Tweaking Your Music Computer

Page 2

page 1 2 3

by Rich the TweakMeister

Note: This page is dated; info is old.

So How much is all this going to Cost? Most important of course is which
Tweak's EZ processor (CPU) are you going
to buy. AMD and Intel are the two
Guide major options.
figuring
Generally, the cost of upgrading CPU and RAM and Don't think that an Athlon XP 2100
Motherboard can be anywhere between $400 and $800
out what means it is 2.1 ghz. Here's how
depending on the components you choose. The latest you need AMD interprets the clock frequency
CPUs are always going to be expensive but the one's spec:
that came out last year are usually very reasonable.
3700+ operates at a frequency of 2.4Ghz
3400+ operates at a frequency of 2.2Ghz
3000+ operates at a frequency of 2.0Ghz
Where does on find out more information on 2100+ operates at a frequency of 1.73GHz.
motherboards, CPUs and memory? 2000+ operates at a frequency of 1.67GHz.
1900+ operates at a frequency of 1.6GHz.
1800+ operates at a frequency of 1.533GHz.
Of course, you should check out The BUZZ on this site 1600+ operates at a frequency of 1.40GHz.
so you can tailor your newsgroup searches like I did for
But this does not mean that an Athlon 3400+ is equivalent to a
the above results. On the Web, a place I go for info on
Pentium 4 2.4 Ghz. We have been conditioned to think that way by
stuff is Tom's hardware guide is also a good place on the the years of Intel's domination over the CPU. Clock speed does not
net to educate yourself on these issues. You can get VIA tell the whole story. It's more a matter of how much work the CPU
drivers and great MOBO info fromViahardware.com In can do in an interval of time.
addition to having great information, there is a message
1. What type of RAM do you want? Always a great
board where thousands of users post their experiences
idea to buy RAM matched for the motherboard. I
with varied hardware configurations. There are plenty of
suggest you not try to deviate from the specs on the
pics of building computers from scratch. motherboard.

Which OS? 2. How many slots for PCi cards do you need? One
cool thing is that many MOBOs now come with onboard
Firewire, USB2, Ethernet. This may replace some of
Windows 98SE or Windows 2000 or Win XP, or Vista your old PCI cards, so you may not need as many slots.
32 or 64? Wait till Windows 7? If you have an older ISA card you need to use, note that
updated April 2, 2005
98SE? Is this a joke? It wasn't when I first wrote the
question when Microsoft released XP, on October 25th,
2001. W2k and XP have proved to be a much more
stable and robust platform for running sequencers,
software samplers, and audio editing programs than 98
ever was. If you ask me whether you should go with
Win2k or XP, I say XP. Win98SE is dead. Cubase SX and
Sonar 4 all work great on XP now. New drivers have
been written, tested, and released. Win 2k remains a
viable platform, though I think it's best for corporate
environments.
I'd stick with XP, then re-evaluate when Win 7 has been out a year.
And you can read more about this in my article on
upgrading to Win XP A
today's motherboards no longer support them. I
recommend you dig a little hole in the yard and say a
prayer for any ISA cards you have. They have no
business being in a fast computer. Just by sitting there
they might slow the machine down.
3. What Chipset do you prefer? Always best to go
to Google and type the following once you have a
configuration in mind.
Problems AND [name of soundcard] AND [name of
chipset]
4. Do you want to Overclock? Should you
Overclock? Note that you will have to take extra
precautions to cool the CPU if you decide to overclock,
and you may trade off stability for speed. In the
balance, for now, considering today's prices, I'd say
don't overclock. Just get a fast CPU and fast RAM.

64 Bit OS are not far away but don't bleed on the 5. Other things that vary from board to board are the
edge. type of hard drives you can install. Some go with
the ATA (IDE) style drives and others with the
newer Serial ATA with its smaller connector. If you are
Tweak's Spin: Soon a 64 bit version of Windows will be going to be bringing over your old drives make sure it
released. You might want to get a CPU that can handle has the right drive slots.
64 bit operation. The main advantage, once the new
Windows version is released will be greater memory. If you have gone through all of these items, there
The old barriers will be shattered and it will soon be should be only 1 or 2 motherboard/memory
conceivable to run softsamplers with a terrabyte of combinations to choose from. Congratulations. You
memory (that's 1,000 gigabytes). This will mean even should now know what you want.
larger virtual studios will be possible at extremely high audio resolutions. Let's hope the soundcard makers
can keep up! While there may be plenty of compatibility issues at first, once they are ironed out we will find
a much more powerful and stable platform for our work.

Go to Page 3 to see an upgrade in progress

page 1 2 3

Hooking Up Audio
MIDI Basics
The Many Functions of MIDI Data
The Audio Interface
Signal Flow Computer-based Studio
Signal Flow of an MPC Hip Hop Studio
Signal Flow of a MultiTrack Studio
Assembling Your Studio Rig
Studio setup in a Nutshell
5 Hot Tips
Building a Quiet Room
Understanding MIDI Interfaces
The War on Hum
Multiple Video Displays
Latency and how to Deal
Word Clock
TimeCode
Everything About Cables
Digital Audio Converters
Bit Depth and Sample Rate
Studio Monitors
Impedance for Musicicans
How to setup a Patchbay
Room Acoustics Basics
Studio Monitors Price List
Acoustic Products
Catalog of MIDI Interfaces