Does This Sound Like A Good Deal?

[kurtkreimier]

Hello Fellow Taxi Forum Members.I am planning on making a PC purchase within the next few days and have been checking a variety of configurations and PC makers over the last week or so. By way of background I will be running Cakewalk Sonar 6 PE, SampleTank 2XL, EWQLSO, Vienna, possibly Miroslav. The below seems to be the best value for the money I have come across but would really appreciate any suggestions. The manufacturer is a local company that has been around for at least as long as I have been here (5 years) and they seem to have a lot of happy customers. That said, they are a smaller company which is a concern to me. But they really do seem to know their stuff and have been very helpful. I on the other hand know just enough to be dangerous. So I wanted to get some feedback from others more in the know. I have also checked out Dell, VisonDAW and PC's for Everyone. I may also check out Gateway before I am done. The configured price they are offering is $1,700 as outlined below.Case - NXTZ Pro Gamer - I have several options available.Board - ASUS P5K SECPU - Intel Quad Core Q6600 2.4 X 4 8MB CacheCPU Fan - Socket 775 IntelRAM - 4GB 667Mhz Kingston DDR2Video Card - 512 8600GT NVIDEAHard Drive - 500 GB Western Digital SATA Mode *DVD - All Format DVD CD Reader WriterOperating System - Vista Premium or XP Pro - My ChoiceAVG AntiVirusMonitor - 22" ACER LCDSound Card - RealTEK HD Audio **Speakers - Genius 5.1 - 1000 Surround Sound Speakers ***Modem - If neededFloppy Drive12 Month Warranty all parts and labor2 Year Warranty on select components (Board, CPU, Hard Drive, Monitor, , etc.)14 Year Warranty on RAM* They have told me the can install two 250 GB hard drives. One for operating system, program files, etc.. and another for samples and data files should this be something I think is needed. Looking for recommendations!** Sound Card Options - Creative Sound Blaster Extreme 7.1 with 2 optical interfaces - add $60. They are telling me they can order and install any sound card I want, but it will probably cost me more money. On my current machine I have been running a Creative Audigy Sound Blaster and have been reasonably satisfied with it. I really do not know much about what is available here. I have also heard good things about the Echo Audio Gina3G. Looking for recommendations!*** Speaker Options - Logitech 7.1 Surround Sound - add $TBD. Once again I am a little in the dark on the best way to go. I'm sure they can get me anything I want but once again $'s become an issue. Looking for Recommendations! I am also thinking about keeping this machine as a totally off line machine and just using a flash drive to transfer files from this machine to my existing machine when I need to upload or download files. My only concern with going this route is keeping things like the operating system, antivirus and library updates current. Does anybody have any thoughts on this?Thanks in advance to all of you who take the time to respond to this post.Kurt

[crs7string]

Kurt,Most DAW users these days have three separate hardrives. One for the operating system, the second to record audio, the third for sample libraries. The operating system drive can be 250 and be plenty enough. As inexpensive as hard drives are these days going with 500 gig for the other two drives is not out of the question and you will most likely fill them up over time. As you stream audio and samples this configuration will be more efficient.What operating system are they going to install?The other observation, and I'm not up to date on the latest sound cards, is that the Creative sound cards seem to be more "hobby" oriented than serious professional oriented. My computer is nearly four years old, I'm using an EMU 1820m with great results. I see a new computer in the future within the next year or so and will probably do a lot of research on USB and Firewire sound cards when I upgrade.If you take the approach of this new system lasting 3 to 5 years and amortizing the cost over that period I think it makes it easier to "over buy" a system. (bigger drives, better sound card etc.)Sample libraries are bigger and cheaper by the year. I think it makes sense to have the capacity to add the most current stuff as it comes along. There is a great sense of let down when a track is returned because your sounds are "dated" ( whatever that means)Chuck

[kurtkreimier]

Hey thanks very much Chuck. After much research, budget consideration and manufacturer comparisons I have gone ahead a placed the order this morning with a custom machine builder here in my area. Here is what I am getting.Case - Custom Noise Reduction CaseBoard - ASUS P5K-E - Comes with ADI 1988B soundCPU - Intel Quad Core Q6600 2.4Ghz X 4 8MB CacheCPU Fan - Socket 775 IntelRAM - 4GB 667Mhz Kingston DDR2Video Card - 512 8600GT NVIDEAHard Drive 1 - 250 GB Western Digital SATA Mode Hard Drive 2 - 500 GB Western Digital SATA ModeDVD - All Format DVD CD Reader Writer w/LightscribeMonitor - 22" ACER LCDSound/Audio Interface - Echo Audio Gina3gSpeakers - Genius 5.1 - 1000 Surround Sound Speakers - These came with the machine but I will probably upgrade at some point to a good set of studio monitors when budget permits. In the meantime I may go ahead and use my existing Boston Acoustics BA7800 5.1 set from my existing machine.Floppy DriveOperating System - XP ProAVG AntiVirusAdware12 Month Warranty all parts and labor3 Year Warranty on select components (Board, CPU, Hard Drives, Monitor, Video Card, etc.)15 Year Warranty on RAMTotal out the door with tax was $2,213. They are telling me they will have it ready for me to pick up on Friday. Can't wait. This is going to be a huge upgrade from my 2003 Gateway. I know I could have gotten more or less. But this was the best deal I could find with the money I had to work with. Next up will be an upgrade to my EWQLSO Silver along with a couple more sample libraries. Kurt

[bigdrisk]

Looks like a very good deal to me, Kurt. Enjoy!

[nickbatzdorf]

Yup, you'll want to use your stereo speakers rather than the Frodgniq ones.

[kurtkreimier]

I finally have my new setup and have installed most of the samples and I love the machine and the sounds. I really love the EWQLSO Gold Bundle sounds but I can tell I still have much to learn in terms of tweaking things. I have been holding off on installing the Kontakt 3 since I have been seeing some issues with Sonar 6 here on the threads but I am going to go ahead with it this weekend and see how it goes. I'll also be installing the Vienna Special Edition library this weekend. It is so nice not to be getting CPU warnings and seeing little to no CPU utilization, not to mention Sonar scrolling through 4 CPU's.On the flip side I have not been able to get the Echo Audio Gina3G audio interface working. I have tried everything I can think of and even Echo Audio tech support seems stumped at this point. If I cannot get it going tomorrow it will come out and head back to the factory and I will look at something else. In the meantime the SoundMAX HD card that came with the motherboard seems to be doing a very good job.Thanks to all of you for sharing your expertise and experiences.Kurt