# New Mac Pro - is a multi-computer rig necessary for composers anymore?



## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

Working composer here ready to upgrade my single Mac Pro (quad-core trashcan) system. For the longest time I had been considering demoting my current computer to PT/video rig and buying a nice new computer to use as my DAW/sequencer rig (and maybe someday a third for VEP). But with the release of these insane new mac pros, I'm considering going big there and essentially creating a one-computer system that runs Pro Tools and Logic and 3 or 4 displays on one machine. Perhaps even VEP. It seems to me that the primary purpose of the common multi-computer setups is to separate limited resources (CPU/RAM/GPU) - which makes sense. But with the specs on these new Mac Pros...I wonder if it actually makes more sense to simplify and eliminate the need for ethernet networking, multiple interfaces, mouse and keyboard switching, etc. I would probably be looking at the 12 or 16 core, 96GB ram model for about $8k-9k. Thoughts? Is there a good reason I'm not considering to keep video, VEP, and sequencer DAW on separate computers?


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## rgames (Feb 19, 2020)

In general, no you don't need multiple machines. It depends on what you write and how you write it.

The real limitations are voice counts and latency and you still need multiple machines if you're hitting bottlenecks there. But only you know what bottlenecks you're hitting.

I definitely wouldn't spend $8k on a master DAW. Anything in the $2500 range is about as good as it gets for a single machine from the DAW perspective - the $8k machine won't perform any better (though I'll admit some uncertainty on Macs in the $2500 price range).

If you have that kind of money then two or three machines totaling $5k will vastly outperform any single machine that costs $8k.

Donate the extra $3k to someone other than Apple. Apple's in pretty good shape 

rgames


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

rgames said:


> In general, no you don't need multiple machines. It depends on what you write and how you write it.
> 
> The real limitations are voice counts and latency and you still need multiple machines if you're hitting bottlenecks there. But only you know what bottlenecks you're hitting.
> 
> ...



Thanks for the reply. I guess the idea of running everything on one computer feels more *elegant* to me and eliminates a whole lot of cables, boxes, switches, etc. But if you think the new mac minis or regular iMacs, for example, are more than capable as a master DAW, then its probably much more economical to go that route with an extra interface and the switches and stuff.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 19, 2020)

Richard has a giant anti-Apple erection, but I'm 100% with him on everything else.

It is more elegant running everything on one machine, but VEP only needs one cable - Ethernet.


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> Richard has a giant anti-Apple erection, but I'm 100% with him on everything else.
> 
> It is more elegant running everything on one machine, but VEP only needs one cable - Ethernet.



True. It's the ProTools/video slave that needs a bit more linkage. For those of you using a separate computer for video playback, do you usually send the Dia/SFX and temp music tracks out of ProTools via an interface and into some input-monitored tracks in your master DAW? Trying to figure out the easiest way to route audio from PT session on a separate computer to my speakers alongside production audio.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 19, 2020)

You'll need to connect a monitor to the PT/video slave, but you can put VE Pro on that machine too.


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## tmhuud (Feb 19, 2020)

I think only you would have a good idea really based on your working projects/templates. I have 2 slaves and I’m used to pretty much watching 64 gigs of ram get gobbled up on both with my basic everyday templates. I’m in the same boat as I’m really forward to going single machine soon.


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## jmauz (Feb 19, 2020)

I run 3 hackintosh machines with VE Pro. Two has 64GB ram, one has 128GB RAM, two have quad core CPU's, one has an 8-core. Plethoras of SSD disk space (around 100TB). Total cost? $6K.

So to answer your question, for those of us who don't want to throw Apple $8K or more, YES, we still need multiple computer rigs. 

Here's another reason - having multiple machines gives me redundancy. If my main DAW machine goes down I have Cubase installed on the other two so I can be up and running again in about an hour.


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## jononotbono (Feb 19, 2020)

I’m not prepared to pay that kind of money for a new Mac Pro at the minute, so using multiple machines is the way I’m going to be working for a while. It’s amazing how much horsepower you add to your system by adding even just a mediocre specced computer. The only thing you have to stomach is the increased electricity bill and a workflow involving multiple machines.


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

Alright, you've all convinced me to go the multiple computer route. I'm still wrapping my head around the best way to route audio from multiple machines to my speakers, and mouse/keyboard control, etc but I think this is the best option


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## jononotbono (Feb 19, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> Alright, you've all convinced me to go the multiple computer route.



Yes. You should get 5 new Mac Pro’s


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

jononotbono said:


> Yes. You should get 5 new Mac Pro’s



That's what I took away from this thread


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## jononotbono (Feb 19, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> That's what I took away from this thread



Bet Cubase’s cursor still wouldn’t be smooth.


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## jmauz (Feb 19, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> Alright, you've all convinced me to go the multiple computer route. I'm still wrapping my head around the best way to route audio from multiple machines to my speakers, and mouse/keyboard control, etc but I think this is the best option



If you use VE Pro, MIDI and audio is routed via ethernet. All you need is a gigabit ethernet switch and an ethernet NIC on each machine. Check out VSL's website for more information.

In terms of KVM control, two of my machines have their own and the third one which I hardly ever need to access is controlled via remote desktop. You COULD use a KVM switch as well but I prefer my setup...all the affordable KVM switches I've used are glitchy. I haven't used them in a long time though so you might have more luck than I did.


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## jbuhler (Feb 19, 2020)

jononotbono said:


> Yes. You should get 5 new Mac Pro’s


Just 5?


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

jmauz said:


> If you use VE Pro, MIDI and audio is routed via ethernet. All you need is a gigabit ethernet switch and an ethernet NIC on each machine. Check out VSL's website for more information.
> 
> In terms of KVM control, two of my machines have their own and the third one which I hardly ever need to access is controlled via remote desktop. You COULD use a KVM switch as well but I prefer my setup...all the affordable KVM switches I've used are glitchy. I haven't used them in a long time though so you might have more luck than I did.


Right. BUT what if I'm not running VEP on the slave computer that is hosting the video?


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## jononotbono (Feb 19, 2020)

jbuhler said:


> Just 5?



1 for Brass
1 for Strings
1 for Winds
1 for Perc
1 for one instance of Omnisphere


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 19, 2020)

About how you hook up your speakers, the most likely setup is to have the audio interface on your main machine. For most people that would be the one you run your DAW on, and the most powerful one. 

What was the other point I was going to make...


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> About how you hook up your speakers, the most likely setup is to have the audio interface on your main machine. For most people that would be the one you run your DAW on, and the most powerful one.
> 
> What was the other point I was going to make...


Definitely gonna keep my main interface on my main machine. What I'm wondering about is the best way to get the audio from the slave machine into said interface. Basically, do I need a second audio or MADI interface or can I do this via ethernet.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 19, 2020)

Oh yeah. I gave up on KVMs 15 years ago in favor of Remote Desktop. Slave computers just behave like separate programs running on your main machine.

And if you don’t have VE Pro on your Pro Tools machine you’ll have to put an audio interface with MIDI for time code to keep it in sync. Or use Network MIDI, actually a better idea. 

But I’d our VE Pro on it.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 19, 2020)

Put


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 19, 2020)

Sorry, I think I'm not explaining myself correctly or it's entirely possible I have a basic misunderstanding of how this stuff works. I will definitely use network/ethernet to sync the slave computer to the master timecode from the main machine. So it'll run as a slave, in sync. But the audio from the slave computer (SFX, temp music, dialog) needs to be heard through my speakers. My speakers will be hooked up to my main computer via my main interface. Just trying to figure out the best way to route the Pro Tools _audio_ into my main interface/main computer.


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## InLight-Tone (Feb 19, 2020)

jononotbono said:


> 1 for Brass
> 1 for Strings
> 1 for Winds
> 1 for Perc
> 1 for one instance of Omnisphere


Winds are mute...1 less computer...


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## jmauz (Feb 19, 2020)

Yeah you'll need some sort of interface on your PT machine and use some sort of sync with your main DAW. PITA...one of the reasons I got rid of PT.


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## gsilbers (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> Sorry, I think I'm not explaining myself correctly or it's entirely possible I have a basic misunderstanding of how this stuff works. I will definitely use network/ethernet to sync the slave computer to the master timecode from the main machine. So it'll run as a slave, in sync. But the audio from the slave computer (SFX, temp music, dialog) needs to be heard through my speakers. My speakers will be hooked up to my main computer via my main interface. Just trying to figure out the best way to route the Pro Tools _audio_ into my main interface/main computer.



This might help


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## Jeremy Spencer (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> Sorry, I think I'm not explaining myself correctly or it's entirely possible I have a basic misunderstanding of how this stuff works. I will definitely use network/ethernet to sync the slave computer to the master timecode from the main machine. So it'll run as a slave, in sync. But the audio from the slave computer (SFX, temp music, dialog) needs to be heard through my speakers. My speakers will be hooked up to my main computer via my main interface. Just trying to figure out the best way to route the Pro Tools _audio_ into my main interface/main computer.



Maybe I missed it, but what are you running for your DAW?


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## jononotbono (Feb 20, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> Winds are mute...1 less computer...



Hopefully everyone mutes theirs and then I’ll be the only one left using them 😂


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## InLight-Tone (Feb 20, 2020)

John Paesano explains how he's gone to using one computer instead of slaves and why in this video starting at around 5:00


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## jononotbono (Feb 20, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> John Paesano explains how he's gone to using one computer instead of slaves and why in this video starting at around 5:00




Yeah it's a good video. To go this route you need a lot of cash. A single machine with that many cores and that much ram isn't cheap. I'd love 1 computer to rule them all but it's serious money.


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## AndyP (Feb 20, 2020)

Since I have the iMac i9 with 8 cores and plenty of Ram I use my MacPro slaves less often.
Also saves a lot of electric power.
The external hard drives with the East West and VSL libraries can be easily moved from MacPro to iMac (using only USB-C which is slightly twice as fast compared to internal disks in MacPro or USB 3.0).
I have upgraded the SSD hard drives and reorganized the libraries so that I can use them flexibly on all computers as needed.
In the slaves only the system disks are internally installed.


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

Wolfie2112 said:


> Maybe I missed it, but what are you running for your DAW?


Logic


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

jmauz said:


> Yeah you'll need some sort of interface on your PT machine and use some sort of sync with your main DAW. PITA...one of the reasons I got rid of PT.


Yeah, so two audio interfaces - one essentially routing audio into the other. I figured this was the case but was hoping there was an ethernet only option.


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> John Paesano explains how he's gone to using one computer instead of slaves and why in this video starting at around 5:00



I wonder how much machine I would need for what I do. There's no way to know ha. I don't do massive orchestral scores, my focus is much more electronic with orchestral moments. The new macbook pro 16s are actually crazy powerful or at least benchmarking pretty wild. Curious if I could run everything off of a $4000 MBP...


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

jononotbono said:


> Yeah it's a good video. To go this route you need a lot of cash. A single machine with that many cores and that much ram isn't cheap. I'd love 1 computer to rule them all but it's serious money.


that paesano money


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## InLight-Tone (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> I wonder how much machine I would need for what I do. There's no way to know ha. I don't do massive orchestral scores, my focus is much more electronic with orchestral moments. The new macbook pro 16s are actually crazy powerful or at least benchmarking pretty wild. Curious if I could run everything off of a $4000 MBP...


If you're not doing massive orchestral stuff, for sure. I'm not sure what sequencer you're using but Jonathon Wright describes using track presets to simulate having a multi thousand track template. I'm doing the same in Logic. I have thousands of presets. With fast m2 drives loading is plenty fast. You can create mini templates with your sends, groups and what not you use already setup. I have blank tracks and can scroll though all my presets in Logic remote and it's tap and load. Not the right sound? Tap again...
https://www.jonathanwrightmusic.com/article/use-studio-one-and-instrument-presets-for-large-orchestral-projects (Preset Orchestral Template)


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

InLight-Tone said:


> If you're not doing massive orchestral stuff, for sure. I'm not sure what sequencer you're using but Jonathon Wright describes using track presets to simulate having a multi thousand track template. I'm doing the same in Logic. I have thousands of presets. With fast m2 drives loading is plenty fast. You can create mini templates with your sends, groups and what not you use already setup. I have blank tracks and can scroll though all my presets in Logic remote and it's tap and load. Not the right sound? Tap again...


This is exactly what I do currently, in Logic


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

gsilbers said:


> This might help



This guy is doing exactly what I was originally posting about. Still so enticing but way more $ than it needs to be as this thread has made clear.


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## Jeremy Spencer (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> This is exactly what I do currently, in Logic



I also work with Logic, same scenario with the "disabled" tracks. I went from using a big slave, to working on just my MB Pro...and I've done a ton of work this way for the past year (mostly orchestral). When PT is involved, I request a video file, with time code burnt in, and simply score to pic inside Logic. When the cues are complete (and approved), I just "checkerboard" a PT session file with the stems and deliver it. really love not having to use the slave anymore. However, for multiple cue projects, I use my single machine VEPro templates so that I don't have to reload all of the instruments between projects (cues).


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## Greg (Feb 20, 2020)

Now that the issues with Catalina are more or less settled, I absolutely love the new mac pro. I went for the 16 core with 8tb of NVME ssds on pcie cards, 384gb ram. 

It cruises flawlessly with my 700 track template in Logic and I can stay at a 128 buffer even at the most epic parts with tons of tracks playing. The disable unused tracks feature in Logic is a beautiful thing when paired with fast ssds. You can zip around your template like its empty and the tracks you need to load only take a milisecond. Highly recommend


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

Wolfie2112 said:


> I also work with Logic, same scenario with the "disabled" tracks. I went from using a big slave, to working on just my MB Pro...and I've done a ton of work this way for the past year (mostly orchestral). When PT is involved, I request a video file, with time code burnt in, and simply score to pic inside Logic. When the cues are complete (and approved), I just "checkerboard" a PT session file with the stems and deliver it. really love not having to use the slave anymore. However, for multiple cue projects, I use my single machine VEPro templates so that I don't have to reload all of the instruments between projects (cues).


Hmm yeah. I wonder if I overestimate my CPU/RAM usage and running Logic, PT, and VEP all on a macbook pro would actually suffice


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## jbmoonchild (Feb 20, 2020)

Greg said:


> Now that the issues with Catalina are more or less settled, I absolutely love the new mac pro. I went for the 16 core with 8tb of NVME ssds on pcie cards, 384gb ram.
> 
> It cruises flawlessly with my 700 track template in Logic and I can stay at a 128 buffer even at the most epic parts with tons of tracks playing. The disable unused tracks feature in Logic is a beautiful thing when paired with fast ssds. You can zip around your template like its empty and the tracks you need to load only take a milisecond. Highly recommend


So tempting. As many other have pointed out on here, if I split it up between multiple computers I can probably get the same power for half the price? I love the one-computer workflow though and I'm not sure I would need as much of a monster as your mac. My template currently is only about 60 tracks compared to your 700 as I don't do a ton of full orchestral stuff, and a good dozen of those are just set up for audio paths (modular, guitar, external synths, etc).

Are you running Pro Tools and/or VEP in the background on the same machine?


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## Greg (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> So tempting. As many other have pointed out on here, if I split it up between multiple computers I can probably get the same power for half the price? I love the one-computer workflow though and I'm not sure I would need as much of a monster as your mac. My template currently is only about 60 tracks compared to your 700 as I don't do a ton of full orchestral stuff, and a good dozen of those are just set up for audio paths (modular, guitar, external synths, etc).
> 
> Are you running Pro Tools and/or VEP in the background on the same machine?



Nope! Just Logic & pro tools is on my old mac pro when I need it


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> the audio from the slave computer (SFX, temp music, dialog) needs to be heard through my speakers. My speakers will be hooked up to my main computer via my main interface. Just trying to figure out the best way to route the Pro Tools _audio_ into my main interface/main computer.



If the sound quality isn't important, Microsoft Remote Desktop routes Windows system audio into a Mac it's running on. 

Has anyone tried that?


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## Geoff Grace (Feb 20, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> This guy is doing exactly what I was originally posting about. Still so enticing but way more $ than it needs to be as this thread has made clear.


Yes, he said that he paid $20,000 Canadian for his Mac Pro, RAM, and other accessories; but that made sense for him, in the context of his workload. He was also able to sell two trash can Mac Pros to help offset the cost.

More here:





Best,

Geoff


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## Geoff Grace (Feb 20, 2020)

On the other hand, an iMac Pro may be worth considering, depending on your budget:



In the 2018 video above, *Christian* compared a trash can Mac Pro to an iMac Pro.

Best,

Geoff


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## gsilbers (Feb 21, 2020)

jbmoonchild said:


> So tempting. As many other have pointed out on here, if I split it up between multiple computers I can probably get the same power for half the price? I love the one-computer workflow though and I'm not sure I would need as much of a monster as your mac. My template currently is only about 60 tracks compared to your 700 as I don't do a ton of full orchestral stuff, and a good dozen of those are just set up for audio paths (modular, guitar, external synths, etc).
> 
> Are you running Pro Tools and/or VEP in the background on the same machine?




I’ve been following some other Mac Pro centric videos and right now the Xeon chip is expensive, but in theory , once those start to come under in price in different outlets the Mac Pro will be a lot less expensive if u add your own ram and cpu.

And I’ve seen several guys using vep and logic and pro tools all on the same computer w one card. I used to do the adat loopback w my rme ff800 so that’s another option.


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## Geoff Grace (Feb 21, 2020)

_"If you have four or five machines, that's four or five times as much chance of more going wrong. Believe me, I've been there."_
- Guy Michelmore

He's got a 2009 Mac Pro and a slave PC running Windows 7. More at the 11:32 mark in the video below:



Best,

Geoff


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## Symfoniq (Feb 21, 2020)

Geoff Grace said:


> _"If you have four or five machines, that's four or five times as much chance of more going wrong. Believe me, I've been there."_
> - Guy Michelmore



And he's absolutely right.

In the cloud server "devops" world that I live in professionally, more machines is often better, because several machines will serve the same role, with traffic load-balanced between them. If one goes down, others can pick up the slack seamlessly, because they are all fundamentally doing the exact same thing. The HTTP request doesn't care which server it reaches if all of them are running the exact same application.

But multiple VE Pro slaves aren't like that when you've got one for strings, one for brass, one for synths, etc. One machine going down still stops work unless you happen to not need strings that day.

If you can manage to fit all your samples on all your slaves as a fallback measure, that helps things, but the reality is that more machines will always increase the likelihood of failure _somewhere_. When I began building fault-tolerant architectures for clients, I started seeing a lot more hardware failures, simply because there were more systems in the mix.


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## rgames (Feb 22, 2020)

Geoff Grace said:


> _"If you have four or five machines, that's four or five times as much chance of more going wrong. Believe me, I've been there."_
> - Guy Michelmore


I'm going to hope that this person is being misquoted here. Because that's a silly statement.

Multiple engines on an airplane? No thanks. Reserve parachute? Nope again. Really?

(By the way - "Believe me" is a euphemism for "I don't have any data, but" or "The data indicate otherwise, but". It is an approach to influencing people that is most often used in religion but has gained popularity in politics in recent years. _Believe me_, the Earth is flat.)

Besides, reliability isn't the main reason why you would run multiple machines. It's simple: if your orchestrations are dense enough to require more voices than one machine can handle then you need multiple machines. That's a bus bandwidth limitation, not a CPU limitation, and you only get so much bus bandwidth on any one machine. So if you need the bandwidth, you need multiple machines. Adding cores and/or increasing latency can only get you so far.

rgames


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## samphony (Feb 22, 2020)

jononotbono said:


> Yeah it's a good video. To go this route you need a lot of cash. A single machine with that many cores and that much ram isn't cheap. I'd love 1 computer to rule them all but it's serious money.


John didn’t purchased the machine as he explained he is constantly up for the more powerful gear that’s probably why he is leasing instead of buying.


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## jononotbono (Feb 22, 2020)

samphony said:


> John didn’t purchased the machine as he explained he is constantly up for the more powerful gear that’s probably why he is leasing instead of buying.



Yes. And this exactly highlights what I am saying. These computers cost a fortune to buy. Leasing gear is fine if you can afford the overheads but you are usually locked into a contract for many years so it’s something to bear in mind.


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## Geoff Grace (Feb 22, 2020)

rgames said:


> I'm going to hope that this person is being misquoted here.


Feel free to jump to the 12:33 mark in the video I posted to hear it for yourself. 

I imagine any evidence he could provide to support his statement would be anecdotal, but logic supports his viewpoint. Let's say, for example, that computers have a 20% chance of failure in five years. If you have just one computer, then it's 80% likely that it will be fine five years down the road. If you have five computers, on the other hand, the odds are in favor of one of them dying in five years. Now of course, this hypothetical example is overly simplistic; but it demonstrates the principle. 

Keep in mind, that he's not advocating against having backup systems, only against having four or five machines in a primary setup. 

Best,

Geoff


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## JJP (Feb 22, 2020)

rgames said:


> Multiple engines on an airplane? No thanks. Reserve parachute? Nope again. Really?


Planes are designed to be able to fly on only one engine. A reserve parachute is a backup. That's not what's we deal with when we use slave machines. They aren't backups.


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## JohnG (Feb 22, 2020)

I'm not sure what you're questioning about Guy's statement @rgames ? I use several PC slave computers and something is always needing attention. Vexing.

Like him I used to run five PCs plus the Mac; that many more things to go wrong. And @JJP is correct -- none of those were "spares," unless you are willing to do without a section of the orchestra.


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## rgames (Feb 22, 2020)

Geoff Grace said:


> logic supports his viewpoint


No, it doesn't. Take a look at the FMECA process.

Regarding spares, yes most slaves are dedicated to a sectoin of the orchestra but if one goes down then you switch that load to another slave. Which is what you would do if you had only one machine anyway. So having multiple machines can only increase system availability (and, therefore, reliability), not decrease it.

Consider this example: say you run everything off one machine. There's some reliability associated with that setup. Now let's say you add a slave and move the strings to it. If the slave dies, you just move the strings back to the single machine, which is what you started with, so it's no more or less reliable from that standpoint. However, let's say your master DAW dies. Well now you have another machine that you can use to run, though perhaps at reduced capacity. But that reduced capacity is greater than the zero capacity you would have if you didn't have the slave. So adding a slave never *reduces* the reliability of the system. It only increases it.

Again, though, it doesn't matter. Reliability is not the reason for multiple machines. So let's not derail the thread.

rgames


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## JohnG (Feb 22, 2020)

rgames said:


> most slaves are dedicated to a sectoin of the orchestra but if one goes down then you switch that load to another slave.



How? That is completely impractical.

If one of my PCs died, I wouldn't have nearly enough excess capacity (RAM, CPU) in another one to handle that lost PC. And that's leaving aside the almost indescribably agonizing process of moving all the samples over from one to another, then rerouting dozens (if not hundreds) of midi assignments to the new computer.

If the DAW computer dies, game over. Unless you have matching computers -- who does? The DAW is a Mac and the satellite computers are PCs. Not counting the Pro Tools computer.

Definitely having five computers in the setup increases the chances of a problem.

Anyway, no sense in arguing -- you are a smart guy and of course it would depend on each individual's setup.


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## JohnG (Feb 22, 2020)

As you said, Richard, back to the initial post!

I guess the reason to have a bunch of PCs is three things:

1. cost of a big system is far less, unless something has changed;
2. more CPU and bus bandwidth; and
3. you don't (necessarily) have to reload everything each time you switch pieces / change from one cue to another.


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## rgames (Feb 22, 2020)

JohnG said:


> Definitely having five computers in the setup increases the chances of a problem.


That is certainly correct. But the overall system reliability - i.e. your ability to write/produce music - is still higher because you have the option to redistribute the load and keep working. As we both pointed out, that might be at reduced capacity, but never any less than what you have with just a single machine.

But anyway... I digress!

Concur with your three points.

rgames


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## mscp (Feb 22, 2020)

John Paesano has a single, monster setup. According to his videos, his Z8 works flawless and he seems super happy with not having to work with multiple computers anymore.

I know someone who has recently bought the new Mac Rack 28-core, 300ish GB Ram. He ran an awfully busy PT project (700+ tracks) with VEP and Logic running at the same time. The computer did not break a sweat.


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## rgames (Feb 22, 2020)

A related topic is how to work at alternate locations - I often work from a laptop on the road and move between a master/slave setup and that laptop. If you set up all the sections/libraries in individual VE Pro projects then you can load up and connect to just the ones you need on the laptop and reconnect to all of them (as necessary) when in the studio.

If you establish a common drive/directory structure on all your machines then it's easy to move among them using that approach. It also lets you load up the slaves only when you need them. An occurrence which, for me, is definitely reducing in frequency.

The pain there is that you do still need to move dongles. It would very so easy for developers to look across the network to see if there's a dongle somewhere on another machine. Alas, they do not.

EDIT: of course, this only works for decoupled projects. But if you're running a huge template you're probably running decoupled anyway.

rgames


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## colony nofi (Feb 27, 2020)

Yeah I'm definitely going to chime in on the camp of "one machine to do it all".
And you only need to look at my old (2012 ish) posts here and around the net to know I have had all sorts of master/slave setups. At one point, I was lugging a 17" MBP (modified....those were the days) and 4 x mac mini slave machines with 16 (woah!) GB of memory in each of them.

Anyway. Needless to say, I am now running single machines. Even my MBP. 
When on the road, speed of setup is important. Single macines just make it that much easier - even with the 10 or so pieces of equipment I end up plugging into it!

When back in the studio, I plug sample / project drives back into docks, and I'm on my way.

Now, the machines I'm running at the moment are not monsters. 128GB ram - check. But old 2013 trash cans for the most part. The time it takes to look after multiple slaves is massively more than the time it takes for me to rethink how I use my DAW (nuendo) and find workflows that work on the machines.

And I *do* reach the limit of the machines. Mostly when running large multi-channel mixes. (300+ tracks, 250 audio, 50 kontakt) into 16+ channel speaker setups.

There's definitely some freezing etc going on - but this is all after the composition / sound design stages. 
However, not that long ago I managed to start working on a 9940X with 384GB ram. I threw the kitchen sink at it. And it just purrs. Now - I can imagine that *some* people with the way they work / their workflows, it still would work to use slaves instead - but I was incredibly surprised at how well this machine ran very large templates - setup with many multi-mic instruments, and didn't miss a beat. Its not cheap. But cheaper than a new mac pro of similar specs. And kicks the butt out of a 9900k machine in all but a few use cases. (You know if you are one of those whom benefits from the clock speed of the 9900!)

You see, to me, having one machine to worry about gives me more time in the day to do other things. Even if it was just once every 3 to 6 months, I still spent AGES when getting new libraries setting everything up and testing. Now I just load and go. I've also changed from massive templates to smaller templates with sets of tracks setup to import as required. All on hot keys so its incredibly transparent. 

I cannot imagine going back to multi-machine setups. And part of the work I do means I'm playing with tech constantly (lots of experiential / interactive and immersive audio between tv/dance/film stuff). Its just a different, less frustrating headspace. 

I don't expect agreement. But I'm happy to discuss things further if folk are interested.

Ramble over


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## Synetos (Mar 4, 2020)

I recently had my hands on a 7980XE. At stock 2.6 GHz, it was horrible for VEP. After I overclocked, it ran great. The deal fell apart and the seller of the rig wanted it back. :( 

Now it am in the camp of having one under powered 6800k with 64GB ram. It doesn't hold up to what I was running on my 6950x (which fried). 

I wouldn't mind a big new iMac Pro or a Mac Pro, but I am not selling a kidney to buy one. 

So, I need to build another PC and trying to decide which way to go.


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## colony nofi (Mar 5, 2020)

Synetos said:


> I recently had my hands on a 7980XE. At stock 2.6 GHz, it was horrible for VEP. After I overclocked, it ran great. The deal fell apart and the seller of the rig wanted it back. :(
> 
> Now it am in the camp of having one under powered 6800k with 64GB ram. It doesn't hold up to what I was running on my 6950x (which fried).
> 
> ...



Although HEDT (lets call them creative workstation chips) are not heavily talked about here, I think that 2020 is the year where they really start to come into their own for things like DAW's and edit stations etc.

AMD's current blistering pace of development in this area is finally giving intel a kick in the butt. Their 109xx chips are really not huge improvements from the 99xx series - but there is some, and their prices have basically halved from last year in response to AMD's third gen thread rippers (3970x and the like). The latest DAW bench results are extremely interesting. Link to scanproaudio latest dawbench info here
I'm holding out for 3960 and 3970 (24 vs 32 cores) results (and a few little bumps ironed out...crossing fintgers) before deciding which way to turn for a new full time production machine, but I suspect I know which way I'll go. Now, I'll probably need to build a cool, isolated machine room...eek! We are talking 400+W draw under full core load (around 15w per core)


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## Synetos (Mar 6, 2020)

colony nofi said:


> Although HEDT (lets call them creative workstation chips) are not heavily talked about here, I think that 2020 is the year where they really start to come into their own for things like DAW's and edit stations etc.
> 
> AMD's current blistering pace of development in this area is finally giving intel a kick in the butt. Their 109xx chips are really not huge improvements from the 99xx series - but there is some, and their prices have basically halved from last year in response to AMD's third gen thread rippers (3970x and the like). The latest DAW bench results are extremely interesting. Link to scanproaudio latest dawbench info here
> I'm holding out for 3960 and 3970 (24 vs 32 cores) results (and a few little bumps ironed out...crossing fintgers) before deciding which way to turn for a new full time production machine, but I suspect I know which way I'll go. Now, I'll probably need to build a cool, isolated machine room...eek! We are talking 400+W draw under full core load (around 15w per core)


I went to order an Intel 10980XE, and they are nowhere to be found. No-one has them right now. I have ear marked about $7-8k for my new rig, so maybe a Mac Pro might be a solution after all. I do like the Mac eco system and could easily sway over to Logic. I run it already with my Mac Book Pro.

If I do buy a Mac Pro, I would probably go with the 12 core for the support of faster ram, and then maybe slightly over base model on Flash storage. I saw linustech do a bunch of upgrades on a new Mac Pro. I can add my own ram and PCie cards for added NVME M.2 storage. None of it looked that difficult.

I am really impressed with how modular the Mac Pro design is. It is very much upgradable, all the way to the processor. So, even though is a stupid entry price...maybe it will last longer than the PC I was going to build?

I also looked more at AMD. It is tempting to give it a try, especially since more of the components would be the same if I didn't like it. I would only need to replace the MB and CPU. But...I am pretty loyal to Intel, but that isn't going to last if I can't even find a CPU to buy.


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## jononotbono (Mar 6, 2020)

Synetos said:


> $7-8k



For this, you could build a monster PC! Depends if you wanna use OSX and Logic. For that kind of money, that's a dream Cubase machine right there!


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## Synetos (Mar 6, 2020)

jononotbono said:


> For this, you could build a monster PC! Depends if you wanna use OSX and Logic. For that kind of money, that's a dream Cubase machine right there!


I had one all spec'd out, but no CPU's are around. I suppose I could move to a Zeon CPU. I just have much knowledge around choosing one...right board, etc. 

I could go the PC builder route and then not worry about it. Seems like they charge about $1000 uplift over what I can do building it myself. But...Apple charges a much larger builder premium. Haha


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## AlexRuger (Mar 6, 2020)

@colony nofi I couldn't agree more with your post. I'm a massive fan of track presets/etc in Cubase -- single machine all the way for me.

Regarding @rgames usual point about bandwidth (which is not incorrect), I think the operative point here is whether or not you care about _using _everything at once vs _having everything loaded up _at once. On a single machine, you can still accomplish the latter (unless you're running absolutely stupid huge Junkie-esque templates), and judging at how important the "show all tracks with data" command in Cubase tends to be around these parts, I imagine the former is less of a concern. Since that realization, I've very much landed in "single machine with as much RAM as I can possibly afford" land, as that enables the latter, which covers 90% of my bases. The remaining 10% can easily be dealt with by freezing tracks -- it really isn't that big of a deal.


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## jononotbono (Mar 6, 2020)

AlexRuger said:


> is whether or not you care about _using _everything at once vs _having everything loaded up _at once.



Exactly!


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## Synetos (Mar 7, 2020)

AlexRuger said:


> @colony nofi I think the operative point here is whether or not you care about _using _everything at once vs _having everything loaded up _at once. On a single machine, you can still accomplish the latter (unless you're running absolutely stupid huge Junkie-esque templates)


I am in the camp of wanting everything loaded up and available, but not huge template all running at the same time with a 1000 tracks.

I currently have two PC's. A 6800k with 64gb ram, and a 5960x with 64gb ram. If I were going to just use whose, how would you configure the VST distribution? Cubase/VEP7 setup. Or which one would you use exclusively in a single machine setup? I can upgrade the ram to 128 for either.

The reason I kinda like a VEP slave, is then I don't have all that stuff open on my DAW. But, I do think it performs smoother when I an running VEP in just local host mode right on the DAW.

Alternatively, I stop using VEP and go with disabled tracks. But then I end up with a giant template again.

I am tempted to buy a skinny 2019 Mac Pro as a single box solution and just move to Logic. I run Logic/Mainstage on my live band with a MacBook Pro, and a Mac mini running bootcamp for Waves eMotion LV1. Mac ecosystem is not something new for me.

Decisions, decisions...all taking away my creative time


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## Alex Fraser (Mar 7, 2020)

Synetos said:


> Decisions, decisions...all taking away my creative time


Sums up music tech for me. I’ve gone completely the other way to most forum folk in that I’m stripping everything back to the bone. Less tech, more music.

That’s the idea, though the irony I’m reading a tech thread isn’t lost on me.


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## JeffvR (Mar 7, 2020)

I've never used multiple machines and I'm not planning to do it. It doesn't seem necessary these days. I just got my AMD 3960x with 128gb (256gb is possible) at probably 1/2 of the price of a comparable Mac Pro. Yes it's overkill, but yes it's future proof and I'm looking forward to using it.


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## Synetos (Mar 7, 2020)

JeffvR said:


> I've never used multiple machines and I'm not planning to do it. It doesn't seem necessary these days. I just got my AMD 3960x with 128gb (256gb is possible) at probably 1/2 of the price of a comparable Mac Pro. Yes it's overkill, but yes it's future proof and I'm looking forward to using it.


I think much depends on your personal workflow. Anyone could probably find a way to use just one machine, but for some it doesnt support the way they like to work.

I think maybe the whole idea of buying the Mac Pro is to run Logic environment. Personally, I wouldnt buy one to run Cubase. If I buy it, it means I have decided to go all in on Logic.

I have tossed around the AMD more seriously as I am finding it hard to get a high end Intel CPU. I am all over the map with options. Whatever I buy, will be better than what I have now.

The fact the new Mac Pro is modifiable all the way to the CPU, sorta makes it quite future proof. But, the initial 7-8k cost would mean I could probably buy a topped out PC, twice in the same life span.


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## JohnG (Mar 7, 2020)

Synetos said:


> If I do buy a Mac Pro, I would probably go with the 12 core for the support of faster ram



I have never seen any evidence that faster RAM helps what we do. Have I missed a stitch?


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## Technostica (Mar 7, 2020)

JohnG said:


> I have never seen any evidence that faster RAM helps what we do. Have I missed a stitch?


Pete at Scan suggests it is important and doubly so with AMD platforms. 
His reviews get posted here.


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## Synetos (Mar 8, 2020)

So...I did a little experimenting last night. I let the motherboard (Asus X99 Deluxe II) Auto OC my 5960x. It is now running smoothly at 3.9GHz on all cores! 

I actually swapped the CPU in the build I have for the 6800k. It is super high airflow case with a big Noctura cooler. 

I am stunned that I can run 2 instances of Spectrasonics Keyscape, and 2 instances of Steinberg HALion 6...at 32 samples! Not one overload and remained steady at maybe 20% on the performance meter. This is far better than I ever got on my 6950x 10 core. The highest core temp was 46C!!! That is stunning!

I am holding off buying anything while I play around with this setup. Being limited to 64GB ram might crimp how much I can preload for a template, but I think there are ways around that with disabled tracks and freezing.

This setup might just be all I need for now, as several suggested. I need to simplify and get back to making music. I have many songs to record before CoronaVirus takes me out


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## Robert_G (Mar 8, 2020)

Not sure what people's setups are but i see no need for a slave. I run 32gb ram on an I7 8700 with ssd on one computer. My template is massive. Its preset with all the tracks disabled in Cubase and when im done with each track i purge the unused samples. CPU almost never hits 50%....averages 25 to 35 when playing finished pieces. Between purging and disabling, ive never gone above 25gb of Ram for a Cubase file.

I think a lot of people are on overkill. I have almost zero issues with crashing, conflicts, loading....no latency issues....no problems worth mentioning at all....all on a pathetic i7 8700.


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## colony nofi (Mar 8, 2020)

Synetos said:


> I am in the camp of wanting everything loaded up and available, but not huge template all running at the same time with a 1000 tracks.
> 
> I currently have two PC's. A 6800k with 64gb ram, and a 5960x with 64gb ram. If I were going to just use whose, how would you configure the VST distribution? Cubase/VEP7 setup. Or which one would you use exclusively in a single machine setup? I can upgrade the ram to 128 for either.
> 
> ...


Don 't forget that you can run VEP and cubase on a single machine very well.
Indeed - on macs, you can run TWO copies of cubase at the same time (which also works for some more esoteric workflows)


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Mar 8, 2020)

I've also gone from multiple machines down to one about 3 years ago. I don't really work much with intense mockups anymore but this machine could handle it regardless. I've had 3 DAWs plus VEP running simultaneously without issues. New mac pro won't give you better performance than something like a 9900k unless all you're doing is working with a bunch of samples but a 9900k should be more than enough for pretty much anyone. Maybe if you're doing massive action cues with tonnes of mic positions open but then when you go to mix that, your 2.5Ghz 28 core mac pro will crap out on you.

Having said that, I can quickly max out my PC when running 192kHz mixing sessions or certain mastering sessions. Unfortunately nothing is really going past 5GHz yet so there isn't really anything I can do other than render plugins. Any mac pro would be a downgrade for me despite my computer only costing somewhere around $2000. Even going to multiple machines for mixing wouldn't really help since my limitations are at the single track level. If I were running large 96kHz sessions then I would potentially run into bottlenecks solvable by splitting down to multiple machines. 

Most people seem to think that it's unbelievable that a single machine can handle everything. Unless you know for sure that your requirements aren't met by a single machine, it's probably fine.


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## Shad0wLandsUK (Mar 8, 2020)

It is more elegant running everything on one machine, but VEP only needs one cable - Ethernet.
[/QUOTE]
One of my reasons for running on multiple machines (and I likely always will), is failover/redundancy. If one of my machines goes down I can still work on another one with almost-no down time. But if all my work and files are on one machine and it goes down (say a hardware fault or complex problem to solve) I can move to another machine then go back to it.

Working in computers has taught me the huge necessity of redundancy in all areas.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Mar 8, 2020)

Shad0wLandsUK said:


> It is more elegant running everything on one machine, but VEP only needs one cable - Ethernet.
> 
> One of my reasons for running on multiple machines (and I likely always wil), is failover/redundancy. If one of my machines goes down I can still work on another one with almost-no down time. But if all my work and files are on one machine and it goes down (say a hardware or complex problem to solve) I can move to another machine then go back to it.
> 
> Working in computers has taught me the huge necessity of redundancy in all areas.


Well if you're working with multiple machines, if one goes down, your entire system may be useless so you're just introducing more points of failure. If you're on a single machine then you can much more easily have a duplicate to switch over to. In the other case you'd have to be ready to swap out any of the many machines and you're more likely to have something fail with all of the extra hardware.


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## colony nofi (Mar 10, 2020)

Shad0wLandsUK said:


> It is more elegant running everything on one machine, but VEP only needs one cable - Ethernet.


One of my reasons for running on multiple machines (and I likely always wil), is failover/redundancy. If one of my machines goes down I can still work on another one with almost-no down time. But if all my work and files are on one machine and it goes down (say a hardware or complex problem to solve) I can move to another machine then go back to it.

Working in computers has taught me the huge necessity of redundancy in all areas.
[/QUOTE]
Yeah - seconding @Gerhard Westphalen - whichever way you go you need backups. One machine = one machine you need to backup. 3 machines = 3 machines you need to backup. Unless your slaves are underutilised (possible) and identical (possible) then no matter what you're going to have to rebuild a machine when one goes down.
Thankfully this is quite easy these days with the tools we have available. I make sure I have disk images on my server (I'm old school and love file servers... even simple NAS's!) and that makes restoring things to a new computer or even just a new internal drive a doddle. Just be prepared 

@Gerhard Westphalen - I will disagree with you on one point. What using a 10940X has taught me is that the multi-mic, high sampling rate MIX sessions are exactly what these chips are amazing at handling. (I'm on cubase, but I am also running some external software to do panning in non-standard environments). The advantages of high clock speed are most often felt when playing in vsti's / real time audio work. Mixing allows buffers of 2048 which on its own allows huge plugin and track counts, and these massively multi-core systems eat up plugins like nothing I've used before.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Mar 10, 2020)

colony nofi said:


> @Gerhard Westphalen - I will disagree with you on one point. What using a 10940X has taught me is that the multi-mic, high sampling rate MIX sessions are exactly what these chips are amazing at handling. (I'm on cubase, but I am also running some external software to do panning in non-standard environments). The advantages of high clock speed are most often felt when playing in vsti's / real time audio work. Mixing allows buffers of 2048 which on its own allows huge plugin and track counts, and these massively multi-core systems eat up plugins like nothing I've used before.



I don't think you're disagreeing with me on anything.

What I said was that the new Mac Pros would really only be better for samples where you can use lots of slower cores. For samples that works pretty much just as well as something faster with fewer cores.

I basically said the same thing regarding how for mixing you need something faster and these processors (9900k included) will far outperform a new Mac Pro. The exception would be with higher sample rate sessions not using intensive plugins where you could benefit from more, slower cores. In that case you'd probably end up with an equivalent performance. Not sure if it would be better.

My other comment which you perhaps misunderstood and thought that I was criticizing these systems is that I don't think they're fast enough. Turning up the buffer only gets you so much. At a certain point it stops making a difference because the computer can't handle it regardless of how much time it has. I'm always at least at 2048 when I'm working at 96kHz or higher. A simple voice and guitar session at 192kHz that I'm working on right now is already maxing me out with the plugins I use. Same with mastering. Generally at most 2 cores are really being used. 5GHz just isn't enough.

Funny thing is that because I'm only maxing out 1 - 2 cores, while I can't add a single plugin to those tracks without it crapping out, I can duplicate that processing on 8 other tracks and be fine.

If DAW manufacturers started distributing single channels and busses on multiple cores (or at least giving the option of doing that) then things would be very different. In that case you'd only need a core that's fast enough to run a single plugin so slower systems with more cores would then outperform everything else. Considering that there are processors with 64 cores, you'd only be limited by budget. With how things are now, no matter what budget I have, there's nothing better that I can get. My only real option would be to split to using multiple computers for mixing, getting UAD cards (no thank you), or get outboard get (also a no for me).


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## Iswhatitis (Mar 10, 2020)

colony nofi said:


> One of my reasons for running on multiple machines (and I likely always wil), is failover/redundancy. If one of my machines goes down I can still work on another one with almost-no down time. But if all my work and files are on one machine and it goes down (say a hardware or complex problem to solve) I can move to another machine then go back to it.
> 
> Working in computers has taught me the huge necessity of redundancy in all areas.


Yeah - seconding @Gerhard Westphalen - whichever way you go you need backups. One machine = one machine you need to backup. 3 machines = 3 machines you need to backup. Unless your slaves are underutilised (possible) and identical (possible) then no matter what you're going to have to rebuild a machine when one goes down.
Thankfully this is quite easy these days with the tools we have available. I make sure I have disk images on my server (I'm old school and love file servers... even simple NAS's!) and that makes restoring things to a new computer or even just a new internal drive a doddle. Just be prepared 

@Gerhard Westphalen - I will disagree with you on one point. What using a 10940X has taught me is that the multi-mic, high sampling rate MIX sessions are exactly what these chips are amazing at handling. (I'm on cubase, but I am also running some external software to do panning in non-standard environments). The advantages of high clock speed are most often felt when playing in vsti's / real time audio work. Mixing allows buffers of 2048 which on its own allows huge plugin and track counts, and these massively multi-core systems eat up plugins like nothing I've used before.
[/QUOTE]
I like the idea of redundancy but I myself would have gotten the Mac Pro if it was not so expensive. It should be half the price than what Apple wants. The iMac Pro is over priced as well.


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## Semester At C (Nov 24, 2021)

colony nofi said:


> Yeah I'm definitely going to chime in on the camp of "one machine to do it all".
> And you only need to look at my old (2012 ish) posts here and around the net to know I have had all sorts of master/slave setups. At one point, I was lugging a 17" MBP (modified....those were the days) and 4 x mac mini slave machines with 16 (woah!) GB of memory in each of them.
> 
> Anyway. Needless to say, I am now running single machines. Even my MBP.
> ...


Hi, I'm attempting to move from four farm computers into a one machine solution and would really appreciate any further insights from your experience. 

For starters, are you still using Vienna Ensemble Pro within the one machine? I'm asking because I don't want to wait for all of my vsts to unload and reload every time I change to a different Cubase session that likely shares 95% of the same vsts between sessions. Having VEP running in the background of the DAW machine would still be an improvement vs. maintaining 4 farms.

That said, my understanding is you can tell Kontakt and/or Komplete Kontrol to leave everything loaded in RAM. Is this what you're doing? 

Any specifics on your Kontakt settings and overall set up would be greatly appreciated.
Best


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