Hello...
I am using Sonar X1 LE on my old laptop. It's working fine except a few dropouts and latency at rare times. But still I am planning to assemble a new PC.
 
1. DAW upgrade/Expansion pack(s)?: My level is beginners. But I see a dearth of soft synth instruments in X1. I would like to have more of soft synths instruments, audio effects and in-built loops and audio programs. It is difficult to understand the terminologies used in the product highlights or even have an overall grasp of which is good for what. Should I upgrade to a higher DAW or get some/any expansion pack(s) or something?
 
2. New PC Config:  My budget is economical and I might not move to a very high end DAW immediately.
a. CPU: AMD octacore?? or i5 ??
b. Mobo: ??
c: Graphics card: Required??
d: OS: Win7 or Win8 ?? Pro or Home?? 32 or 64 bits?
e: Any other handy tips and provisions I should keep for PC upgrade in future.
f: Cooler power??
g: RAM: will go for 8GB first, will add later.
h: SMPS power??
 
Regards,
Kane

1) Cakewalk offer more basic versions from $99 (Artist edition).
 
2) a) Intel Series 5 processors might offer more internal data bandwidth for same cost of the AMD. Now that Intel have starting producing 8-core solutions themselves, 4 or 6 core solutions might be more financially feasible. As an AMD user myself I am not bias however my next cpu will be Intel based.
 
b) The motherboard with all the mod cons might look good although concentrate on storage and expansion. If you plan on a silent PC with plenty storage then you don't need SLI/Crossfire features per se.
 
c) Like I said above, if you don't plan to play games or you might just watch the occasional movie then a passive heatsink AMD or Nvidia GPU will do the job. Alas some chipsets will have built in GPU which are pretty decent. Even Intel Iris graphics should do the trick.
 
d) If you can Windows 7 or Windows 8.1, Windows 8 is a horrible release. 64-bit is a no brainer these days. 
 
e) Go for a computer chassis with plenty cable hideaways, cleanable filters and good airflow to maintain the systems reliability over time.
 
f) There's an argument for using factory installed watercooling solutions over traditional air/copper or aluminium coolers. What you don't save in money is saved in noise generation and greater heat dissipation. 
 
g) 8GB yes, more if you can afford to.
 
h) Power supplies are better if they are reputable and also have 80+ or better certification. Modular cost a bit more however let you configure how many connections you actually really need at the one time.

You can buld an office computer for $400
You can build a DAW for $700
Those are the bare bones. I know this because I just built both. 
 
What are the specs for your Latop? It might be OK if set up properly. SSD drives more memory are a huge upgrade to Laptops 
 

Its specs are CPU 2.4 GHz and RAM 512Mb. Is adding a SSD drive going to help with this config and how?
 
 
 
 
 

SSD are fast, non-mechanical, memory based storage devices which operate over a SATA connection. Their speeds can be anything up to just over 500Mb/s  when reading data and just a little bit less when writing. Meaning they are silent, generate less heat and reduce the need for RAM.
 
I use a Crucial SSD drive to store my main sample libraries.
 
How you format the drive depends on what you use it for. 64K sectors are recommended for large sample libraries where as 4K is more ideal for smaller writes like an operating system.
 
 

What kind of SDD drive will be compatible with the config I have?

I would need more info like your laptop model or PC model, so I could give you a more informed answer. Some older equipment isn't compatible with the newer generation of drives. Alas you will find most will be.
 

Before even thinking of SSDs, I'd add more RAM. 512MB is very little for a modern operating system to work in before you add a DAW on top. On a DAW you want to avoid Windows writing to the swapfile on the disk as much as possible because it takes time and that time often means dropouts.
 
As for SSDs, unless the laptop has a SATA interface built in then SSDs are pretty pointless as the drive interface itself will be a limiting factor in data transfer.
 
In a new build, personally I'd go with Intel rather than AMD for the cpu and motherboard chipset. I'd also price in a good cpu cooler and quiet fan and a quiet case fan - Noctua for example. Seasonic make good fanless power supplies though they aren't the cheapest on the market. Unfortunately for any computer component that generates heat the easiest and cheapest way to get rid of it is a cheap, noisy high speed fan so that's what you'll generally find on cheaper components.
 
As for graphics, the Intel on-chip graphics are OK but can be a bit slow even for dragging windows around the desktop. If your budget stretches to it I'd look for a low price fanless gpu. Doesn't have to be too powerful, and there are quite a few around if you look for them. Sapphire make AMD-based fanless boards at pretty good prices and some are quite capable - my DAW has a fanless Sapphire AMD R7 200 series gpu in it that can even cope with less stressful 3D games without problems.
 
As for operating system, 64 bit Windows 8.1 is where I'd go. having run Vista, 7, 8 and 8.1 on a DAW I'd say each release has got a bit better at handling real-time audio processing and generally a bit smoother, faster and lighter.
 
SSDs make sense as the system drive in a new build because they speed up access to data considerably. Also maybe for storing samples. As for spooling audio to and from, they are also good at this but the frequent writes may shorten their life (I can live with that, others differ - my current Intel SSDs have been in use 2 years and show no sign of slowing down yet). If you only want to use a single SSD then use it for Windows and applications and a big 7,200rpm HDD for everything else. Avoid the "green" drives which save power by varying their rotation speed, they are fine for many purposes but not for streaming multi-channel audio. Partition the HDD so that the first partition is half or less of the total capacity then use it for Sonar projects (the first partition is nearest the outer edge of the disk which means better sustained read/write rates). Use the rest for the documents, pictures etc. directories that Windows requires (you can move them from their default location on C:) and anything else you need to store.

Yeah I know that a SSD drive will not make any considerable difference with the old config I have.
 
In a new build up, if I go for an i5 3.5 and RAM 8GB DDR3, how does the following specs in a mobo matters:
1. form factor?
2. socket type?
3. chipset?
4. memory slots?
5. ports?
anything else worth considering?
 
ASUS Ranger seems very tempting but will burn my pockets. Should I go for mobo like this one and get away with not getting a graphics card?

Something like this....https://www.asus.com/uk/Motherboards/H97PRO/
 
If you're not gaming, you definitely want something more refined and less gimmicky.