MAC or PC for production?

[Vesca]

Hey guys,

So, I've got about £1,500 give or take, to spend on a new computer. A desktop of course.

I know there is a huge debate surrounding the whole "Mac Vs Pc". But, I'm wondering, what do you guys think is better suited for production?

I've been using windows up until now and had a few major security breeches which have almost stopped me from playing out some nights. So I have a bit of a lean towards Mac. However, if windows 7 has similar stability to Mac OSX, then I would probably get more for my money from PC.

Here are some of the computers I was looking at.

Please feel free to suggest any other sites.

Mac

3.60GHz Intel Core i5
8GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 4x2GB
1TB Serial ATA Drive
ATI Radeon HD 5670 512MB GDDR3 SDRAM
8x double-layer SuperDrive
Apple Wireless Keyboard (British) & User's Guide (English)
Magic Mouse

- £1569 -
Apple

PC

Intel® Core™ i7 960 Quad Core Processor (3.20GHz,8MB Cache)
Microsoft® Windows® 7 Home Premium pre-installed
ThermalTake V5 Black Edition Gaming Chassis
950W X-Power Desktop Power Supply
Asus P6X58D-E-USB3 - Intel Core™ i7 & i7 Extreme Edition - LGA1366 Socket(ATX)
G.Skill 8GB DDR3 1600MHz Memory (4x 2GB KIt)
1.5TB Serial ATA 2 Hard Drive with 32MB Buffer
Blu-Ray Combo Optical Drive (Blu-ray ROM, DVD/CD RW)
1GB NVIDIA Geforce GTX465 with CUDA Graphics Accelerator

*Having to add a moniter and keyboard and mouse*
(Yes its a gaming computer)

- £1654 -
Mesh Computers

PC

CPU: 3.33GHz (OC) Core i7 950 3.06GHz Quad Core
Mainboard: Gigabyte EX58 Core i7 LGA1366 Motherboard
Video: ATI Radeon HD 4350 VGA, DVi, HDMI
Memory: 6GB 1333MHz Triple Channel RAM
OS Drive: 320GB SATA II
Audio Drive: 1TB SATA II
Optical: Dual Layer CD/DVD Writer
Noise Reduction: Acoustic Case Lining & hard drive caddies
OS: Windows 7 64 bit tuned by Rain for audio production

- £1699 -
Rain recording

PC

Intel Core I7 960 3.20GHz 4 cores 8 threads
120mm CPU cooler and exhaust fan
Gigabyte UD3A, PCI - PCIe - 6 dimms
3GB (3x1GB) DDR3 1333MHz Corsair
320GB OS drive
500GB Audio drive
530W Seasonic
HD3450 ATI dual ouput silent cooling
DVD R/RW
2x Texas Instrument firewire ports
19" Rack case with acoustic insulation
Windows XP Home custom install
*Had to include Monitor*

- £1703 -
Direct Resolution

Thanks.

[Pedro Sánchez]

Self build and save half the price of them PC systems.

[DZA]

PC!!!!!!!

[corpu5]

pc

[Ldizzy]

..



but..


mac tho

[alphacat]

My computers/cars analogy:

Macs are high-end performance machines like BMW's that go fast right out of the box, handle corners very very well, and are sleek & sexy; BUT - it's not easy to get under the hood and fix shit yourself, any & all aftermarket upgrades or potential repairs will cost you plenty, there are not as many aftermarket upgrades available and what ones do exist are almost never free and usually on the pricy side. People who prefer Macs just want to get on with the business of driving fast and don't want to memorize the minute details of their engine configuration.

PCs are normal stock production cars; they don't go as fast or handle the corners as well right out of the box, but because they cost so much less you can easily buy aftermarket upgrades that can make it faster in a straight line - and if you're not afraid of getting your hands dirty, you can tweak it to perform comparably with a Mac around the corners. There are also gazillions of free aftermarket products (granted, many of 'em are worth that much too) for the PC, and if you're mechanically inclined and not prone to get frustrated easily, fixing it yourself for free instead of taking it to the mechanic is definitely an option.

If I had much more cash than I do now, I'd own both.

[Pedro Sánchez]

My analogy: Macs are PC's with pre selected parts, a glossy OS and fancy casing.

and I own both unfortunately.

[deadly_habit]

[tylerblue]

There is absolutely no wrong answer to this question. It is essentially whether or not you want to use Logic as your DAW. In your price range, whatever you get will be more than enough.

[pete_bubonic]

I have both,

Self built XP desktop
Intel Pentium P4 3.2 ghz
3gb Ram
Some other irrelevant shit

and

4th gen Macbook
2.4Ghz intel core 2 duo
Upgraded corsair 4 gb ram.
yaddayaddayadda

My macbook is obviously leaps and bounds ahead of my desktop but still only cost £670 (mac wholesaler off ebay) about 2 years ago. As a result, my macbook quickly became my primary workhorse (plus going into a field with headphones and producing is great).

To be honest, I'm not really sure why you want to go for something as powerful as you have listed. Are you going to be working on really long pieces (hour plus etc)? Or ultra complex with crap loads of effects where you simply can't bounce and resample? If I were to dump a grand and a half on a desktop, it better be the best gaming rig I ever used, or be sat in an active recording studio earning me money. I've had lots of audio and vst tracks and effects popping off in Logic 9, I only ever run into system slow downs when I'm multi tasking (or got Windows on the go at the same time). An i7 for music production is overkill, so unless this desktop is going to be for something other than music production I would consider downsizing.

As for mac vs pc. the car analogy used above is the same that I use when people ask me, if you got the money, get a mac, the majority of people I know who work in music use them for a reason. Mainly stability (seeing Plastician's -and others- pc lappy tank on him at a couple gigs) but also Logic (though I hear some OSX virtual machines are getting fairly stable and not too resource hungry). The selected parts and having an OS designed to work with just a few components instead of the vast array of combinations out there that Windows does an impressive job of stitching together, provides me with stability and peace of mind.

In conclusion, I guess I am not overly bias towards one or the other, I'm a gamer myself, so I'll be building a new PC rig soon enough for Portal 2 and Diablo 3, but I can't see me moving back to that platform for music production or performance.

[ninjadog]

It really comes down to personal preference. I switched to mac and now I actually forget how to use a PC properly. If you do buy a new mac definitely get the apple care.

The only reason I would get s PC is lack of cash or if I had to, I wouldent mind owning one. But my G4 PPC duel 867 is still holding up really good tho.

[wormcode]

Depends on the software you use or intend to use.
I would build a custom PC and run OSX in VM. With todays processors it's no problem, I've seen a friend of mine alt+tab between Win 7, OSX and linux on the same computer without a hiccup.

[tylerblue]

Depends on the software you use or intend to use.
I would build a custom PC and run OSX in VM. With todays processors it's no problem, I've seen a friend of mine alt+tab between Win 7, OSX and linux on the same computer without a hiccup.

why

[Siderealdb]

My personal preference is pc.

[pete_bubonic]

Depends on the software you use or intend to use.
I would build a custom PC and run OSX in VM. With todays processors it's no problem, I've seen a friend of mine alt+tab between Win 7, OSX and linux on the same computer without a hiccup.

why

I'm pretty sure I could do all this on my work i3, but why would I want to? Why not get the platform I'm going to be primarily working in? If our man (for whatever bizarre reason) wants to run multiple OS, Cubase and Logic and other stuff, then yeah go for it. If he wants a dedicated DAW specifically for studio/recording use. I don't see the point in going through VMs. Only reason I still have windows xp in a vm on my mac was to run PaulStretch and now there's better native osx vsts, got no need.

[stereotactic]

Two questions you need to ask yourself.

1. Do you prefer Windows or OSX?
2. What DAW do you want to run?

If the answer to those is either OSX or Logic, then Mac. I just got my Mac with Logic, and I love it... as I said though, I have just got it. No problems yet though.

I also have a PC laptop set up with Cubase, which is what I was using until recently. The lappy gave me more jip and took longer to get working 'right', and I did have a fair few problems (mostly due to Dell lappys not liking audio very much. Or me) but when it worked, it worked fine.

I got the Mac basically because A: I could and B: I liked Logic and a number of collab mates use it. Getting into it a bit more, I kinda think Cubase actually does audio editing better, but I'm still just learning with Logic so... Mac's also have a reputation as more stable and reliable because of their 'off the shelf' architecture i.e. always the same components across the board, but I dunno if that is true or a myth tbh.

Anyway, I digress. Basically, ask yourself those two questions, and base you eventual decision on the answer.

[hasezwei]

only reason to use a mac: logic. a very very good reason though

[HAACK]

self build, PC

[BadBoyBastian3B]

mac ftw for production hands down really the only thing mac has under its belt

[abakus]

Mac anyday. PC fanboys are wrong! Mac fanboys are right!