Can I Use A Power Mac G4 400mhz For Pro Tools?, Digi 002 Options

[Mikkel]

Anyone have experience with PT on "slow" machines...?

[PristineRec]

I have been using a G4 466 running PT 5 under OS 9.1 with a Digi 001 for a few years with no problems. I have gotten up to 19 tracks (never tried any more than that) at 24 bits at 48k, along with about a dozen RTAS plugins. I record to an internal Ultra 160 SCSI drive.
If you're using the Digi 002, then you're also using OS X, which puts a bigger drain on the system than OS 9, but I can get quite a bit going on my system without choking it to death.
If you check Digidesign's website, I believe it does say that the slowest G4 that is supported to run the Digi 002 is the 733Mhz model. So officially they don't stand behind the Digi 002 running on a machine that slow, but that doesn't mean it won't work for your purposes.
It will definitely be a less than optimal system, but it's been working for me since my 466 was brand new 3 years ago.
The only time I run into trouble is trying to run too many plugins at once. That's the biggest drain on the CPU. As a workaround, I use PT to bus tracks together and into an AUX input and add the plugins (reverb is the biggest CPU hog) to the AUX input.

This post has been edited by PristineRec: Mon 26 Jan 2004, 07:18