As I said in another post, I think Apple is no longer innovating.  Just look at their fixed-memory and fixed-hard drive solutions in the MBP world.  Not only are they fixed when you buy the machine, they are very limited.  Max it out?  Don't make me laugh.  
 
And to make up for that shortfall, Apple doesn't even offer a 17" laptop at all.  Somebody else said that a single modern i7 can beat out a dual Xeon Mac Pro.  Don't know about that but I will say that the Mac Pro is just as limited as the Mac Book Pro.  I'm disappointed in Apple precisely BECAUSE they seem to have abandoned the computer buyer/user.  Or at least they've mildly insulted us.  [eyeroll]
 
Oh sure, I'll keep the Sonar Mac installer.  But if Apple continues down this path, I'll never buy a Mac. [sad]
 
By the way Cakewalk, why can't we get standard emoticons on this board?  The ones you offer are too tiny on a modern high resolution monitor and they're of terrible quality anyway.  
 
I can't really even tell what I'm choosing.  [evilmad, confused]
 
It's lame I have to type my emoticons with LETTERS!

denverdrummer
OSX CoreAudio does some cool stuff, but it does come with significant overhead compared to ASIO.  The advantage is you can do some cool routing with multiple interfaces and even your onboard mic and headphone jack, where ASIO is more of the "one at a time" approach.  The big drawback to CoreAudio (and my information is a few years old so they may have updated some of this) is that performance goes to crap when using smaller sample sizes where Windows with ASIO drivers is more consistent performance regardless of samples.
 
This info is a few years old but will give you an idea:
 
http://www.dawbench.com/win7-v-osx-4.htm

I find my UFX performs about the same on OS X as Windows. I sometimes need to up the buffer for mixing on the MacBook to a bit more than the PC in my signature, and once in a while freeze Logic tracks on the Mac, but the Macbook has a slower cpu which may well account for a chunk of that. Not a huge difference, but a difference. Sonar also seems to handle threading better, especially when monitoring via the DAW software.

There's also the possibility that an AU version of a particular plugin might be less efficient at using resources than the Windows VST version. I also tend to use Waves plugs in Logic rather than ones that come with Platinum, amd some Waves plugs have a pretty high latency of their own. Though at least Waves tell you what the plugin latency is, unlike most plugin houses.

What differences there are aren't huge or game-changing.

Interesting observations tlw thank you for sharing them .
 
all the best,
 
Kenny
 
 
 

I am thinking of getting the little $900 USB UAD Apollo interface for use with my laptop and my workstation.  It has a dual in it; just like the PCIe card in my workstation.  Portable, and would work with the UAD in the workstation for more plugins (although I've never ever exceeded the limit..heh).
 
And besides the two tape emulators, there are no more UAD plugins I'm pining for.  Just the hardware.
 
But I procrastinate.  Over and over again...

Positively Charged
As I said in another post, I think Apple is no longer innovating.  Just look at their fixed-memory and fixed-hard drive solutions in the MBP world.  Not only are they fixed when you buy the machine, they are very limited.  Max it out?  Don't make me laugh.  
 
And to make up for that shortfall, Apple doesn't even offer a 17" laptop at all.  Somebody else said that a single modern i7 can beat out a dual Xeon Mac Pro.  Don't know about that but I will say that the Mac Pro is just as limited as the Mac Book Pro.  I'm disappointed in Apple precisely BECAUSE they seem to have abandoned the computer buyer/user.  Or at least they've mildly insulted us.  [eyeroll]
 
Oh sure, I'll keep the Sonar Mac installer.  But if Apple continues down this path, I'll never buy a Mac. [sad]
 
By the way Cakewalk, why can't we get standard emoticons on this board?  The ones you offer are too tiny on a modern high resolution monitor and they're of terrible quality anyway.  
 
I can't really even tell what I'm choosing.  [evilmad, confused]
 
It's lame I have to type my emoticons with LETTERS!

Certainly as far as the Mac Pro, Apple doesn't care much anymore.  The OSX side of their buisness is pennies compared to the iOS side of their busieness.  I don't know about an i7 beating a dual Xeon, maybe in a specific configuration, but certainly the HP Z-series workstations blow the Mac Pro out of the water performance wise, and HP has always kept their design through all their products that every single component in the system is field replaceable.  HP, Lenovo and Dell all own the majority of the  3D CAD workstation space, but Apple still owns the studio space.  I have a feeling with the new Mac Pro design that could turn tables in the future if they don't change.  Most Studios are running the older generation Intel Mac Pros, and when the time comes to upgrade, there is no advantage going to the new trash can design.
 
I think Tim Cook has been a horrible CEO and they've lost alot of ground in certain areas, especially the iPad market.  I used to have a 3rd gen iPhone, but I've gone to Android for the simple reason that iOS has no file system on it, which makes it useless to me, and using iCloud or iTunes to sync your phone is really silly IMO.