Music on PowerMac G4

**MacFeel** · February 7th, 2003, 09:39 PM

Hi!

Im about to swich to a Mac from a crappy Windows driven PC.
I will use it for music only.Are there any musicians here?
I would like to know a few things about the power i can expect from the PowerMac G4 range.
Can someone please tell me how many Audiochannels with Eq,Fx i can get from a PowerMac using Cubase SX or Logic 5,6?
How many softsynths(with total voices) with Eq,Fx can i have on different midichannels?
How many devices can i use in Cubase SX with Reason v2 running from ReWire in Cubase SX?
I hope someone can give me some hint of the power i expect from these PowerMac G4.
Should i wait for the next PowerMac range?
Should i buy the Dual 1.42Ghz PowerMac G4 and expand it to 2 Gb ram?

MacFeel

**Remco** · February 8th, 2003, 03:03 AM

I can't tell you how much is the max, because I, with a G4 800MHz, never reached the max. I can only tell you about my set-up and experiences so far. I have a RME Hammerfall Multiface, a TC-Works Powercore-card and Logic Platinum 5.5. It really works like a dream. My advise is to go for the fastest system you can get. Just ask for info about using duals with audio. I've heard there can be some problems. So, maybe a single G4 is better, but I'm not sure. I would buy the maximum RAM you can get. I would choose Logic, because it's always been ahead of Cubase and now especially, because it's an Apple company, so integration with MacOS X is perfect and will be even better in the future. If you want low latency, go for Mac, not PC. MacOS X is THE music-OS. There's nothing that can compete.
Good reverbs have always been too heavy for Mac's/PC's, so that's why I bought the great Powercore-card, that has wonderful reverbs, compressors, EQ, etc., with no burden on your CPU. Also look at the wonderful UAD-1. Which is very good as a compressor, but has more wonderful things. I mainly use the Emagic EXS24 Mk2 sampler as my sound source (no hardware) and some soft-synths.
Logic 6 will be out this month, which is wonderful. Powercore MacOS X drivers will be released any day now (maybe they're already there). As a sound card the RME Hammerfall Multiface is great. Check their site. Great sound and latency. Also take a look at MOTU's Firewire sound-cards. There's more. They're OS X-ready.

**MacFeel** · February 8th, 2003, 09:02 PM

Thanks for the info!

Could you tell me about how many audiochannels with fx and how many softsynths with fx and voices you can get from your system?

Any info on that would be great

**Remco** · February 9th, 2003, 05:29 AM

I don't know yet, because I haven't reached the limit yet, and I just started using the 800MHz PowerMac.
I think you can get as many audiotracks as you want. Really lots of them (depends on your HD, so you could eventually choose faster PCI IDE-card and a faster HD). The numer of effects could be lots and lots if you use effects like flangers, that don't ask much CPU. If you want top-quality reverbs, your CPU will soon be up its limit. That's why I should also buy a Powercore or UAD-1. The Powercore probably has more CPU (DSP)-power than the PowerMac you will buy. I believe the difference also lies in the fact that a typical desktop computer CPU is good at doing everything. The DSP CPU of the Powercore or UAD-1 isn't good at doing everything, but it's especially very good at calculating effects.
Also with softsynths it differs how much CPU is used. If you buy Logic and use their softsynths, it will be relatively easy on CPU in comparison to using softsynths of other companies. The softsynths are part of the Logic code. Also MacOS X gives you extra CPU headroom. You can use more effects/softsynths in OS X than you can in OS 9.
Another option would be to use a sound-card like the RME Multiface and use it as a mixer. You connect things like a good hardware compressor and reverb to it and route it through a bus, so you can actually use it in your computer as a bus-effect. Haven't tried this, but it should work too. Hardware is more expensive though than a Powercore or UAD-1.
If you want to use many, many sounds then using the EXS24 MkII soft-sampler of Emagic is the way to go. Uses very little CPU, just needs lots of RAM. That's what I use. It has great filters and parameters, so you're free to do whatever you want. And you're able to get the most wonderful sounds, like synths, analog, real instruments, etc.

**MacFeel** · February 9th, 2003, 06:07 PM

Thanks again!

Could you do a test for me?
I wonder if you could make a 5 minute song with audiotracks(as many as possible on your machine) that lasts for 5 minutes,let them be in stereo and use eq,fx on all of those audiotrack channels.Could you also use softsynths on maybe 16 midi channels with eq,fx max voices on all synths,really max it out.
This is important for me,please?
I need this type of information as a musician because,its easier to see the whole picture like this.
I hope you can help me

Thanks

**Ricky** · February 9th, 2003, 10:41 PM

The dual 1.42 GHz PowerMac would handle that like a champion, man.

I've used a dual G4 533 MHz... it's fantastic. I bet it would handle it well too.

**MacFeel** · February 10th, 2003, 06:51 PM

Hi!

I know that the Powermac G4 is verry powerfull.I need to know exactly how much i can get out of it.Its a lot of money for me to buy this PowerMac G4 so,i need to know how much it can give me,performance wise that is.I hope someone can and will do a test for me.If you are an musician and use a PowerMac G4 Dual version,could you please also do some tests for me?
I will be verry happy if anybody can do that.

**Meltdown** · February 10th, 2003, 08:45 PM

Using Dual 1 gig Quicksilver G4 and Digital performer 3.11
30 mono and 28 stereo tracks 24bit/44.1 K
60 plugins eq, bombfactory Classic compressors, reverbs etc. Never have maxed it out yet!
34 rewired channels with Reason synths and samplers.
Both processors at approx 70%
Note: I use scsi lv160 15K drives wich are not standard issue and are expensive.
Using a Rme multiface with Dsp wich doesn't strain the cpu so much.
I will add a Powercore in the near future. Warning: The new Macs don't boot in OS9 anymore.
Only the dual 1.25 gig will!
A lot of pro audio apps and plugins will need OS9 for now.