Okay, here's what I've decided [Archive]

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folk prophet

08-19-2003, 01:00 PM

I\'m going to get the following at the end of this week (probably Fri.)

Garritan Strings Giga Bundle
Sam Horns and Bones
Westgate Woodwinds

This I\'ll combine with Sam free trumpets and Timpani, and use other percussion samples I already own (Proteus 2 sounds and other\'s I\'ve collected over the years, mostly as SF2s.)

Of course, when Sam trumpets (commercial) comes out I\'ll get that as well.

That should give me pretty much the full orchestra for a reasonable starting price.

Then, in 3 or 4 months, when I have more money, I\'ll upgrade my percussion with London Orchestral Percussion, and I\'ll get VOTA for voice stuff.

Ultimately, I decided that VSL was just WAY out of my price range...although that would be my first choice were money not an option (supplemented, of course, with Sam Horns.) And I\'d still love to get VSL in the future.

But I think the way I\'ve chosen will give me what I need in the most cost efficient way.

Now, as far as hardware goes, I\'ll upgrade the RAM a bit for my PC at home. But I won\'t be at home much. My new school schedule will keep me away from 6:00 in the morning to 7:00 at night on a few days. So I\'ve decided to go for a portable option. Here\'s what I\'m getting:

Dell P4 2.6 Ghz w/ 512ram. External HD w/ firewire and the Echo Indigo sound card. I may spring for the 3Ghz but it\'ll cost me a few hundred extra.

Anyhow, I\'ve pretty much dug into this idea. But please feel free to let me know if anyone thinks I\'m making a perilous mistake in any regard. And then we can argue about it some. And who knows, maybe I\'ll change my mind. images/icons/smile.gif

Needless to say, whatever I decide, I\'m just about crapping my pants with excitement to get into it all. images/icons/grin.gif

Gary M. Thomas

08-19-2003, 01:08 PM

Hello Folk Prophet, I wish you the best of luck with your endeavors. It sounds like you\'re ready to take-off! Just a side comment.... you cannot go wrong with Sam Horns! They\'re really great! images/icons/wink.gif Gary

folk prophet

08-19-2003, 01:12 PM

Originally posted by Gary M. Thomas:
Hello Folk Prophet, I wish you the best of luck with your endeavors. It sounds like you\'re ready to take-off! Just a side comment.... you cannot go wrong with Sam Horns! They\'re really great! images/icons/wink.gif Gary I LOVE what I\'ve heard or them. I\'m definately hooked. Whatever I decided, I\'d get Sam Horns too. images/icons/smile.gif Actually, I kind of decided that I couldn\'t really go wrong with any of my top choices, which is why I decided to go with the cheapest way.

Alan Russell

08-19-2003, 02:14 PM

Folk Prophet,

sounds nice..I am looking at the DELL 3.20 GHZ but I would recommend that you really RAM it up here..

I\'d go from 1.5 to 2 Gigs on the RDRAM or equiv..
512 Ram is tight but you need more to run these work horses IMHO..

Did you consider a dedicated drive fot your libraries..this is a must!

wishing you the best - stay in touch!

Alan Russell

folk prophet

08-19-2003, 02:20 PM

Originally posted by Alan Russell:
Folk Prophet,

sounds nice..I am looking at the DELL 3.20 GHZ but I would recommend that you really RAM it up here..

I\'d go from 1.5 to 2 Gigs on the RDRAM or equiv..
512 Ram is tight but you need more to run these work horses IMHO..

Did you consider a dedicated drive fot your libraries..this is a must!

wishing you the best - stay in touch!

Alan Russell I\'m not sure I\'ll have the money to go with that much RAM upfront. I\'ll certainly try and upgrade later. But I\'ll look into it for sure.

The implication of a firewire external drive was meant to be that it would be dedicated. The laptop itself would have a 30gig drive from which I\'d run the sequencer. The firewire drive would be dedicated strictly to sounds.

Thanks

Francis Belardino

08-19-2003, 02:39 PM

Don\'t forget

1 drive for system

1 drive for audio

1 drive for Giga

I use 3 USB 2.0 drives for Giga and they smoke!!!

I like them better than my firewire drives (very quite) and cost less

Simon Ravn

08-19-2003, 02:47 PM

USB/FireWire drives are the exact same IDE drives as you would use internally in your PC, just with a converter controller inside the case, and they have slightly higher seek times than regular IDE drives due to that extra interface.

Francis Belardino

08-19-2003, 02:49 PM

USB (Firewire) hard drive is breakthrough for money conscious people searching for high quality backup solutions. USB (Firewire) hard drives combine the large capacity of the normal IDE hard drives and the convenience, wide availability, and fast data speed of USB (Firewire) interface. The actually cost is lower than tap backup due to the fact that no additional device required for its\' operation, while the data speed is much faster, the job which take tap backup a few hours will take USB (Firewire) hard drive only a few minutes.

JonP

08-19-2003, 02:49 PM

Does anybody not have SAM libraries?!!!. They are amazing and definitely a great choice for anybody\'s collection. I CANNOT wait for the Trumpets to appear images/icons/smile.gif

Francis Belardino

08-19-2003, 02:50 PM

hence USB 2.0 or Firewire interface is the better choice. USB 2.0 have the advantage of being downward compatible with USB port, and a higher theoretical maximum data transfer speed, in reality, Firewire interface still works faster

folk prophet

08-19-2003, 02:51 PM

Originally posted by Francis Belardino:
Don\'t forget

1 drive for system

1 drive for audio

1 drive for Giga

I use 3 USB 2.0 drives for Giga and they smoke!!!

I like them better than my firewire drives (very quite) and cost less Hmmm. That\'s the second USB suggestion I\'ve gotten. I thought speed on the drive was imperative and that firewire was faster. I\'ll check into USB drives though.

As far as the 3 drives thing goes, well, I\'m trying to go cost effective for now. So maybe I\'ll add a USB drive later. But for now, just the internal and one external. Unless you actually say that WON\'T work.

Francis Belardino

08-19-2003, 02:54 PM

It will work.

3 drives is just best for performance. I am sure some will jump to disagree but I know many high-end Giga users with this setup. Hence why I have it images/icons/smile.gif

I am lucky enough to have great an understanding wife images/icons/smile.gif and now have 3 PC\'s (Dells)

audio/internet
Giga
Video

folk prophet

08-19-2003, 03:06 PM

Originally posted by Francis Belardino:
It will work.

3 drives is just best for performance. I am sure some will jump to disagree but I know many high-end Giga users with this setup. Hence why I have it images/icons/smile.gif

I am lucky enough to have great an understanding wife images/icons/smile.gif and now have 3 PC\'s (Dells)

audio/internet
Giga
Video My wife is understanding. My bank is not. images/icons/smile.gif

Jamie Haggerty

08-19-2003, 03:08 PM

Originally posted by folk prophet:
I\'ll check into USB drives though.Just be sure you realize he is talking about USB 2.0 and not USB 1.0. There is quite a bit difference in speed between the two.
Cheers,
J

timzydee

08-19-2003, 03:10 PM

Glad you\'re interested in the woodwinds. By the way, I\'ve used a single drive for Giga sounds and Audio with very few problems.

Simon Ravn

08-19-2003, 03:23 PM

Originally posted by Francis Belardino:
USB (Firewire) hard drive is breakthrough for money conscious people searching for high quality backup solutions. USB (Firewire) hard drives combine the large capacity of the normal IDE hard drives and the convenience, wide availability, and fast data speed of USB (Firewire) interface. Not quite sure what you mean there, but FireWire/USB2 is not as fast as IDE.

folk prophet

08-19-2003, 03:24 PM

Originally posted by Simon Ravn:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Francis Belardino:
USB (Firewire) hard drive is breakthrough for money conscious people searching for high quality backup solutions. USB (Firewire) hard drives combine the large capacity of the normal IDE hard drives and the convenience, wide availability, and fast data speed of USB (Firewire) interface. Not quite sure what you mean there, but FireWire/USB2 is not as fast as IDE. <hr /></blockquote>But is it faster than a Laptop drive would be? I was under the impression that laptop drives were slower...hence the external drive theory. Or is that just to have a dedicated drive?

Francis Belardino

08-19-2003, 04:20 PM

Where did I say that, Simon?

Does not say it\'s faster then anything --- just says they are fast and they are and we know that so....

Let\'s just say it plain

USB 2.0 rocks
and so does Firewire.

I use both

USB 2.0 for Giga
Firewire x2 for video (video is a space eater)

The end images/icons/smile.gif

KingIdiot

08-19-2003, 05:08 PM

USB2/Firewire should be fine for Giga, they\'ll prolly suck for anything that can do more than 160 voices.

JonFairhurst

08-19-2003, 10:41 PM

Some time ago I read a review that found that Firewire drives were faster than expected, since they impose less load on the processor than IDE or SCSI. And USB 2.0 didn\'t keep up, but the controller chips may have improved since then.

The one problem with 1394/USB is that they don\'t provide enough juice to run the drives on the laptop battery. So, unless you buy a big battery for your drives, you\'ll need access to the old AC to run your setup. Regardless, it should be a nice, portable system.

HiRez

08-20-2003, 07:52 AM

Originally posted by folk prophet:
Hmmm. That\'s the second USB suggestion I\'ve gotten. I thought speed on the drive was imperative and that firewire was faster. I\'ll check into USB drives though.FireWire has a slightly higher theoretical bandwidth (~480 Mbps) compared to USB 2.0 (~400mbps), but it\'s unlikely you\'ll be coming anywhere close to saturating it because most hard drives can\'t access and transfer data that fast anyway. I wouldn\'t worry about it; chose whichever one is more cost-effective for you. I recommend NOT daisy-chaining other devices off it though—use a separate port for that. What you want is a fast hard drive, 7,200 rpm, preferably one marked as an \"A/V\" drive (this means it\'s built to reliably stream data on and off at a continuous rate, which is essentially what you\'re doing with a streaming sampler). Look for low seek and access times (given in milliseconds), although these numbers are easily manipulated so that\'s only one thing to look for. There are a few 10,000+ rpm drives but they are very expensive and a good 7,200 drive should do fine for you. For reference, most laptop drives are 4,200 rpm, with a few now 5,400 rpm, generally too slow for streaming massive amounts of data.

You can partition your drive when you format it and dedicate just one partition to samples or even make multiple partitions for multiple sample libraries, as well as some for any other data you want. Disk partitions are treated as independent drives, so they can be erased and defragmented separately without affecting the others. This would allow you to store different kinds of data on the same drive without getting them all intermingled (bad). The only bad thing is that to change the size or number of partitions on the disk, you must erase the entire disk, so make sure you think it through before you set it up and leave some breathing room.

As for RAM, it\'s probably the cheapest way you can improve your machine. I\'d take the $ you saved by not springing for the slightly faster processor and invest that in RAM. Usually you get screwed when you buy RAM from the same people selling you the computer, though. It\'s not unusual for them to charge 5x-10x the price you could pay to buy and install it yourself. Check http://www.ramseeker.com (\"http://www.ramseeker.com\") to get the lowest prices. I\'ve always gone with thrid-party, mail-order RAM and never once had a problem with it. When you buy the laptop, though, make sure you understand the configuration of the RAM, and how many and what type of slots you have, and how many will be left open. For example, if you order one with 512 MB, they\'ll likely fill both slots (1-2 is typical with portables) with a 256 MB chip each. This means if you ever want to upgrade, you have to throw out at least 256 MB to add more...bummer. Instead, in this case you might ask to have a single 512 MB in only one slot, leaving one open.

Good luck!

christianb

08-20-2003, 08:21 AM

HiRez,
I\'m fairly sure you have those specs backwards: fire wire=400, usb=480. I\'m wondering however why firewire 800 has not made it\'s way into this discussion.

christianb

compozed

08-20-2003, 10:06 AM

I hesitate to write this, but in looking at your shopping list, I would consider Sonic Implant strings over Garritan. I would say that in the 20 years I\'ve made a living in this business, buying the Garritan strings is the poorest purchase decision I\'ve made. I spent $1000 for something that after a year of trying, I only use for a couple of patches occasionally. The problem? They (more specifically the violins) just don\'t sound good. IMO

I\'m sure others have a different opinion and I don\'t mean to bash a product. I\'m just letting you know that if I were to do this again I would make a different decision.

Netvudu

08-20-2003, 10:11 AM

I don´t see why you should hesitate to write that seeing how you already stated clearly that you´re just giving your personal opinion.

Francis Belardino

08-20-2003, 10:19 AM

Francis Belardino

08-20-2003, 10:47 AM

Sharmy ...

I love the sound on Kaveh\'s A&E demo.

I\'ve been meaning to ask him ho \"out of the box\" is that sound or what.

It\'s really beautiful and warm. Nohting harsh about it.

folk prophet

08-20-2003, 12:23 PM

Originally posted by compozed:
I hesitate to write this, but in looking at your shopping list, I would consider Sonic Implant strings over Garritan. I would say that in the 20 years I\'ve made a living in this business, buying the Garritan strings is the poorest purchase decision I\'ve made. I spent $1000 for something that after a year of trying, I only use for a couple of patches occasionally. The problem? They (more specifically the violins) just don\'t sound good. IMO

I\'m sure others have a different opinion and I don\'t mean to bash a product. I\'m just letting you know that if I were to do this again I would make a different decision. As Sharmy suggested, it\'s the bundle that sold me on it.

SI: $995 + Giga: $699 --- $1694
Garritan Bundle: --- $1100

That\'s 600 bucks more toward eating the next few months. images/icons/smile.gif (Or toward more RAM or something.)

And, from the listening I\'ve done via demos, it seems that the real weakness (if it can be called that) of GS vs SI or VSL is in sweeping, warm, legato writing. I do write that way sometimes...but usually unison with other parts...trumpet, flutes, horns (at the octave) or something...which would hide the strings a bit. I never write for strings alone. Its just not my thing.

Normally my writing is exceedingly brass heavy, with strings used to add warmth and variety -- or -- as counterpoint or fills in the form of arpeggios, runs, or other bouncing aggressive parts. As I understand it (and from the demos) Garritan works wonderfully well in this regard. It does seem brighter in tone than the others...but for how I primarilly use strings, that\'s good.

If I consider the bundle price with the full amount applied to Giga as it would be, I get the strings for $401. That ain\'t too bad for a full string set, even if it ends up in later years not being my primarilly used collection.

Any other thoughts in this regard?

HiRez

08-20-2003, 03:50 PM

Originally posted by christianb:
I\'m fairly sure you have those specs backwards: fire wire=400, usb=480. I\'m wondering however why firewire 800 has not made it\'s way into this discussion.Oops, yes you are correct, Christian. I still believe FireWire has slightly better throughput though in real-world conditions though (http://www.thetechzone.com/display.php?i=227&p=3 for example), but they are both fairly comparable in a single-device setup. A few drives even have both interfaces on them. One place where FireWire will be faster is transferring data from one device to another. USB 2.0 has to send the data to the CPU, and then back to the other device, whereas FireWire can send the data directly point-to-point with no intervention from the CPU.

As for FireWire 800, yes it screams, but I believe Prophet said he was looking for a PC setup, and I have not yet seen FW 800 available on anything but Macs. Also you need a very fast (and hence probably not really cheap) HD to take advantage of it. 800 mbps....mmmm.....dooooooonuts......

HiRez

08-20-2003, 04:10 PM

Originally posted by Eric Doggett:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />You can partition your drive when you format it and dedicate just one partition to samples or even make multiple partitions for multiple sample libraries, as well as some for any other data you want. Disk partitions are treated as independent drives, so they can be erased and defragmented separately without affecting the others.
I would lean against doing this. You end up with multiple virtual drives, yes, but it\'s still one physical drive. It will not be any faster because it\'s partitioned as such. Plus, you open the opportunity to have everything lost if that one drive fails. Not to mention paging, etc, and other OS operations that would hamper your ability to get samples playing as quickly as you need them.
Get a second drive, move the samples to that drive. Performance will be better. And safer.<hr /></blockquote>In a partitioned setup, I was assuming nothing else on the disk (any partition) would be accessed while streaming samples. Nothing the OS or another app might be using. Just a convenience if you can\'t afford multiple drives or don\'t want to carry them all around (remember, he is getting a portable setup and more drives means more space, more weight, more noise, more heat, more power supply bricks, more cables). So for example, I might put some documentation PDFs on another partition, or use one for a 3D render scratch disk, just not if I\'m using the sampler. In an ideal world, sure, everything would be on a dedicated disk, and if you can afford to, it\'s obviously the way to go. Maybe Prophet can fit everything he needs on his internal 30 GB, but I found my own 40 GB internal drive filled up very quickly and hence, I started needing external storage for things (my external 120 GB is getting full now as well). But as I said, I do dedicate partitions to specific things, and generally only use one partition at a time, especially for performance-critical apps.

Mrbits

08-20-2003, 05:11 PM

USB2 and Firewire are okay as long as they\'re built into the motherboard. Otherwise the bandwidth of USB2 / Firewire hard drives is brought down by the plodding 133MBps PCI bus, especially if you already have a ATA133 Hard drive whizzing away on it. Even Intel\'s much awaited 3GIO spec will only give throughput of around 250-500MBps which, by the time several high speed devices are attached will also suffer. So, if you plan on using USB or Firewire drives, make sure the ports are wired into the motherboard and NOT just on PCI cards

RichB

Eric Doggett

08-20-2003, 11:17 PM

You can partition your drive when you format it and dedicate just one partition to samples or even make multiple partitions for multiple sample libraries, as well as some for any other data you want. Disk partitions are treated as independent drives, so they can be erased and defragmented separately without affecting the others.
I would lean against doing this. You end up with multiple virtual drives, yes, but it\'s still one physical drive. It will not be any faster because it\'s partitioned as such. Plus, you open the opportunity to have everything lost if that one drive fails. Not to mention paging, etc, and other OS operations that would hamper your ability to get samples playing as quickly as you need them.
Get a second drive, move the samples to that drive. Performance will be better. And safer.

Eric

Francis Belardino

08-20-2003, 11:27 PM

see? told ya images/icons/smile.gif

Wait a sec. Eric? Are you \" \" me?
Look up a post or two. images/icons/smile.gif