To Mac or not to Mac?

[matto]

For my ten pence worth. Go Mac. They just work !!!!

Any experience ive ever had of PC (over the last 15 years of music making) makes me wonder how any PC developer ever survives. Driver conflicts...virus... a million third party hardware manufactures that all seem incompatible with each other.
Theres a reason pro audio and video has always been Mac, and again,,,they just work. Yes you can get a PC cheaper.But how much is your time worth? You'll spend a hundred times more hours sorting out problems on a PC than you will a Mac.

By the way you can always run any PC programs you cant live without on a Mac these days with bootcamp etc (Macs are now intel chip based and have been for a while)

If you buy a PC that's built for music you won't have any of the problems you describe and (if you buy from a reputable company) you will get much better service than you'll get from Apple.
The saying that 'there's a reason pro audio and video are Mac' may have been true 15 years ago but since then things have changed drastically and I have found my Mac using composer friends have at least the same amount of problems and crashes that I do...i.e. very very few, but not none.

Marc, I say there is no reason to switch unless you prefer Macs from a philosophy point of view (which is a perfectly fine reason). If you have a custom PC built, you can get exactly what you need, have it built as quiet as you need it, and have it tested and even have all your software loaded on it. You won't get any of that from Apple...if you wanna talk about 'what your time is worth'...

matto

[billg1]

It's really not even true to say that all pro video applications were mac, especially 10-15 yrs ago. back then when broadcast facilities demanded uncompressed video most people used Avid software on a custom built PC. Now that HD video can be captured and edited on almost any decent computer the only thing that really matters is what kind of software you prefer to use. Final Cut Pro is Mac only so if that's what you like there's no choice but IMO there is better editing software. And I'm not aware of any MAC hardware/software solution for live video switching, but I haven't kept up on the latest.

I have two custom built PCs. One was built from the ground up for uncompressed video capture/live switching and editing (cost me 6k) and the other built for $1,500 as a backup for compressed HD digital editing. I use my backup video PC also for my DAW. although both are getting pretty long in the tooth (going on 5yrs. old) I've never had a bit of trouble with either, they've been rock solid and a been a breeze to upgrade. I never put my work PCs online though, so I don't have to worry about viruses. I absolutely think MACs are better for online work, the only PC problems I've ever had were virus related. (oh, I did have to replace the power supply in my BIG system)

[marcblack30]

Yeah, most of my PC issues have been virus related, though but my internet etiquette has improved vastly over the years I still manage to get one now and again The other thing is maintenance on the tower itself, dust bunny's always find their way into mine, I've actually had a video card seize up because of dust. I went out to Best Buy today just to have a look in person at the iMac and it is simply gorgeous, I think have to make the move, if I don't do it now I probably never will, and I really want to!

[billg1]

Yup, I've been thinking that when I upgrade workstations I might go Mac for my audio (if I have the money). But it wouldn't be because I was having trouble IN PC land, it would mainly be to feel safe having a DAW that can be online. It's such a PIA not to be online, especially when authorizing software.

[orest]

The virus thing and the OS thing was the main reason I switched to Mac.
I've never liked windows and for every update I've made on a windows machine, the slower it got.
I've never experienced that on my Macs. My Mac Pro is now a bit over 3 years and it takes 15 secs to start the machine and be able to load my project.
My laptop is a PC dual core 2.0 with 4 gig of ram and it's equally old, it takes forever to start that machine and it's extremely slow to work with.

I had an iMac but I won't buy a computer like that again. The pro machines are built for pro work. It's extremely easy to upgrade/switch hardware in this one. I have 4 hard drives and 16 gig of ram and I can still upgrade the memory to 32 gig. I'm also running that machine in 64-bit mode, and it's extremely fast!

[kenneso]

I use both Mac (for music) and PC (at work). The PC is used for everything from software development to reporting using Office, and they both work satisfactory. My biggest gripe against PC is keeping track of all the drivers, it's hard make sure that every single driver is updated to the latest version all the time. On Mac this is taken care of by the regular updates, except for external gear like audio cards, midi controllers, etc but you usually don't have too many of those compared to the internal components in a PC.

Another good thing about Mac is that currently there aren't too many games available on the platform that can take your focus away from making music, but this isn't going to be the case for very long.

[Kazak]

Marc:

I have an iMac purchased in Dec 2009 and I was concerned that I was moving here to Kazakhstan where there are NO Apple Stores. The Apple store in Houston told me to contact them if I ever had any issues. I am happy to say that I have lived here for a year now and I have never had any technical issues with it. I use Garageband to do my demos, and it also is very intuitive just like they were saying. The hours you will save not having hassles is worth any extra money )

Alicia

[mojobone]

Yup, I've been thinking that when I upgrade workstations I might go Mac for my audio (if I have the money). But it wouldn't be because I was having trouble IN PC land, it would mainly be to feel safe having a DAW that can be online. It's such a PIA not to be online, especially when authorizing software.

The main reason my next machine will be a Mac Pro. That, and it's time for me to move to some truly professional DAW software. If you're a power user with multiple machines, authorizations may not be as big a hassle, (or any bigger hassle than moving a dongle) but I believe Bryan Fusilier found a guy building a real rager for cheaps, recently, if you go the custom PC route. On the PC side, nothing much ever happens that a clean re-install of the entire operating system won't fix, heh.

[fusilierb]

Yup, I've been thinking that when I upgrade workstations I might go Mac for my audio (if I have the money). But it wouldn't be because I was having trouble IN PC land, it would mainly be to feel safe having a DAW that can be online. It's such a PIA not to be online, especially when authorizing software.

The main reason my next machine will be a Mac Pro. That, and it's time for me to move to some truly professional DAW software. If you're a power user with multiple machines, authorizations may not be as big a hassle, (or any bigger hassle than moving a dongle) but I believe Bryan Fusilier found a guy building a real rager for cheaps, recently, if you go the custom PC route. On the PC side, nothing much ever happens that a clean re-install of the entire operating system won't fix, heh.

I did and I'd be happy to share his info if you want.

Just to throw my 2 cents in, I'm all mac and very happy (although I will be ordering this custom PC in the very near future as a slave). It's not just the stability and lack of worrying about viruses and all those ridiculous updates that windows constantly sends out, it's the workflow. The macs are just easier to move things around on and work with multiple apps, imo.

And yes the iMac's are gorgeous. I would hesitate to base a DAW around one mainly for expansion reason's, but they are still VERY capable machines and depending on how you record would probably make a great music machine.

[marcblack30]

On the PC side, nothing much ever happens that a clean re-install of the entire operating system won't fix, heh.

Oh believe me you, I've done my fair share of clean installs, that's one of the things I'd like to get away from! I'll be placing my order this Friday, Friday, Friday yeah!