Computer Upgrade Advice Please

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guitarman1956
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2012/02/06 12:16:31 (permalink)

Computer Upgrade Advice Please

I'm looking to upgrade: I'm "not" a gamer. I record audio with Sonar X1 Producer. I process from 4 to 12  tracks of audio, synth and midi plugins. I currently have a 2.7 Ghz dual core processor. Would I benefit goint to a higher processing speed than 2.7 and more cores?  If so, what would you recommend for audio recording and normal home computing.
Thanks
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    soundsubs
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 12:28:16 (permalink)
    hey man--- i JUST did this (see my other thread)..
    a couple things you need to research, consider, and decide:

    1.) Which OS do you need? Win 7 or WinXP
    -- i have lived and loved on XP for years, being that it just worked. i had no problems with it at all. you may feel differently.
    i chose to upgrade to win7 because i got 8 gb of RAM and 8 processors. you may choose differently.

    2.) How much hardware do you need? I went with the max, but dont really need it. Again, if its just you and your description, you might not feel that much of a bump from your current system, other than now being able to load 3584 plugins at once. thats all there really is. i hate to say this, but in this case "more = better" 

    3.) Do you want to DIY or pay someone else to do it? im a nerd, so i chose to DIY (myself) and bought a local system and put an OS on it. took me about 3 days altogether to get everything installed, updated, tweaked. This takes patience and research. There are tons of people and posts on the internet about tweaking Win7. Start in this forum and go out from there. One thing you'll need to research is DPC latency... start with "latency mon" program.

    4.) Figure out how to get Sonar X1 installed and tweaked.

    Sonar Platinum | modular synthesizers galore
    Win 10 // Dell Xeon's | RME UFX | Maschine 2.3 | Virus TI | Roland System-1 
     
    #2
    soundsubs
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 12:30:22 (permalink)
    ... also, you'll be able to keep your soft synths running live rather than freezing them all the time. this might help you in the creative process.

    Sonar Platinum | modular synthesizers galore
    Win 10 // Dell Xeon's | RME UFX | Maschine 2.3 | Virus TI | Roland System-1 
     
    #3
    daryl1968
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 12:51:58 (permalink)
    Hi Guitarman - you don't say what OS you are running now. 32 or 64 bit? How much RAM currently?
    #4
    StarTekh
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 13:06:25 (permalink)
    Guitarman: tell me what processor you want to build on, we can make you a shopping list also Note:Soundsubs just built/orderd (Mill) killer system dual processor, Dual processor is the way to go if you can afford it !!
    post edited by StarTekh - 2012/02/06 13:23:00
    #5
    JustGotPaid
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 13:32:47 (permalink)
    Two words:  Jim Roseberry
    http://www.studiocat.com/3/index.php/Home


    Sonar Platinum
     
    #6
    daryl1968
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 14:52:40 (permalink)
    he is looking to upgrade - that doesn't mean he has to spend a fortune on a whole new machine. If he is running 64 bit, it could be that he only has 4GB of RAM and upgrading that is as cheap as
    #7
    StarTekh
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 15:16:02 (permalink)
    2011 motherboard Intel 3930 Intel 16g Crucial 1000.00 end
    #8
    guitarman1956
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 15:26:16 (permalink)
    Thanks for all the helpful replies guys. I currently run Windows 7 - 64 bit. I went from 32 bit to 64 in order to up my ram to 8 gb.  My mother board is a FoxCon...and a AMD processor.  I wouldn't have any problem changing out the hardware myself. My real question here is:  Would upping the processor speed and getting more cores (from where I'm at now) really help Sonar X1 Producer?  Or do I simply have enough?

    Thanks again
    #9
    StarTekh
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    Re:Computer Upgrade Advice Please 2012/02/06 15:30:25 (permalink)
    Guitarman: 6 cores.. on the short list i posted would smoke most systems here!!
    #10
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