New haswell macbook for recording? (Hope this doesn't turn into Mac vs PC again :p)

A

adildo

Inspired
Hey guys just saved up enough to buy a computer. And after reading thru my earlier post about which computer to get, I am leaning towards Mac. To experiment with using it live w/ableton push etc and for recording at home as well.

Now, the new 13" haswell mbp comes with either 128 GB or 256 GB ssd and they are non upgradeable unless I spend 1k extra to upgrade to the 500 GB ver. :(

My question is - is it possible to use the 256gb version for recording with an external drive or should I spend more for the 500 GB version :( or just get the old 13 inch?

Also Has anyone bought these yet ?

Thanks!




Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk
 
Really depends on how may tracks you will be recording. 256 can go quick and depending on how plugins, samples and what not you have. Two drives will generally give you better performance. One for the OS and apps and the other for your data. I have run Cubase on a 5 year old Macbook Pro with one drive and had no problems. I generally only have a dozen or so tracks.
 
I use a PC or laptop for recording. The latter has a 256 GB SSD for the OS, Cubase and some VSTs I frequently use. The rest is on an external HDD connected via USB 3. It works fine. I'd suggest you did the same with either USB 3 or Thunderbolt-HDDs. Do not spend the money on that rip-off 500 GB-SSD upgrade.
 
I love both my iMac and new(ish) Macbook Pro. Why not just go for a new early 2013 MBP, upgrade it till your wallet turns to dust and get your money's worth? IMO, the benefits of using a Retina model do not outweigh the losses incurred from being held over a barrel by Apple and their absurd premiums on arbitrary and over priced upgrades.

Plus, Mavericks ain't all that, unless you have to record via USB with the Axe.
 
i currently use a 2012 13" retina MBP and it's great. the graphics card is a bit lacking for raw power, but for editing anything visual like photos and video, the retina screen is by FAR better than the non retina screens. i don't even use it in "retina" mode - i use the largest resolution possible for more screen space. the contrast and color is so much better.

i also like that there are no moving drives - all flash based so i can lift it and swing it around or whatever without worrying about skipping a drive. it's the base model but with 8 gigs of RAM instead of 4. the 128GB hard drive makes it tough to be my only computer (i use an iMac as well), so i really keep limited files on the thing.

i've done many 16 track recording sessions with only the internal drive and the quality of the recording was never affected. i recently did another recording for 7 hours with 16 tracks and used an external thunderbolt drive with the same results.

that sucks about the haswell macs... i would love to eventually upgrade to a 15" retina, but starting at $2600 for the discrete graphics is a bit tough. i do miss my 17" mbp!
 
As some of the others have said: I still think the best bang-for-your-buck is going to be an older MBPro with a spinning drive. Upgrade it to and SSD + HD setup. There's a lot of years in a setup like that, the SSD will keep it running snappy and the HD will give you the built-in space you're going to need for tracking audio. No external drive necessary.

You lose out on the retina graphics, but it's not the end of the world. Especially considering you can get a tricked out 2012 MBPro like this for ~$1500 bucks all in with the upgrades.
 
iaresee said:
As some of the others have said: I still think the best bang-for-your-buck is going to be an older MBPro with a spinning drive. Upgrade it to and SSD + HD setup. There's a lot of years in a setup like that, the SSD will keep it running snappy and the HD will give you the built-in space you're going to need for tracking audio. No external drive necessary.

You lose out on the retina graphics, but it's not the end of the world. Especially considering you can get a tricked out 2012 MBPro like this for ~$1500 bucks all in with the upgrades.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply ? Do u mean fusion drive ? Half Ata and half ssd? Because that's only available for the Mac mini :(
The only cost effective option from the website is to get the non retina mbp and 1 tb of serial ata. Would that be oK ?
 
adildo said:
Thanks for the reply ? Do u mean fusion drive ? Half Ata and half ssd? Because that's only available for the Mac mini :(
The only cost effective option from the website is to get the non retina mbp and 1 tb of serial ata. Would that be oK ?
Click to expand...

You can put dual drives in any MacBook Pro that has both a hard drive and a SuperDrive bay. So any of those models. You can set it up as a fusion drive, so it appears as one logical drive to the OS if you want. Or you can run it as a two drive setup with your OS and apps on the SSD and your audio tracks on the HD.
 
iaresee said:
You can put dual drives in any MacBook Pro that has both a hard drive and a SuperDrive bay. So any of those models. You can set it up as a fusion drive, so it appears as one logical drive to the OS if you want. Or you can run it as a two drive setup with your OS and apps on the SSD and your audio tracks on the HD.
Click to expand...

Really ? Hm. Just pmed you for more info on how to do this
 
You have replace the Optical drive with an optibay enclosure to install a second HD or SSD. I have an early 2013 MBP with 2 512Gb Samsung 840 Pro SSD's and 16Gb of Crucial RAM. It smokes my IMac. SSD's baby, that where the speed is at. With a little creative Terminal coding I removed the block that Apple has on models that come with a DVD drive ass stock, because only MacBook Air and Retina models are supposed use the USB Super Drive. I haven't configured my system to a Fusion setup, because using 2 SSD's kinda defeats the purpose. It hella quick though. Boot up time is 6/7 seconds from a standing start and apps open in a "flash" (geddit?)
 
This seems pretty technical . hope I don't fuck up when doing it . after seeing all the posts , I decided to go with the non retina mbp and maybe 1tb serial ata (if I don't do the mod) and 8gb ram. Thanks very much for all the info guys :)

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk
 
There are no bad options. I think the retina graphics resolution is not that big of a deal. I'd much rather have a 15" MBP than a 13" with retina graphics. DAW programs need a lot of screen real estate. If you spend most of your time hooked up to an external monitor it doesn't matter that much anyway. I ditched the SuperDrive in my early 2011 15" MBP and installed a 500 GB 7200 RPM drive for audio (not a simple retrofit but with care a manageable DIY project). Works great but note that a) more heat is generated and less ventilated since you cover the DVD slot and the fan runs constantly and b) it draws the battery down faster. I haven't gone to SSDs yet so I'm looking forward to that performance boost but even with mechanical drives my system provides ample horse power. I recommend Oyen Digital for drives, especially if you are getting the enclosure. They provide solutions optimized for pro audio and video with Oxford chipsets and so on. They've never let me down.
 
Running 2 SSD's, I've noticed that whilst my machine is virtually cool all the time, it does draw more power from having both drives active. Worth it in my opinion.
 
I have the new macbook pro 15# Haswell
In cubase I have input latency around 10ms...output around 17ms. For some reason the in and out latency drops to around 7 ms.
So for me this isnt a problem as I never use the internal speakers other than for playback.
 
A few important points here

Regarding the Haswell MBP, there is only latency issues when using the build in audio (speakers), with headphones or an external sound card / interface (like the Axe II) there is no problems - I would think all serious users will monitor thorugh an external sound card and not on the build in speakers of the MBP - no??

The new rMBP's have a better i/o feature set with 2 Thunderbolt ins, USB 3.0's and HDMI, which will come in handy now but even more so in the future. All IMHO and YMMV.

While the early MBP updated will be a smoking machine, IMO the build in 5400-rpm hard drive isn't any good for recording and mixing.
On my old early 2011 MBP 15" 2.2GHZ i7 with 8 GB RAM, I had a lot of issues because the 5400-rpm HD was simply to slow.
So I'd advice you to go with 7200-rpm or even better SSD's

/RB
 
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