Laptops - Quiet vs. Performance

[Len911]

I suppose technically it would work, use an ipad, $269, with an Audient iD4 $199, and an ios audio app. The ipad has 32GB, plenty enough for the track you will be recording with, and even plenty of recording takes to make wav or aiff files to go to main computer for importing and mixing.

https://youtu.be/JNV9-WITBI8?list=PL2rn ... pxwGeYJOsA

[Merryband1]

I haven't noticed all that much fan interference when recording, but then again, I do a lot of direct input through the interface. Wen, I usually put the tiny transmitter mic into the back of my folk harp to record. It isn't the best, but it works okay. I then plug the receiver into the interface instead of the amp (which is what I use in performances where there's an audience of more than two or three). When doing acoustic into a microphone with guitar and/or fiddle, I do try to set the mic a bit farther away from the computer/laptop. So far, it seems to work, but I agree that the fans can be noisy! I love the idea of using an iPad. I know Sweetwater has an entire collection of sound peripherals to use with iPad, iPhone, and Mac. All pricey, but these days, what isn't?

I'll definitely look into getting some quiet fans. Right now, my HP laptop has seen better days, and they've stopped making parts for it. (Story of my life.) New computing equipment isn't in the budget right now, but I do want to upgrade when I can. Maybe after my first big sale! (I'm nothing if not positive.)

Merry

[wen]

I haven't noticed all that much fan interference when recording, but then again, I do a lot of direct input through the interface. Wen, I usually put the tiny transmitter mic into the back of my folk harp to record. It isn't the best, but it works okay. I then plug the receiver into the interface instead of the amp (which is what I use in performances where there's an audience of more than two or three). When doing acoustic into a microphone with guitar and/or fiddle, I do try to set the mic a bit farther away from the computer/laptop. So far, it seems to work, but I agree that the fans can be noisy! I love the idea of using an iPad. I know Sweetwater has an entire collection of sound peripherals to use with iPad, iPhone, and Mac. All pricey, but these days, what isn't?

I'll definitely look into getting some quiet fans. Right now, my HP laptop has seen better days, and they've stopped making parts for it. (Story of my life.) New computing equipment isn't in the budget right now, but I do want to upgrade when I can. Maybe after my first big sale! (I'm nothing if not positive.)

Merry

Thanks Merry! Nice to hear from you What "tiny transmitter mic" are you referring to? Yes putting the mics as far from the computer as possible makes a difference.

If I could do this over, I'd look more into one of those "silent" computers. I didn't know they existed.

Here's what I've done so far on this project, https://soundcloud.com/wendawilliamson/ ... rb/s-1SYKO

[wen]

I don't use laptops anymore, I'd rather record with an iPad.

I have two Mac Mini's both 100% silent. My t-shirt makes more noise than that.
I also have a Windows pc in a silent cabinet. It is also very quiet, and due to the silent cabinet, high specs and a big power supply unit (PSU), very low noise.

An issue with laptops no matter what specs is the small PSU's, which cause the fans to work harder and make more noise.

You don't need all that much to record, so an iPad is less bulky, dead quiet and just as good as a laptop to record on, imo. For mixing I would turn to a desktop, unless you have a mac laptop with high specs that wont make the fans go crazy when pushed for performance.

As you can tell, I believe computer fans is the major noise issue to be solved or workaround.

Kolstad that is very interesting. I had not considered an iPad before. I am behind on technology

Do your Mac Minis have mechanical drives, or SSDS? If mechanical, I am surprised they are quiet. I looked and didn't see how much memory they typically have.
They are dead quiet, and both have mechanical drives. The internal HDDs are even just 5400rpm's! I use an external SSD (Samsung Evo850) for my Spectrasonics and orchestral libraries, though. Allthough both Trillian, Stylus RMX and Omni 1 worked fine from the internal 5400 drive. I did upgrade to SSD for Keyscape, though.

If I am doing a larger piece using orchestral vst's etc., I would need at least 16 gb of memory I would think. But I don't necessarily need big specs on the laptop or iPad etc., because I have those in the tower. I think that would depend upon which orchestal libraries you are talking about, as they are very different in how much they are taxating the system. I have 16gigs of ram in my i7 Mac Mini, late 2014 model and works fine, but I dont use things like East West (I use mostly ProjectSam, which are pretty light on the system in Kontakt), which I believe would require more. You could also consider putting your samples on a slave computer, install VE Pro and hook it up to your daw computer via ethernet. I don't know much about iPads. So I could download Studio One to it, and record on it just like a computer? And attach external drives of my sample libraries? I'd have to get an external keyboard though, that would drive me nuts.No I dont think you can really record a lot of midi tracks with an iPad. What you can do is to record audio tracks in Capture and transfer them wirelessly to Studio One, though. http://www.presonus.com/products/Capture-for-iPad . You can also use the iPad as an external controller for mixing in Studio One with Studio One Remote http://www.presonus.com/products/Studio-One-Remote . You can also compose midi tracks on the fly with Notion for iOS and then transfer those midi files to Studio One and finish the tracks there http://www.presonus.com/products/Notion-for-iOS

How would you transfer your audio files to the tower then, download them onto a flash drive as a wav, and then import them, I guess? Wireless or USB.

I have a "quiet" case I got from MicroCenter, which helps, and added a water cooling system and I thought it had a heat sink fan that is supposed to be quiet; so the noise I still hear might be coming from the power supply? That is hard to determine from a distance, can you open the cabinet and look closer while its on, to determine the source of the noise?

Thanks for all your info!

Kolstad thank you I will have to try that (listening closely.) I'm a bit of a technophobe, lol... If I replaced the HDs in my tower with all SSDs I bet that will make a big improvement. Possibly the water cooling system is loud, will try to ascertain.

I did find out something interesting about the laptop - the fans on the Dell laptop only come on when the battery is charging! So there is a faint intermittent clicking noise that I doubt would even be picked up by mics when I record using battery mode.

I'll keep all this about the iPad in mind though, thanks for all the info.

Quietpc.com has some good components, next time I will build a tower myself.

[Merryband1]

"Tenderness" is just beautiful, Wen! Thank you for sharing it with Mom & me!

The tiny transmitter mic is from Radio Shack. It was part of the transmitter package I got, um, ten or so years ago... (eleven? twelve?) I also bought a couple of full-size wireless mics at the same time. About the only thing I don't like about wireless mics is their requiring batteries from time to time. Had to go buy new ones just the other day for the full-size mics, because I hadn't used them in a while. Somewhere, I'm supposed to have a track I recorded with this. I'll go look, and if I find it (and it's worth listening to), I'll upload it to Soundcloud and add a link. (And, it's terrible. I recorded it years ago as a test, and haven't rerecorded it yet. When I do, I'll post a link. )

Merry
PS I tried to upload an image, but it didn't work... Let's try this:



Aha! Yes, that worked!
Oh, and that is a different clip. It came with a matching black one, but somewhere along the line, I lost it. This clip still works, though. I put the clip of the transmitter onto the back of the harp, or down inside it, and then clip the mic around the middle hole, for the best sound.