a time), and I may try swapping it in to the new PC. Any thoughts on the PC in the link or an audio card that might suit my needs if the M-Audio doesn't work out?
Yup, definitely 8GB min RAM with Win 10. I have a non-DAW portable office laptop with 4GB and Sonar installed for travel, but it really feels constrained with that little amount of RAM. At idle, just Win 10 uses over 40% of that RAM. If I open Sonar with a new project and only Rapture Session, I am at 51% use on the RAM. At one time I used a M-Audio Delta 44 PCI based interface with a break-out box. Then I built a FireWire based PC about 10 years ago. Things have changed. Modern internal audio cards are almost non-existent for today's PC's. The most commonly used interfaces now are the USB2 audio interfaces, with a few USB3 models available. There are some hybrid USB/FireWire units, but most systems are not shipping with FireWire anymore. Mac has killed FireWire off, in favor of Thunderbolt, which is really not a PC compatible interface as far as Windows drivers currently stand. So USB2 is really all you need, but there are some USB3 options out there, for digital audio today. Check out the units offered by Tascam, Focusrite, and Steinberg, for low entry cost. Then look at the MOTU and RME for higher end use.
DAW: CbB; Sonar Platinum, and others ...
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Rob[at]Sound-Rehab
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/29 04:20:30
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Nuclear Vampire
I'm thinking it will need a dedicated audio card to replace the onboard one.
Apart from sufficient RAM, the next most important thing on your list. abacab
So USB2 is really all you need, but there are some USB3 options out there, for digital audio today. Check out the units offered by Tascam, Focusrite, and Steinberg, for low entry cost. Then look at the MOTU and RME for higher end use.
If you don't need a lot of I/O you can get one of the smaller interfaces, but if you can afford it, pick one from the top vendors RME or MOTU. It makes an incredible difference when it comes to DAW software stability.
GOOD TUNES LAST FOREVER +++ Visit the Rehab +++ DAW: Platinum/X3e, win10 64 bit, i7-3930K (6x3.2GHz), Asus Sabertooth X79, 32 GB DDR3 1600MHz, ATI HD 5450, 120 GB SSD OCZ Agility3, 2x 1TB WD HDD SATA 600 Audio-Interface: 2x MOTU 1248 AVB, Focusrite OctoPre, (Roland Octa-Capture) Control-Surface: VS-700C VSTi: WAVES, NI K10u, FabFilter, IK, ... (too many really)
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abacab
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/29 09:13:25
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Nuclear Vampire
The old PC has an M-Audio 192 card that my mixer runs into (I am sort of a one man band so I typically just record one instrument at a time), and I may try swapping it in to the new PC.
Regarding the M-Audio Delta Audiophile 192, it has been discontinued since M-Audio was sold by Avid to inMusic Brands in 2012. No new drivers have been released since, however they do keep a "legacy" drivers download page. The last supported drivers were issued for Windows 7. You can read more or inquire here: http://community.m-audio....rivers_for_win8_coming PCI is being phased out, in favor of PCIe, so you may need to custom build your own computer to get it. Bottom line, it's probably going to be easier to update the audio interface to USB, and avoid the headaches of trying to swap the legacy card over. Getting it to work properly on a newer OS with old drivers may still be an issue ...
DAW: CbB; Sonar Platinum, and others ...
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Nuclear Vampire
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/29 09:48:32
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Thanks for all the awesome replies! I will definitely be going with 16 GB of RAM. The PC itself can accommodation up to 32. It also has a free PCIe slot, so it seems my M-Audio card is history. Will begin my research into an interface. The MOTU stuff looks fantastic, until I open my wallet lol
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Mister_deSade
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2016/12/29 15:58:18
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Go as much as you can with RAM. With 16 GB you will be in a great place and won't have to deal with as much, or perhaps any latency nonsense ever. Also, consider Solid State for your main OS Drive. Install programs there and consider storing all samples and associated audio files on a secondary SATA drive of 2TB or more. I just resurrected an old PC from about 11 years ago that would barely start, replaced with a $50 Sandisk SSD and the thing is fast, like a brand new PC.
Also, be wary if you are switching to Windows 10 on a new PC. You might have issues using previous hardware that require firewire with all these new motherboards coming out.
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BRainbow
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/01 20:34:33
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<<<With 16 GB you will be in a great place and won't have to deal with as much, or perhaps any latency nonsense ever.>>>
I don't think this is accurate. My understanding is that latency has little or nothing to do with RAM and everything to do with the audio interface and its drivers.
Cakewalk (forever), Two WIN10 64-bit DAWs: home-brew ASRock x299 Taichi / i7 7820x w/ 64GB RAM and ASUS X99A-II / i7-5820K w/ 32GB RAM, ZOOM UAC 8, Mackie ONYX 1640i FW Mixer/Interface, Mackie ONYX 1200F, Avalon U5 PreAmp, NI Komplete 11 Ultimate, EastWest Composer CloudX, Yamaha MOTIF XS8, Ensoniq SD-1 and ESQ-1, Korg M1rEX, Yamaha TX-81Z, Roland D110, Line6 HELIX Rack and Native, POD HD-Pro, POD Farm 2.5, Yamaha NS-10 and Presonus Eris E8 monitors, Yamaha Disklavier Upright Piano, mics, guitars, basses, and the cutest little tambourine.
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abacab
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/01 20:53:59
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The amount of RAM has nothing to do with latency ... once you have enough to load your system and programs, plus your DAW with it's project, plugins, and samples, you are all set. Modern motherboard chipsets, memory controllers, and RAM are among the fastest components on a current PC. That's why flash disk drives are so fast. The audio hardware and drivers can be the biggest issue for DAW performance. Sometimes you have to adjust the size of your audio buffers to allow for what you are doing. The default does not always work best for all situations. Small buffer sizes give you the benefit of low latency at a cost of CPU usage. Large buffers take less CPU, but creates longer latency. You need to find the balance that works for your project and your system. This applies to all DAWs. Hopefully you are using a decent dedicated audio interface with low latency ASIO drivers. But if not, and you are running Windows 10 and Platinum, you could check out the improved Sonar WASAPI driver for Win 10 just introduced in Sonar Platinum update 2016.11. http://static.cakewalk.co...AR_2016.11_Release.pdf For adjusting audio buffers, look at these knowledge base articles: I'm getting a delay or latency when recording or performing synths https://www.cakewalk.com/...g-or-performing-synthsAudio Dropouts, Clicks and Pops When Playing and Recording Audio Driver Latency/Buffer Size Needs to be increased if you are experiencing dropouts in the sense that the audio engine is completely stopping and your Cakewalk software is reporting "DROPOUT" in its Control Bar or Status Bar https://www.cakewalk.com/...-Playing-and-Recording
DAW: CbB; Sonar Platinum, and others ...
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Jim Roseberry
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/02 09:03:11
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BRainbow
<<<With 16 GB you will be in a great place and won't have to deal with as much, or perhaps any latency nonsense ever.>>>
I don't think this is accurate. My understanding is that latency has little or nothing to do with RAM and everything to do with the audio interface and its drivers.
That is absolutely correct. The amount of RAM has nothing to do with audio latency. Audio latency is determined by two things alone - Audio interface
- Latent plugins
Increasing RAM beyond what is needed will *not* increase performance. You need to have enough RAM for your largest projects... to prevent the machine from hitting the VM swapfile in lieu of physical RAM... as this kills performance.
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Mister_deSade
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/02 16:43:17
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Right, RAM means nothing.
Let's go forth and say, track a drum kit with 12 mics and 1 GB RAM and see how we fare...
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abacab
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/02 17:09:03
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RAM means nothing regarding audio latency.
DAW: CbB; Sonar Platinum, and others ...
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Jim Roseberry
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/02 20:08:15
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Mister_deSade
Right, RAM means nothing.
Let's go forth and say, track a drum kit with 12 mics and 1 GB RAM and see how we fare...
At the risk of being repetitive... As long as the machine has enough RAM to run your largest projects (to avoid hitting the VM swapfile), adding more *will not* have any impact on performance. This is fact. ie: If your project requires 8GB RAM... and you've got 16GB installed, doubling or quadrupling the RAM to 32GB or 64GB will not buy additional performance. RAM has zero affect on audio latency. Latency has but two sources: - Audio Interface
- Latent plugins
If you're running sample libraries, additional RAM can be used to load/stream samples (which would out-perform any drive including SSD). That's a different subject...
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Cactus Music
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/03 19:30:37
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☄ Helpfulby Starise 2017/01/05 10:16:32
I've recorded plenty of 12 track recordings back when 1 Gig was max with XP. It was the drivers and the Interface that facilitate recording audio and a 100GB 7200 RPM hard drive was the ticket in those days. So if your running W XP and only have 1 GB RAM you certainly can record 12 tracks of audio. But of course you won't be doing anything on a W10 or even W7 with 1 GB of RAM that is not a real world case scenario. That computer will have at least 4 GB and would work just fine for 20 + tracks of audio ( done that) 8 GB is the norm for even an office box these days. Your average DAW uses 16 or more GB's even if we don't need it, it's nice to know it's there. You say you built your Vista machine. Have you thought of building the new one? Lots of stuff on sale right now and you should be able to build an i5 for around $600 with solid first class hardware in it. Off the self computers are like Walmart home stereo's to me. I was just given a 2 year old HP i7 box that cost $2,000. Compared to the the 2 I built about the same time for less than half of that it's a cheapo machine inside. 125Watt PS?? Pour quality RAM ( only 10GB) I seriously was going to make it my main DAW because the processor is i7 and mine is i5. There was no noticeable difference when rendering audio etc so I'm staying with the one I built. I actually don't know what to do with it now as even my office computer is better built. I guess I'll see if someone in the family needs an upgrade. But I'm convinced the way to go with a DAW is build your own, OR buy from a custom builder.
post edited by Cactus Music - 2017/01/05 12:13:28
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bapu
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/04 12:17:02
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Jim Roseberry
Mister_deSade
Right, RAM means nothing.
Let's go forth and say, track a drum kit with 12 mics and 1 GB RAM and see how we fare...
At the risk of being repetitive...
As long as the machine has enough RAM to run your largest projects (to avoid hitting the VM swapfile), adding more *will not* have any impact on performance. This is fact.
ie: If your project requires 8GB RAM... and you've got 16GB installed, doubling or quadrupling the RAM to 32GB or 64GB will not buy additional performance.
RAM has zero affect on audio latency.
Latency has but two sources:
- Audio Interface
- Latent plugins
If you're running sample libraries, additional RAM can be used to load/stream samples (which would out-perform any drive including SSD). That's a different subject...
Mister_deSade, Never argue with a DAW builder. Jim is a professional DAW builder. IOW, let the DAW builder win. 
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patm300e
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/05 07:53:00
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I only had 8 GB and an OLD AMD 8 core and that loaded the Cakewalk sample track by Javier Colon (I think)...
It ran just fine, so I would have to Agree with Jim on this.
That project had full MIDI and digital audio with effects so I guess 8 GB was enough to fully load everything and support glitch free playback. BTW, I was using an Original Presonus Firebox (Firewire) interface at the time.
 SPLAT on a Home built i3 16 GB RAM 64-bit Windows 10 Home Premium 120GB SSD (OS) 2TB Data Drive. Behringer XR-18 USB 2.0 Interface. FaderPort control.
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dlesaux
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/22 17:26:49
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Yes, just got a PC built by Jim at Perfect Audio. He knows his stuff! See specs below. Couldn't be happier!  For the first time, I forget my computer is even there!
Peace! Daniel Sonar Platinum - 2017.10 and PreSonus Studio One 3.5.5
Windows 10 64 bit
Studiocat Skylake Desktop PC with Intel i7 6700k processor @ 4.20 GHz / 16G RAM
Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 Audio Interface and Cakewalk UM-2G Midi Interface Check out my website
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Sheanes
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/22 20:09:02
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recommending a PC with an onboard SSD
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rj davis
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Re: Opinions on a PC for Sonar
2017/01/24 18:22:12
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dlesaux
Yes, just got a PC built by Jim at Perfect Audio. He knows his stuff! See specs below. Couldn't be happier! For the first time, I forget my computer is even there!
Spent 20+ years building my own DAW's and maintaining them while trying to make music. Got a PC from Jim 3 months ago and it's been nothing but making music since. (Also got one of the aforementioned RME interfaces, which is a joy.) I do ENJOY building DAW's, but don't think I'll ever go back. Pushing technology into the background is SO very liberating. Other folks feel differently, and you may as well. I know because I did for so long. :)
Ron Windows 10 Sonar Platinum i7-5700K 4.0 GHz StudioCat ProStudio (monster) RME Babyface Pro Mackie MCU Pro Neumann TLM49 Too many guitars...
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