PC vs Mac

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People always like to talk about specs and computing power when it comes to mac vs pc. The true functionality comes from the connection between hardware and software and in the elegance of programming. You could have a fast computer running the worst software and it would be no good. When you are able to release hardware and software simultaneously that complement each other you can optimize software for hardware, hardware for software. When Apple decides to update the way the bootloader functions they can roll out new computers with this functionality. PCs have hardware manufacturers and software manufacturers that have to work together..slow and inefficient.
 
alltrue said:
People always like to talk about specs and computing power when it comes to mac vs pc. The true functionality comes from the connection between hardware and software and in the elegance of programming. You could have a fast computer running the worst software and it would be no good. When you are able to release hardware and software simultaneously that complement each other you can optimize software for hardware, hardware for software. When Apple decides to update the way the bootloader functions they can roll out new computers with this functionality. PCs have hardware manufacturers and software manufacturers that have to work together..slow and inefficient.
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Strange that you would choose the bootloader as your example, as the OS doesn't come into play until after the bootloader has finished doing its job.

The only good reasons for picking a Mac in today's day and age are

1: Compatibility (although if you create your PC based on a compatible Hackintosh build, the compatibility argument goes out the window), and

2: Time (if you have much more money than time, a Mac is pre-configured for music decently out-of-the-box). Poor people spend time to earn money, and rich people spend money to earn time. That has something to do with why you see so many ridiculously overpriced Macs in the hands of highly-paid top industry producers. A wealthy producer doesn't care whether a $3,000 Mac can be matched in performance by a $1,200 PC, because the value equation is tilted for him to prioritize his temporal resources over his monetary ones.
He doesn't want to take his time to research components, download drivers, etc., because his time is worth more than the difference in price.

For raw power, a PC always beats a Mac at the same price point (and often beats Macs at higher price points!). A $1000 PC beats a $1000 Mac. A $3000 PC beats a $3000 Mac. It's not a matter of "not having enough money for a Mac". If I were gifted $5000 to spend only on a computer, the money would go into a beastly PC. The time it takes to learn how to optimize a PC should be viewed as an investment, as you need to learn only slight differences for different OS versions. For example, the only major optimization differences in W8 are turning off Dynamic Ticks and ensuring that HPET is enabled in both the BIOS and the OS. Besides that, the optimization guidelines are generally the same as previous versions.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
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alltrue said:
People always like to talk about specs and computing power when it comes to mac vs pc. The true functionality comes from the connection between hardware and software and in the elegance of programming. You could have a fast computer running the worst software and it would be no good. When you are able to release hardware and software simultaneously that complement each other you can optimize software for hardware, hardware for software. When Apple decides to update the way the bootloader functions they can roll out new computers with this functionality. PCs have hardware manufacturers and software manufacturers that have to work together..slow and inefficient.
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Each and everyone of those statements is a motherhood statement - all very nice and general but light on specifics

the bootloader is also know as the bios as salem points - in most pcs we do not need to roll out a new one to take account of the updates made, simply flash the new version of the bios to the bios firmware chips and voilà, we have new functionality prior to the os loading - and such updates are usually free!!!!

and while the bios controls the basics of the input and output system, it is the OS that control hows the software you write/use interacts with the OS sitting on top of the bios, i.e. regardless of the bootloader from Apple or the bios on any other PC, anything that is written uses hooks in the OS to function, so your problems of software and hardware having to work together still remain regardless of the manufacturer......
 
Rekordhead said:
How well does logic run on that system?
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Logic has not been a dual platform DAW since Apple bought Emagic and pulled the pin on Logic's PC user base, so whether or not Apple's walled garden approach has paid off for Logic users is indeterminable given that there is no longer a current Windows version, what is known however is that Logic uses hidden buffers and that almost every dual platform DAW performs better under Windows.
 
Thats what im saying. Im considering replacing mine with a ssd but don't know how to do it. Maschine typically takes like 10 seconds to open up and more if its a large project. How would this compare to a solid state?
 
bandcoach said:
downside of ssd - because it is solid state ,i.e. ic based, if a sector gets corrupted or otherwise damaged there is no getting it back, unlike a hdd which you can reformat - some models become very expensive paper weights in a short space of time
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I thought I had corruption issues with my SSD and ended up returning it, only to discover that CyberPower gave me defective Ram sticks which eluded detection with Memtest86. Wish I had the SSD back.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
only serves to illustrate the issues of damaged sectors within RAM - makes even more sense now to refer to a SSD as a ram disk that doesn't borrow from system/program RAM

my son keeps asking if I want one (SSD) and I keep saying no

I'm even wary of very large capacity drives as if they fail you can lose way too much stuff, hence my preference for network storage if I can't put my drives inside my machine
 
bandcoach said:
only serves to illustrate the issues of damaged sectors within RAM - makes even more sense now to refer to a SSD as a ram disk that doesn't borrow from system/program RAM

my son keeps asking if I want one (SSD) and I keep saying no

I'm even wary of very large capacity drives as if they fail you can lose way too much stuff, hence my preference for network storage if I can't put my drives inside my machine
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You could put a couple of them in RAID for redundancy (rather than speed).

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
yeah, but given that unless you actually are using some of the higher levels of raid the redundancy does nothing if the RAID (Redundant Array of Indexed/Inexpensive Disks) itself fails - to make it safe having more than two is important and for my home operation I cannot justify the extra level of hassle to do this even if I were to use a linux box and lay in some raid control software on top

3 layers of backup suffice for now (second drive same content (aka mirror), NAS located critical backups, DVD/BluRay burns of older files every 6 months) and maybe a 4th layer if needed (RAID version of the above disk based methods)
 
bandcoach said:
yeah, but given that unless you actually are using some of the higher levels of raid the redundancy does nothing if the RAID (Redundant Array of Indexed/Inexpensive Disks) itself fails - to make it safe having more than two is important and for my home operation I cannot justify the extra level of hassle to do this even if I were to use a linux box and lay in some raid control software on top

3 layers of backup suffice for now (second drive same content (aka mirror), NAS located critical backups, DVD/BluRay burns of older files every 6 months) and maybe a 4th layer if needed (RAID version of the above disk based methods)
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When I had my SSD, I stored all of my projects and other important work files on a HDD and stored the OS and all re-installable libraries and plugins on the SSD.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
hollandturbine said:
That's the way to go, because there really is a trade off between performance and reliability.
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I thought that the corruption was the SDD's fault, but it must've been that it was more prone to corruption from RAM errors since it was accessed much more frequently as the main drive. My first clue that I should've kept my SDD was that my HDD started having the same issues once I made it my main drive. :(

With that said, never buy from CyberPower. Lol. Their defect rate is very high. They gave me an engineering sample CPU in their first build for me, I had to turn around and send it back (for legal purposes if not for anything else), and then their next build ends up with some bad RAM. Luckily I had bought 16GB of Crucial RAM intending to bring it up to 32GB -- took out the generic RAM and popped in the Crucial -- no problems since.

AF:UHBGIUAGHIPU#GT)&QW(3tgh3awghaw4hlgh3wa 9tgho3wP 897

In keeping on the topic, though -- this is a manufacturer-specific problem for hardware parts, not a problem with Windows (for the few of you who might misinterpret this as a fault with PCs). As a matter of fact, it was a piece of Windows software (HCI Memtest) which detected the problem after a platform-independent boot tool (Memtest86) let the problem go undetected and left me scratching my head in my attempts to deduce the problem.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
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A SSD's speed is not throttled by having to spin the disk into position, so it is running at the full sata buss speed
 
Happy Beats said:
the supposed speed of these drive intrigues me
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bandcoach said:
A SSD's speed is not throttled by having to spin the disk into position, so it is running at the full sata buss speed
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My OCZ Vector SSD benchmarked at a peak of 560MB/sec. read speed. It was exciting.
The current HDDs I have right now benchmark a rate of 60MB/sec. read speed, by comparison.

The seek time is also much, much faster for SSDs, meaning that they process large numbers of small files (read: sample libraries), much more quickly.
HDDs, by contrast, choke drastically on large quantities of small files. My current HDDs fall from 60MB/sec. to as low as 5MB/sec. when dealing with very high numbers of small files.

The only potential problem with SSDs (besides affordability) is reliability. They have been around for only a fraction of the time that HDDs have been around. Samsung's 840 Pro series seems to have great reviews compared to other SSDs -- that's what I might end up getting if I pick up an SSD again soon. Then again, I'll probably try to save up for an SLC SSD just for reliability purposes. MLC uses one memory cell to represent three possible states, which is one of the reasons for its higher failure rate -- it requires tighter production tolerances.

-Ki
Salem Beats
 
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PErsonally , I am absolutely sick of my PC. It is constantly freezing up and crashing. So or my next computer, I will be purchasing a MAC. With a Mac you can run any app,e program such as logic, and you can use bootcamp and still run all of your PC programs. I really believe it is the better deal of the 2. A bit more expensive, but I think definitely worth it for a WAY better computer.

Thanks,

Kara
Kazarabeats.com
 
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