# Recycle old Mac Mini Server or buy a portable PC slave for VEPro?



## cato (Feb 5, 2020)

Hey everyone,

Apologies if this has been posted before, but it seems a lot of threads refer to tower PC slaves as opposed to portable units which is what I'm interested in. I've got an old i7 quad core Mac Mini server, but I've been pointed to this unit by a good friend of mine who highly recommends it as a slave PC for running VEPro:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1503326-REG/hp_8jf45ut_aba_z2_mini_g4_i7_9700.html
My question is: should I sell the Mac Mini and invest in this unit, or will the Mac Mini do quite well as it is for running a typical orchestral template (think typical instrument sections using kontakt instances, play, 4-5 omnisphere and UVI instances)?

I'd most likely install an SSD on both units for the main drive, but with the Mac Mini I can also use my Thunderbolt 2 Blackmagic Multidock to stream my samples in my main studio which fits better in my workflow (I have an OWC Thunderbay mini for going on the road).

Basically, I'm trying to find as quiet a slave system as possible that is super portable yet a capable workhorse, hence the small-scale options I'm looking at.

Thanks for any thoughts,

Cato


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## cato (Feb 6, 2020)

No love?


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 6, 2020)

I suspect your question is getting no love for the simple reason that it's sort of a "how long is a piece of string" question - only in this case it's string instruments.

The answer depends on whether your Mac Mini can run the instruments you want it to run. And that depends on processing power and how much RAM you have installed, i.e. if it's not enough then you need a different machine.

Why not just load up the Mac Mini you already own and see how well it does? SSDs do make a lot of difference, so you could either just buy the one(s) you're planning on and use it/them in whichever machine you settle on, or you could do what I'd do: assume that if the Mac Mini gags with a spinning drive, you're too close to maxing it out even if you do add SSDs - and therefore should buy the PC.


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## cato (Feb 7, 2020)

Thanks Nick, maybe you're right and it's a matter of testing the Mac Mini before I do anything else...

It's a relatively powerful machine, but obviously poor in comparison to the new Mac Mini. I suppose I was looking for anyone with experience using a Mac Mini quad server like mine as a slave in VEPro and also a portable PC like the one linked to so I can see the comparison.

Will get my feet wet and set up the MM first. Thanks for your help!


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## Nick Batzdorf (Feb 7, 2020)

The thing is, you can run a *lot* on any modern computer, especially now that Cubase and Logic can both load only the instruments they need to play the session, i.e. the template can be as huge as you want with everything cued up and ready to play.

Now, if you believe what you read on the Internet, you'll think that we're still in the era of needing a new computer every 2-1/2 years.

Man. Why didn't I post this before?


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## Brobdingnagian (Mar 28, 2020)

So what direction did you go in, Cato? Was your mini enough to get the job done?


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## MarcusMaximus (Mar 28, 2020)

For what it’s worth I get a lot of mileage out of using what sounds like the same model Mini Server as a master with a PC slave running VEPro, works very well for the most part runnng reasonably large orchestral projects. See specs below.


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## jcrosby (Mar 28, 2020)

cato said:


> Hey everyone,
> 
> Apologies if this has been posted before, but it seems a lot of threads refer to tower PC slaves as opposed to portable units which is what I'm interested in. I've got an old i7 quad core Mac Mini server, but I've been pointed to this unit by a good friend of mine who highly recommends it as a slave PC for running VEPro:
> 
> ...


I used a steup like this for a while. It worked pretty well. The biggest limitation was RAM... I'd hit the RAM ceiling all the time since these machines were limited to 16 GB. 

As a few others pointed out, I haven't found the need for a slave since they added dynamic plugin loading to Logic. Other DAWs YMMV though.. I've tried most DAWs and none of them are nearly as efficient as Logic... What DAW are you working in?


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## kitekrazy (Apr 9, 2020)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> The thing is, you can run a *lot* on any modern computer, especially now that Cubase and Logic can both load only the instruments they need to play the session, i.e. the template can be as huge as you want with everything cued up and ready to play.
> 
> *Now, if you believe what you read on the Internet, you'll think that we're still in the era of needing a new computer every 2-1/2 years.*
> 
> Man. Why didn't I post this before?



Part of that is because of poor development that throws optimization out the window. Game developers are the worst. Then there is the other side of the coin spending $$$$ on hardware to think it's future proof.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Apr 9, 2020)

What are games?


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