Apple Macbook Pro question

[beej]

I would guess the same as everybody else - external drives and/or CD'sDVD's...

[Nonplus]

Stop reading now! Just listen to audiorules, who knows more about this topic than anyone else.

PS - Audiorules -- open Activity Monitor or run iostat on your macbook pro or whatever you use, then rationalize why you never get anywhere near 400MB/s in any application ever.

[audiorules]

Nonplus, grow up.

Educate yourself on the various particulars of the protocols. We all know an internal SATA or even ATA drive is going to be more efficient than a FW or USB drive, but it's not what your tests don't show is the difference in track or plugin counts when using a second physical drive for audio, which is known to lessen the load on the system drive, and yield a higher track and plugin count. Basic audio 101. Not to mention that a second drive is not an option internally in a laptop.

I never said I know more about this topic than anyone else, but I surely know more than you dude.

[Sascha Franck]

And you use what to back your audio up?

External harddisks. To hell with CDs/DVDs.

[audiorules]

Agreed, unless you've only done a very short recording or a couple tracks, sessions with 50 tracks are going to take hours to burn to DVD, and days to CD.

[Sascha Franck]

I also think that HDDs are more reliable. At least in case you a) give them a testride before using them for backups and b) treat them well.
Most drives fail after either a short period of time (hence the testride) or when being worn out (hence the nice treatment).

[morphex]

I backup on a regular basis to an external FW drive, then after a project is completely finished, I make sure to organize and properly label all of the audio and midi files associated with the project, then burn a CD-R or DVD-R as a 'master' backup copy. Then that disk gets stored in a personal fire-proof safe for long-term storage. I know that sounds a little drastic but at least I feel secure in knowing that if I needed to make a remix or an alternate version of my track, everything is in one place and is well protected.

Peace - morphex

[Nonplus]

Nonplus, grow up.

Educate yourself on the various particulars of the protocols. We all know an internal SATA or even ATA drive is going to be more efficient than a FW or USB drive, but it's not what your tests don't show is the difference in track or plugin counts when using a second physical drive for audio, which is known to lessen the load on the system drive, and yield a higher track and plugin count. Basic audio 101. Not to mention that a second drive is not an option internally in a laptop.

I never said I know more about this topic than anyone else, but I surely know more than you dude.

First: the topic of this thread is: 5400 vs. 7200. and i demonstrated published benchmarks that say it *does* make a difference. droning on about FW = noise.

Second: do you actually use MacBook Pros and FW drives with Logic, Pro Tools, Ableton, etc.? do people pay you to solve problems with these systems? have you actually done performance testing of a MacBook Pro?

well, you know more than me "dude". i'll stop wasting time contradicting you and get back to work consulting on DAWs and testing and supporting music hardware and software. gotta pay those bills.

[Muzik 4 Machines]

i'll remove the dvd from my macbook pro this fall and replace it with another 100GB frive, will be used only for asmples/refills storage to attain the fully mobile (ie, not missing some sounds when my drive arrays are not present) and to record to(I rarely mix both, it's either all virtual or all recording those days)
for me the internal HD is pretty performant as it is to play my samples and/or recordings, I just need more space

[audiorules]

I backup on a regular basis to an external FW drive, then after a project is completely finished, I make sure to organize and properly label all of the audio and midi files associated with the project, then burn a CD-R or DVD-R as a 'master' backup copy. Then that disk gets stored in a personal fire-proof safe for long-term storage. I know that sounds a little drastic but at least I feel secure in knowing that if I needed to make a remix or an alternate version of my track, everything is in one place and is well protected.

Peace - morphex

In the digital domain, nothing is considered backed up until it's backed up twice. Your HDD/optical method is pretty SOP for the music industry, and aq good work ethic to go by.

[Shane Sanders]

I backup on a regular basis to an external FW drive, then after a project is completely finished, I make sure to organize and properly label all of the audio and midi files associated with the project, then burn a CD-R or DVD-R as a 'master' backup copy. Then that disk gets stored in a personal fire-proof safe for long-term storage. I know that sounds a little drastic but at least I feel secure in knowing that if I needed to make a remix or an alternate version of my track, everything is in one place and is well protected.

Peace - morphex

I wish I had done the same.

[thesis]

i'll remove the dvd from my macbook pro this fall and replace it with another 100GB frive

You're saying its possible to remove the superdrive from a MBP, and replace it with a second hard drive?? I haven't heard of this before.

A dual hard drive MBP would be very useful for me...

[audiorules]

Yes it's possible on most laptops to remove the optical drive for a second HDD, however should you ever need optical disc access (your system crashes and you need to boot from disc) you're screwed.

[thesis]

Yeah, thats a rather good point... Next time I want to format and start fresh, I'll need to take my laptop to bits. Think I'll stick with an external drive.