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Posted by: Philosorhymes Thu 19 Jul 2007, 10:07

Hi all, I would like to purchase one of the new macs (I am not yet sure if it will be a pro or normal macbook) but I would eventually be putting some big sample libraries from Native Instrument on the drives.

I have a question though, Which would be faster, between these two configurations below


1) Upgrading my macbook or (macbook pro), to a 7200rpm drive and installing my libraries on this OR

2) Leaving the standard drive in my macbook (or macbook pro) and getting an external Bus powered Firewire Drive and installing my libraries on this. (The external will be 5400rpm).


The idea is that I carry minimal bulk so I do not really want to get an external 7200rpm drive as all these require power supplies which are normally fairly bulky.


Many Thanks in advance.

Posted by: gdoubleyou Thu 19 Jul 2007, 20:19

Even if you max out your RAM OSX will allways use part of your system disk for virtual memory.

So you don't want to be streaming samples, doing plaback and recording from your system disk, i suggest an external 7200rpm firewire drive.

Posted by: lepetitmartien Fri 20 Jul 2007, 02:45

If you're going further than a few tracks at the same time and you stream samples, you'll NEED the external drive.

And I think too that the 7200 external firewire drive will be mandatory.

Note that the new big 2.5" drives of 200-250 GB are fast nearly as a 7200, so maybe it'll be a good solution one day with an external enclosure.

Posted by: Philosorhymes Fri 20 Jul 2007, 11:35

Thanks Guys, this haas been helpful,

Would I lose a lot of performance by havng a 5400rpm instead of a 7200 rpm external drive. The only reason I am hesistant to get a 7200rpm is that because they require the extra power supply, which is a bit of a pain to log around.

I will not really be doing much recording to my external drives, really it would be sample streaming. I may do the occasional 'recording' but probably not frequently.

Also, can I upgrade the normal macbook (NOT macbook pro) to a 7200rpm disk? They don't seem to offer this upgrade online and I am wondering if there is possibly a problem with overheating or something?


Many Thanks in Adavance.


Phil

Posted by: lepetitmartien Fri 20 Jul 2007, 12:45

Macbooks get hot already with 5400 drives, it's only a bit worse with a 7200.

The question of external drives for laptops will be fully addressed only when flash drives will really come in.

Posted by: imhookt1 Fri 20 Jul 2007, 18:00

I found that by using the external firewire is definitely better to run the application from and you really don't need those wallwarts they get there power right from the computer itself, but do make sure your computer has access to a power source, keep that plugged in all the time your running your external 'cause the externals use up the computers battery in a hurry. Get an external that has system boot compatibility if your going this route. I have my protools app. on both drives I switch between the two the 7200rpm's is what my externals all have so I really couldn't help you on that, my logical guess would be the higher rpm. should run faster, but I do suggest go the higher buffer as that too will help your performance and get as much ram for your macbook hope this helps, happy musicmaking www.michaelthehookdeutsch.com check my documentary you'll dig it. the"Hook"

Posted by: charlzz Sat 21 Jul 2007, 20:52

Posted by: charlzz Sat 21 Jul 2007, 21:19

5400 is fine if you're only recording up to 8 tracks at a time to an internal or external drive. If you record to the internal drive, you need to partition it with a seperate partition for the audio tracks. And, you should defragment that partition before you start recording.

But, the standard proceedure is to record audio tracks to an external FW400 drive 7200rpm. If you have a huge sample library, it should go on a third external 7200.

If you check out Digidesign requirements, for example. They won't even talk to you in tech support if you're not using this configuration. If you're not using an external FireWire 400, 7200rpm, 8MB cache drive, then you're just asking for an inconsistent recording experience. If you're recording something important, do you really want to risk audio dropout? And if you're using a FireWire interface, you must get a FireWire 400 drive that has two FW400 jacks on it and plug the drive into the computer first and the interface into the drive. The FireWire400 drive should also use the Oxford911 bridge chip. (The new triple or quadruple interface drives only have one FW400 jack)

Here is the info straight from Digidesign:

To date only FireWire drives with the following specifications have performed well with Pro Tools systems:
7200 RPM drive
FireWire 400 drives with the Oxford 911 FireWire chipset interface
FireWire 400 drives with the Oxford 912 or 924 FireWire chipset interface
FireWire 800 drives with the Oxford 912 or 924 FireWire chipset interface
FireWire 400 and FireWire 800 drives should not be combined
Check with the drive manufacturer to verify that their drive has the "Oxford 911", "Oxford 912", "Oxford 924" or comparable chipset & drive speed of 7200 rpm