Computer / Software

AMD's Opteron range of CPUs are popular with musicians and ready for 64-bit computing — so how does Inta Audio's Opteron PC compare with typical Intel machines?

Apple's original iMac marked the beginning of a turnaround for the company, and despite the consumer-oriented nature of the product, iMacs have found a place in many a home studio over the years. With the iMac range finally inheriting a G5 processor, have Apple created the perfect entry-level machine for demanding Mac musicians on a budget?

I'm a DJ who's looking to get into the production side of things (house and techno). I was going to opt for a PC over Mac. What should I be looking for in terms of processor speed, memory, soundcard and so on?

Computer specifications have changed radically in the three years since Carillon launched their first music PCs, but the company's signature metal rackmount case and attention to detail still sets them apart. Their powerful Core 4 machine offers support for three monitors, plus a huge 400GB RAID 0 hard drive array for audio data.

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Buying a music computer from a specialist builder is an increasingly popular option for the PC musician. We rounded up some of the leading names in music PCs to find out exactly what they offer.

My PC uses an Abit KR7A-133 motherboard running an Athlon Thoroughbred XP 2400 processor with 1GB of RAM. My motherboard manual says PCI 4 shares an IRQ with the two USB ports, and that PCI 1 shares with the AGP. My Audiophile currently has an IRQ to itself and so I'm not touching it. However, I need the TC Powercore to not share an IRQ. If anyone can explain what to do, I'd really appreciate it.

I need some way to play a stereo backing track when playing live with my band. I don't want to use a CD player, as they skip, but I'm wondering what other options are there?

Most of the major Windows sequencers now support dual processing, and if you want the ultimate performance, machines like Red Submarine's dual Xeon PC could be the way to go.

Gmedia continue their quest to render the best of the world's keyboards in software form. But will it give OSCar fans a case of the grouches?

I'm considering moving over from my current Mac setup to a PC laptop for mobile recording, using Nuendo 2 and either an RME Cardbus interface or one of MOTU's Firewire systems. Can you point me in the right direction? Is a Centrino laptop the only sensible choice for this kind of application?

Although Centrino laptops have advantages in terms of weight and battery life, standard Pentium 4 CPUs still offer the ultimate in performance, and Nu Systems's desktop replacement machine is a processing heavyweight.

Few products have been hyped as much as Apple's new G5 range of 64-bit personal computers — but how good are they for making and recording music in the real world? We test the 2GHz Dual Processor model...

More and more musicians are turning to systems based around a laptop PC, and Intel's new Pentium-M processor — as found in this model from Maxdata and SME Solutions — seems to perform well with music applications.

My guitar player's girlfriend has a four-year-old Gateway Pentium III laptop with 64MB RAM and Windows 98SE installed, and she has agreed to let me do whatever I need to so that we can use it for music. How do we wipe the thing clean and end up with Windows XP for an OS, 320MB of RAM and Emagic Logic Audio Platinum on there?