# MacMini for EastWest Composer Cloud ? If not, what ?



## Elephant (Jun 5, 2018)

Has anyone got any hands-on experience with running Composer Cloud with a mac mini (and no slave) and how does it do with LPX ? Any feedback would be appreciated. If the feedback is it runs really badly, is there anything that is small / portable that is OK ? Really appreciate anyone who is a subscriber to the Composer Cloud sharing their proactical experience of what it takes to run it in practice. 
Many thanks !
E


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## Puzzlefactory (Jun 5, 2018)

Depends how big you want your projects to be? 

Personally I would check out the refurbished market place. You can pick up a high spec “cheese grater” for around the same price as a new Mac mini.


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## Elephant (Jun 5, 2018)

Thanks Puzzlefactory. The projects will not be huge. Some orchestral stuff, max size being something like Rossini's William Tell overture.


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## Silence-is-Golden (Jun 5, 2018)

OSX and Play are much more “compatible” these days, but if you want to run bigger projects then the standard recommendation is : get Vepro, even if you run it on one machine.
Works much more efficient(CPU, Ram, track arming) and saves you time, Ram and some minor deficienties that Play can still be prone to within LPX.

In terms of hardware any imac, mini, macbook (pro) with decent specs and sufficient ram will do with the above recommendation.


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## JonesyXL (Jun 5, 2018)

The only Play library I have is Hollywood Brass silver, but I have a 2012 quad core mac mini with 2 ssds and I'm pretty happy with what it can handle. I don't run huge templates but it can cope with a modest orchestral template very well. I do have a couple of Kontakt libs that bring it to its knees if I use multiple instances, and running a lot of soft synths can sometimes cause problems.

I'd predict, although I can't say for sure, that if you have a decent spec mac mini (quad core, 16gb ram and ssds) it should be fine for EW libraries. RAM would be the main issue I think with the Play engine - you'd have to find a way to purge samples (i'm not sure exactly how but I think it can be done).

Of course a new mac book pro with external ssds will be a better option, but obviously its going to cost a lot more.


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## JonesyXL (Jun 5, 2018)

Silence-is-Golden said:


> OSX and Play are much more “compatible” these days, but if you want to run bigger projects then the standard recommendation is : get Vepro, even if you run it on one machine.
> Works much more efficient(CPU, Ram, track arming) and saves you time, Ram and some minor deficienties that Play can still be prone to within LPX.



Ah that's cool, didn't realise VePro was effective on one machine.


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## macmac (Jun 5, 2018)

I don't have Play but I do have a 2014 Mini 2.6 with 16GB RAM and SSD, which replaced my failing-then-dead Mac Pro cheese grater. Here's why: when the pro died, I needed something to tide me over because at that time (and now too), there were no new macs that I wanted. My plan was for the mini to be temporary while I waited, then it would become an extra computer. I had contemplated another MP tower but after having 2 Mac Pros that died, I decided on the mini. Much to my surprise, this little thing has yet to slow me down and surpassed my expectations. Runs everything great, including the latest versions of graphics apps, Logic, and Studio One with a load of plugins and tracks. I'm yet to see a beach ball, and I've had it now for well over a year. It's quiet, does not get hot, and I really love it. It's hooked to a 30" Apple Cinema HD display, and thunderbolt chassis with 4 external hard drives.

That said though, I don't do huge orchestral templates or have VEP requirements—my orchestral needs are mostly for hybrid-type embellishments, so I am absolutely *not* saying this machine could keep up with a huge orchestral track count or that it would satisfy the needs of most people here. I'm sure it would not. But I do own Spitfire, some Sonokinetic, Serum, KU11 and it's all good here. My Slate plugins require 4-cores, yet they work just as well (low CPU) on this 2-core mini as they did on my 8-core MP. To me, it's an impressive machine.

Another thought here: with the Apple yearly OS updates / breakage, etc., I can see the benefit of finding an OS / setup that works then stay frozen that way, as many studios do (hold off on any upgrades of anything). However with the mini, my counter-thought is that because the mini is less money, it doesn't make me feel like I have to keep it for 10+ years to get my money's worth out of it, so for someone who likes to upgrade a computer every couple years or so, a mini is perfect for that. That is if it can meet a person's CPU needs. JMO.


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## Elephant (Jun 5, 2018)

Brilliant answers sofar thanks very much. From this it seems that the next question I need to ask is how much RAM a medium sized orchestral template uses with all the big EW libraries in the Composer Cloud, and is there a way within Play or LPX of purging samples ?


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## Jeremy Spencer (Jun 8, 2018)

Elephant said:


> Brilliant answers sofar thanks very much. From this it seems that the next question I need to ask is how much RAM a medium sized orchestral template uses with all the big EW libraries in the Composer Cloud, and is there a way within Play or LPX of purging samples ?



This is such a hard question to answer. There are so many variables when it comes to orchestral templates, and without knowing the exact patches you'll be loading, it's hard to be precise. Will it be Hollywood Orchestra? Symphonic Orchestra? Goliath? A mix of several? Whatever you choose, just be sure to have at least an i7 processor, 16GB Ram, dedicated SSD(s) for the samples, and an audio interface.


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## resonate (Jun 9, 2018)

Elephant said:


> is there a way within Play or LPX of purging samples ?



The only way of purging sample within Play 6 is to use the manual purge function, which is light years behind Kontakt's unfortunately.....

the best setup would be with Ve Pro 6 - you can disable individual instances & unload from memory by sending a midi CC command / automation from any host.


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## Elephant (Jun 9, 2018)

resonate said:


> The only way of purging sample within Play 6 is to use the manual purge function, which is light years behind Kontakt's unfortunately.....
> 
> the best setup would be with Ve Pro 6 - you can disable individual instances .....



OK this is great. This prompted me to do some searches, and I found Jonathan Wright's articles on setting up templates - if you have an instance per section, or an instance per library, then that will do the trick in LPX until they catch up with Cubase on track disable.


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## Elephant (Jun 9, 2018)

Wolfie2112 said:


> This is such a hard question to answer. ....... Will it be Hollywood Orchestra? Symphonic Orchestra? Goliath? A mix of several? .


Quite. Probably will be a mix of several, and until I start working with Composer Cloud I will not know. 
@macmac what thunderbird enclosure are you using ?


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