I'm ready to buy a new laptop, does anyone have any recent experience with some of them out there.

[gondii]

Haha, on it

[leeleema]

I've read multiple complaints about the build quality of the recent 15 and 16 inch Macbook Pros relating to the default sample rate of 44.1 KHz. Energydrink, do your speakers crackle and pop when playing basically any music through them?

[jancivil]

I can't tell what a build quality has to do with "default sample rate", maybe it's me. I didn't know there was any default sample rate.
I have the 16", higher spec MBP and the first extant (older) project I loaded on the new machine has 48khz audio. I have the onboard speakers and my audio interface set to 48.
I also don't know if you mean its speakers or something else. I'm not monitoring the Cubase project using the MBP speakers, but I have watched a couple of movies this way.

One potential problem appears to be confusion in an aggregate device, which according to an Apple support person yesterday may result in problems. Which may be pilot error. It seemed imperfect to me with the 2018 MBP but account for pilot error here as well (I had headphones, the MBP speakers and the display's speakers to manage; the latter seemed problematic, fortunately there's no real call for it). BUT, I couldn't get a video to start in Safari or Chrome at all after installing my Quantum 2626 Presonus interface Wed night, and unplugging it sorted the problem. Yet plugging it back in didn't cause the problem the second time. Apple support was just about to tell me about the audio as a cause of problems as I figured, while on hold, that her Safe Mode suggestion pointed to the interface (unique drivers), & she mentioned the aggregated device. After this I'm experiencing no problem with audio - there wasn't one to begin with - or things which won't start at youtube at all. And my System Preferences 'Sound' is still using the multi-output cfg for system audio.

[echosystm]

Something that is often overlooked when buying a laptop for audio use is that many non-Apple laptops have ground noise. Apple have done a very good job on this front, because they know so many professional musicians and DJs are using Macs.

https://support.native-instruments.com/ ... ng-Sounds-

[jancivil]

Actually I can imagine how a build quality would affect audio, and be garbage, to be clear. I don't get what was said there about a sample rate at all but there's a lot I don't get. The upshot of that is Apple is getting calls about something stemming from audio in some way, which resembles my issue but probably isn't that issue. I sorted it myself but I guess I wanted to talk to somebody who is supposed to know stuff.

[leeleema]

Actually I can imagine how a build quality would affect audio, and be garbage, to be clear. I don't get what was said there about a sample rate at all but there's a lot I don't get. The upshot of that is Apple is getting calls about something stemming from audio in some way, which resembles my issue but probably isn't that issue. I sorted it myself but I guess I wanted to talk to somebody who is supposed to know stuff.

Sorry, my phrase 'build quality' was a bit ambiguous. I meant it to include the quality of all inbuilt hardware components, as well as the system as a whole, including whatever is driving the audio. 44.1 KHz is a default setting for most things where digital music is concerned. The 15 inch macbook pros, from a few years ago to present, had a problem with the speakers crackling and popping at that setting, which isn't good really seeing as sites like youtube would stream at that rate. The new 16 inch macbook pros apparently have exactly the same problem. Apple said in November 2019 that they were aware of the problem, it was software related, and it would be fixed in a software update. It's July 2020 now, and they are still selling an essentially defective machine.

Can I ask why you work at 48kHz? That was a workaround proposed by Apple until they fixed the 'software' issue (which is almost certainly a hardware fault).

[jancivil]

No real reason. I have some audio at google drive, along with a project I downloaded, and it’s 48. In the past, compatibility with a video editor on a job. Cubendo is reputed to handle conversion poorly, and there isn’t a strong reason for that conversion either.

[jancivil]

I really don’t know, but it brings to mind ‘a bad batch’. But I may have done all projects at 48k on the 2018 (every really finished project goes to youtube). I’ve rendered only one thing on this one, an mp3. Probably not most, but for me numerous things ‘default’ to 48 (96 etc).

As to software, I suspect aggregate device in Audio MIDI Setup is faulty.

[BertKoor]

The 15 inch macbook pros, from a few years ago to present, had a problem with the speakers crackling and popping at that setting, which isn't good really seeing as sites like youtube would stream at that rate.

Sorry to rain on your parade, but me and all my colleagues all got a MBP in 2017 and I never experienced this, nor did any of my colleagues. Fake news I'd say.

[Haptix]

^Its not just one model or two..

https://www.macrumors.com/2019/12/06/ap ... ing-sound/
https://www.macrumors.com/2018/08/08/20 ... s-reports/

[jancivil]

This is my second high-end MBP. I have not experienced cracking speakers once, if you mean the internal speakers. I watched movies frequently on the 2018, half the time on the speakers. It didn't cause the LG display speakers to break up either, nor the speakers I bought later. There was a specific audio issue presented by the T2 security chip with certain audio interfaces, which I didn't use. I don't remember what the symptoms reported were, but this is real.

This is people reporting a 'pop' at the end of playback. It strikes me as odd to argue it has to be a hardware fault and support it with article that reports "Apple confirms it's a software issue" and doesn't even gainsay that.

I am not at this juncture really a fan of Apple (the heavy security thrust; I say "I f**king hate Apple" with some frequency), but amplifying a rumor mill into facts not in evidence gets a bit wearing.

[Haptix]

Awfully lot of rumours then..

https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments ... _external/
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8509051
https://www.logicprohelp.com/forum/view ... p?t=138992
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/do ... i.2153841/
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8466406
https://www.gearslutz.com/board/music-c ... 018-a.html

And yes, still ongoing stuff..RME Audio interfaces for example, the T2 caused "annoyances" are very real..

[kvotchin]

If I were to buy a laptop right now, for audio production (and possibly other purposes), it would definitely be a Ryzen 4000 series-based one. In terms of latency, among other things, they are kicking ass.

[jancivil]

The latency here with the Presonus Quantum 2626 is literally unbelievable; Cubase under Mac and I'm doing a project I absolutely would have to render the first stage of (with a monstrous Absynth patch) before orchestrating, w. round-trip under 10ms with no breakup whatsoever. This is news. Holy Grail level news, Cubase under OSX with truly low latency.

My (non-trivial) experience with RME on a MacPro was far from this. Frankly I think it's an interface suited for a Windows system and not optimal with Core Audio (which is fairly typical; confer Steinberg's ASIO2CoreAudio dot bundle). Not sure who characterized the T2 chip as mere _annoyance_ to be quoted on, but I did not minimize anyone's experience like that. EDIT: I've ascertained no one did.
THIS is a known issue. (That I have not experienced. So, if the goal is to fight anecdote by anecdote, I'm not playing that.)

I did have the M key go out on the 2018 MBP but I assumed my fault, possibly inaccurately.

[Haptix]

^A lot of things in that first paragraph tells that you really do not have any glue what you are talking about. Anyway as the OP asked for experiences about laptops, both the good and the bad should be pointed out.