Re: keyboard workstation vs. controller + PC for the hobbyist composer
- From: Hank <hankyp00@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 11 Apr 2009 00:27:32 -0400
On Fri, 10 Apr 2009 10:45:21 -0500, "Rick Massey"
<seafox@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well, first off some of your numbers are a bit high. The M-Audio Keystation
Pro 88 has a good action, lots of control features, and can be had for about
three hundred and fifty bucks. From there you're in softsynth land with huge
numbers of freeware synths.
Now, your computer is going to cost a bit, but there are ways to keep that
under control as well. You don't need quad core for this, either, as a lot
of people are doing great things with single core processors. Therre are
also some pretty solid low cost programs out there, both for MIDI sequencing
and also for audio recording.
FLStudio is shaping up to be a top-notch workstation package for the
Windows platform.. more and more I see guys who were early FLStudio
users showing up on Sirius radio on the electronic music channels,
they are bigshots now, too busy to post on the boards and talk to us
hobbyists :) Honestly FLStudio may not be the best choice for all
music types but it is an extremely powerful, capable DAW, and as a
host just might be the best for ease of use. You can get the low-end
versions for $50 or so and (I think?) upgrade at any time. Once
bought you never pay for upgrades and the upgrades are quite
worthwhile. It has morphed from a toy into a serious music production
tool.
Its true that you don't have to spend a lot on a PC to run it, and
generally speaking you will get more bang for your buck by going for
clock speed more than mutliple cores. It does appear to take good
advantage of mutl-threading with regarding to loading up more VSTs,
however the mixer thread won't so this is likely to be your biggest
bottleneck.
When it comes to CPU, more is better of course but the component you
don't want to skimp on is the sound card (don't get on-board audio).
You don't need to spend a lot of money there, but be sure to get one
with AISO drivers for low latency between the controller. 4ms-6ms is a
typical setting I use. I just use a Creative X-FI but I might go for
something different if I were recording vocals or guitar. It works
fine for my use and there's no difference in the final .mp3 output
from my card or a better one.
The other consideration is that most people do more with a PC than
just music, so by investing there you are getting much more than just
a musical instrument, you're buying a tool that lets you get many
kinds of work done faster. Everytime I upgrade to a new PC
(approximately every 3 years or so) I am wowed by the productivity
gains, even in areas where they don't seem to make sense. You'd think
surfing the net is largely limited by your internet connection but on
a faster PC everything is more responsive, even if only because the
page renders to the browser quicker... you just get from point A to
point B faster, and in music that means ideas flow from your head to
the track faster with a faster PC.
.
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