We were going to add a bunch of broll for this vid but we've got too many projects that need to be finished .... so treat this vid like a mini podcast ❤ Also! If you're planning on subscribing and want more 'Music Tech' related content, then sub to our new tech channel 'Tefty Music Tech' here: th-cam.com/channels/_0rGx4ifn3dufNhicjh06g.html All future technical music related content will be on that channel going forward. All future music 'performance' related content will stay on this channel! Cheers 🙏 Tefty & Meems
So if I'm using Logic with a bunch of third-party plugins that another Logic user doesn't have, would I not still have to do an audio bounce from the relevant track to make it useful for them?
I've watched quite a few Mac vs Win video's when it comes to music production. This is the first video that factually and specifically explains why this or that OS is better, or less suited. thanks for the knowledge. I've been using an M1 for about 2 years now (before Windows), and for everyday, non-professional use the user experience sure is sweet. My favorite feature by far on Macs is the way plugins install. You don't have to think about, just a few clicks and it's done. They are always installed on exact the same location, ready to use in your DAW. No more fiddling about in the folder/data management of your DAW to point your DAW to all the different folders where plugins were installed.
Making music on a Windows PC for a long time. No major Issues to report. I am using many VST instruments and physical synths. Windows 11, Studio one 6, N.I. library, Izotope processing amongst many more. Again, very happy and see no reasons to switch
Same here, though I'm on Windows 10. From what I've seen of 11, I'll pass. But yeah, I've had no major issues with Windows, and I've been producing music on Windows since the turn of the century.
PC 1992-2005 Mac 2005-2015 PC 2015- to date. Reason? RAM. I run 256mb RAM. NO ONE can afford Apple RAM. As I don’t use the music PC for anything other than music production. Absolutely no issues with windows or any software integration.
@@JTPiano2011 Good point, RAM is so important. I just looked at the Apple website and choose the biggest RAM option, just to have a look at the price... well, compared to the 24gb RAM option, Apple charges 1.600$ for the upgrade to 128gb of RAM. This is a crime.
I used to be a Mac user; what really drove me to using a Windows PC for music was waiting for plugin vendors to update whenever a new OS comes out. Legacy plugins on a MAC? Pain in the ass. On windows? Everything works, with jBridge also really, really old stuff. Opening a session from 2005? Not a problem, all the plugins will (or can) be there.
I used to need to use my computers for a lot more than music production. Gaming, Analysis software, CAD, etc so it was PC all the way because you were extremely limited in what Apple supported for outside of standard productivity , video editing, and music composition. Now I have a dedicated music production laptop and desktop and stayed with Windows. Everything works just fine for me. Drivers aren’t a problem and both are user upgradeable (a must for me). Apple isn’t flexible. Repair and upgrades aren’t going to happen. I need to have control of my hardware.
This Video is about music production, not about all you want to do with a computer. I started 2004 with music production on a PC/Windows. After 2 years I switched to a Mac. That was way more flexible in things of music production. A few years later I switched back to Windows, because a new Mac was too expensive for me. 1 year ago I switched again back to Mac, because of the new Mac Mini M1 machines. And they are brilliant for music production and the prices now are also very good for what you get…thunderbolt 4 for example. The only thing a PC is better is for gaming, nothing else. I know a lot of people who make video productions, not one of them are using a PC for this. Mac all the way for media production these days, no question.
@@axoplanet6081 False, I’m not a bottleneck myself to hardware, it is optimized better for music media? Yes is it the only and best option? Subjective 8-21-23
I find myself thinking along similar lines - regardless of all the specification details, RAM is always the most important for what I do as well as touch screens - touch screen dj laptops, 4 touchscreens in the studio and 128gb of ram for the studio ($2.5k for the Alienware), laptops with 64gb ram $2k, maybe $1.5k used - Macs will never have touchscreens or upgradable ram to levels available elsewhere so that is that. LOL - Its really hard to pay the same or more for way less in both of these areas - limitations of ram and no touchscreens on desktops/laptops is a deal breaker for me.
The big problem with Apple is that it breaks compatibility with almost every OS update. If you have Waves plugins, be prepared to buy their Waves Update Plan every year because the plugins will no longer work after an OS update. You can of course choose not to update your OS, but then after a few years you can't use new plugins anymore because your OS is outdated. The same with DAWs, if you want to keep running an old version of a DAW because you don't want/need the latest paid upgrade, then don't update your Mac OS because your DAW will no longer run. Windows doesn't have this problem, I still run some V10 Waves plugins without any issues and if I want I can run a 10 year old version of any DAW and it will just work.
I never had any of these issues. I have a mac mini from 2012 that was updated to Catalina (2019) and is able to use new plugins and old plugins from old OS. Also, updating to Catalina did not affect my old plugins nor my DAW. I'm still able to user an older version of GB. Sounds to me like a user problem.
Its well known when you update Mac os many things it wont work. Well I have friends that say they dont have issues but they end in tech support anyway😅@@nightfightsday
I have been doing MIDI stuff since the mid-80s. Started with Atari STs, and in the 90s, switched to PC and have been all PC ever since. Recently upgraded my $300 off-lease Dell 4th Gen i5 PC with 16GB RAM and 1TB HD to a brand new Ryzen 7 5700G with 32GB of memory and dual NVME internal drives: 1TB and 512GB. The total cost of the new PC was sub $1000. The only new Mac M1 you could get for around the same price is a 8GB RAM/512GB SSD. I have used Behringer interfaces for quite a while and have never run into problems with their UMC drivers. I have had no need for multiple audio interfaces, so ASIO has worked just fine for me. I use 7 or 8 different DAWs and tons of VIs and effects and everything works really smoothly.
I know this is a year old, but it may be worth considering the project SynchronouseAudioRouter, if you're on Windows. Basically it's a low levl C++ lib that emulates aggregation without using Asio4All, but rather leveraging the Asio driver on the audio interface itself. Ran into this problem on windows recently, using my RME Fireface UCX II, which only has 1 x 8 ADAT IO. So extending my IO using a second interface was fine, but what I really wanted was to get 16 input/outputs so that I could use my cranborne on one and my eurorack on the other.
Another big advantage from the Mac side with respect to hardware MIDI is that Core MIDI supports audio timestamping so MIDI interfaces which support this (like my Edirol UM-880) are much more accurate in terms of outputting stable MIDI clock and again you're not reliant on proprietary drivers.
I’m glad I found your video because this is a topic that hits home for me because I’ve always been that rare person who has been using windows, Mac and Linux for the past 20 years because i just never thought of it as a mutually exclusive choice. I’m a server software architect so Linux, Mac and Windows was always just necessary platforms to have around. When I put together my latest gaming rig I did it on windows because games. When I put tighter my music production studio I used my MacBook Pro, because I didn’t want to clutter my gaming space with music stuff. I have 3 MacBook pros all from 2019, 32 gb intel core I-9. Top of the line but not Apple silicon because I didn’t want to waste more money on buying another MacBook when I already had 3 that were only a few years old. I’m starting to wish I made a new pc for the production studio based on the things you mentioned. Despite these MacBooks having core I-9 and 32gb, I can make a pc that has a better proceseor and more ram for cheaper, and it won’t affect my workflow to switch os at all. It kind of doesn’t really make sense to use Mac unless you prefer Mac for whatever reason. Just use what you like.
This is a fantastic video! I would have gone with mac if mac's could be troubleshooted and build/rebuilt. I don't like proprietary nonsense, I like the ability to take a panel off and make an upgrade if needed or even fix something rather than send it back and wait two weeks to hear "It's borked, buy another one". I've worked with a couple artists that had mac's that crapped out, and had friends with PC's that crapped out. Electronics will be electronics, at the end of the day since I'm an avid "Hybrid" Hardware-Software user. I'll stick with windows, purely because I use an apollo x8p that handles all of my outboard gear and a modified windows system that uses a Thunderbolt workaround. Either way, I agree, both have their drawbacks and their advantages and I'm glad you went in depth to the issues with both systems!! This needs to be heard everywhere!
@@chokocat9064 Apple and Microshaft both should be held responsible as monopolies and be forced to design backward compatibility and repairability into EVERY area possible. ANY efforts to prevent repair or update should be treated as a criminal act against our economy, against our ecology, against our kids, against our sustainability.
This is the exact video I have been looking for. Thank you for shooting this informational video without showing any bias. Your perspective is very specific to our industry and helpful in 2023.
Always been a Mac user from the late 90's. Work as a producer and sound engineer ( both Live and studio, ) and also lecture music production and live sound in a Uni that is all Mac based, never even considered a PC. Why would I. Not even an industry standard in my world. Until a few years ago when I started to learn motion graphics, CGI, generative graphics, Unreal engine and 3D (and very quickly found that a Mac doesn't cut it in that world. ) So I installed a custom Ryzen 9 3950x 2080ti PC in my studio. To cut a long story, one day ( just for shits and giggles ) decided to instal Ableton on the PC to see how it faired. Basically I was totally blown away by the sheer power of the machine over my Macbook Pro ( yes it's a desktop vs a Laptop ) but still, I loved it from the get go. Just ridiculously powerful. And, for some things I actually preferred the windows environment over OSX, especially the file management. I connected the PC to my modular setup via my expert sleeper/RME baby face combo ( which is solid ) installed Bitwig and haven't looked back. Now I absolutely love it. FTR my PC cost my around £4K here in the UK, the equivalent Mac Pro ( at the time, 3 years ago ) would have cost me around £12K and it wouldn't have run the renderers needed for the 3D work I was doing. Anyway, I still use the Mac for teaching and the odd project but I'm loving the PC all the way ( never thought I'd say that sentence either ) My only real issue ( and I agree here ) it that the PC is awful with aggregate devices, core audio is way better for bigger setups. It also can't run Logic Pro, Pro Tools looks crap on it ( which is surely an avid thing ) and I can't run the Dolby renderer for Atmos mixing on the PC which is a pain as it's something I'm learning ( again, an avid thing ) And to top it all off I get to run Microsoft Flight sim in my downtime which is amazing. At the Uni I get to work on the new Mac studio computers too, I find them a little frustrating to be honest now, especially with file management. The M1 chips are not as great IRL as people make out either, lots of issues over the intels, especially with plugins and older interfaces. I don't really like Ventura either, Apple IMO keep making the OS worse by trying to make it simpler. Anyway, that's my take. PC's though are definitely not the dogs they used to be though, that I'm absolutely positive about.
Hey, thanks for the great writeup. Would you mind explaining in what way file management bugs you on Mac? I keep hearing this, and I don't quite get it. I'm really curious. I've used Mac, Windows, and Linux Desktops in workplaces and at home in the past and they all worked well for me. I like and dislike them all in some way, so I'm not trying to be glib or anything. Thanks 🙂
Similar story for me. Used Mac until the mid 2000;s then you realise how much more audio processing power is available on PC than a Mac. Arguably you pay a little with less stability, but it's usually just a settings issue. The latest DAWBench results show just how much M1 & M2 is underperforming for similar or more money.
I got a new MacBook with Ventura and wanted to toss it and ProTools out the window the first day..complete disappointment. Yes Apple build quality is supreme but the operating system on the MacBook feels like I went back in time. I have to take and extra step to get simple things done. Graphics are great but doesn’t matter if I’m frustrated with the system..even my cheapest windows laptop does the functions the MacBook can’t..I’m all in on windows. Just easy to navigate..once you learn all the short cuts on windows you’ll see how much more you get. Apple is a great phone..earplugs..watches etc..but MacBook is not for me. Sorry Apple. 👎
I started years ago in the same way you did, I was a Pro Tools engineer in Nashville from 2000 to 2005 and I owned 2 full Pro Tools TDM systems and rented them out to artists so they could record at home. Back then you still couldn't mix in the box since most CPUs were single core, but you could do 90% of your tracking at home. I switched to using a Mac in 2004 simply because of core audio. I still have both Windows for some things but I use Macs for music because of Core Audio, which replaced the ASIO standard that everyone (Mac, PC & BSD) used back then and Windows still uses it. Core Audio put the driver standard in the actual OS Kernel making the need for a driver for 90% of interfaces a thing of the past and it integrated nicely with the operating system and your DAW. Also your DAW doesn't take over your computer's entire audio system like ASIO when using the Core audio which is nice if I want to refrence a song on TH-cam during a mix session. Most (not all) Windows drivers are the standard USB Ploytec driver which is just class compliant USB passthrough, which isn't that great. So it can be hit or miss with some interfaces. Others like RME and Motu have built their own drivers with most engineers saying they are rock solid. Thunderbolt drivers are pretty much rock solid on a Mac while I hear tons of engineers complain about how terrible most Thunderbolt drivers for Windows. I like Windows for engineering apps like solidworks. But I find myself moving more and more toward Linux over Windows but I use Macs for audio production in my studio everyday and for live audio nothing has been as stable as MacOS when using live audio production apps like Mainstage or even Waves Soundgrid. But over all It's like a car, some people have great experiences with Chevy cars while other people have better experiences with Ford so you stick with what you are most comfortable with.
WASAPI is essentially CoreAudio for Windows, it bypasses the OS kernal like ASIO. End of the day ITB is all happening on the CPU so CoreAudio, ASIO or WASAPI all perform pretty much the same in my testing.
@@SamHocking WASAPI only works in USB class 1 mode which is Kernel streaming with an endpoint buffer even in exclusive mode, on the other hand ASIO works in USB Class 2 mode only and has NO dependency on the Kernel for audio whatsoever. WASAPI is using the Kernel audio you can see this in Microsoft's own diagram on WASAPI audio in a article called "User-Mode Audio Components". So whether in Shared mode or Exclusive mode the audio is moving through the OS Kernel to stream the audio back to the device making it more prone to audio distortions and higher latency depending on the type of CPU. ASIO on the other hand bypasses the Kernel and allows for the lowest latency possible this is why no audio interface company builds a WASAPI driver they all build ASIO drivers. There are a couple DAWs that have implemented WASAPI options into their apps like Reaper or Mixcraft but it still is prone to Kernel distortions from aliasing and endpoint buffers. If Microsoft would just fix the operating system to handle correctly this wouldn't be so convoluted for the end user to understand but because Microsoft want to support legacy devices going back over 35 years they will not fix it anytime soon. Even Linux has a better implementation. For years Linux used Jack-Audio for pro audio but they have now switched to an API called called Pipewire which is basically a clone of the Mac's core audio system. Pipewire is a transparent audio implementation of Class 2 USB audio for professional devices "driver-free". So to answer your question WASAPI is nothing like core audio and No WASAPI does not bypass the kernel in windows. These are just facts from Microsoft. But at the end of the day use whatever operating system you like and are comfortable with and make great music. Cheers!
@@joesalyers I can only go by my own testing, I saw no difference in DAWBench stress testing re. Latency or DSP performance. Of course having a common interface from Windows itself and my DAW is also useful whereas ASIO requires a bridge to WDM to work. End of the day it all works for a typical ITB studio. If you have a link to exclusive mode using windows kernel, I'd be interested, I couldn't see anything. Seems to bypass WAE entirely and direct to hardware driver?
@@SamHocking There are 2 types of class compliant audio devices for USB WASAPI is a class 1 device and only ASIO drivers and Thunderbolt drivers are class 2 which is the professional standard that does not use the internal USB clock. USB Clocking causes jitter since data streams are in packets and not direct streaming like Class 2 which uses the audio interface's clock or if you use a wordclock with your interface ASIO will use the external Wordclock timing.
Just took the plunge and got an M1 MBP. It's Ramen Noodles for awhile, but (re)starting (after 20+ years) and after tons of research and talking to folks who do music production, it just seemed the best bet. My Windows machine was a boss and ostensibly for gaming as well, but truth be told I'd collected a large Steam library that gathered dust. It's kind of a weird feeling now. Like when I finally gave up a landline (I'm over 50, so that was really daunting!). Your vid helped confirm that I made the right choice (for me). Cheers!
Congrats! Hopefully the transition goes well. It can be very awkward for a few months when you switch systems. Macs have a different approach to things, but ultimately all the typical stuff can be done just as effectively.
Outstanding video. One thing I’m curious to hear your thoughts on that I see as a major negative with Apple is how frequently they update the OS-and I don’t mean that from a windows has a security update comparison standpoint, I mean from an OS versioning issue. So many plugins (sometimes even DAWs as a whole) break with an upgrade from one Mac OS to another and require an expensive upgrade for the plugins (Waves is known for this). With Windows I have both old and new plugins running and have never been forced to buy a plug-in upgrade due compatibility. I can even run old pro tools versions using the compatibility modes windows has (such as run in windows 8 compatibility mode). I see that as a huge plus. Especially for hobbyist. What do you think?
…oh and to expand on that negative you can only avoid it for so long as when you get a new Apple computer you have to upgrade to a minimum of the OS that device ships with.
@@peteytwofinger thanks man. It’s a shame but I’m surprised how few people mention this major pain point. Especially considering the cost of plugin and saw upgrades by companies that charge.
@@musictechdude8On the flip side, if you want to make the most of the last generation or so of both AMD and Intel hardware on the PC side, you have to use Windows 11.
@@TheMuso28 true but it’s not a breaking change. I’ve never even had a major version of windows cause issues with compatibility and if it does they have “run in windows __ compatibility mode”
Thanks for your interesting perspective on this emotive issue. To use a British expression it's 'horses for courses'. At present I think Mac has the lead in terms of music production. However, I bought a 2007 Mac Book Pro for Cubase 4 controlling Reason 4 by Rewire. I'd only had it 5 months and then along came a new OS and the expectation that I'd willing splash out more cash now my wallet had been assimilated by the MacBorg. I never upgraded it, I froze the system in time and it still works fine today with Cubase, Reason and firewire and my wallet dodged a bullet. I'm used to building my own PCs (it's fun for me) and I know where I am with Windows and Cubase 11 & 12. I usually write retro synth pop (no symphonic orchestral stuff) and I like to keep the track count under 30, which means it's less resource hungry on my modest 64bit Win10 i7 laptop. I still use an old 2015 AMD A10 Win10 with Cubase 5 using older 32bit VSTs/VST2s and bounce between the two. I guess Tefty, at 57 I'm stuck in my ways, but if I was new to Music Production I probably would go the Mac mini route.
Thanks for sharing. I use an smaller MiniM1 as my Music only computer. aspects on MacMini specifically a.) it is silent/tiny/easy to tug away- no fans B) hard drive space on those - too small for my liking and bigger ones are uneven more expensive. You can get around with an external drive but really wish the internal would start at 512GB to have room for libraries.
I finally decided to look into this topic and when I saw the search results, I instinctively chose your video first because I can always trust your input to be fair and nuanced.
Yeah when I first started making music it was on hardware sequencers. Around the mid 00s I was looking to go DAW. Everyone I knew used an apple, so when I went to see what was on offer, I was floored by how little you got for the price. I'd used and built PCs all my life, and could build a PC with the same hardware for less than half the price. Architecture can play a role, but I'm still not sure that what you get with the M series is worth the money. This can also be true if you're using it for more than just DAW. Like if you're using it for video production or content creation, etc. If you're strictly a beat maker or on the EDM scene in music production then I'd say it might be ok, but I don't know, I'm just used to building my PCs because I know exactly what's in it, and can fix/replace those parts if need be. As for the windows issues, I think most people will not notice these. If you get to where you're going to open a pro studio type of environment then you'll likely need to consider those limitations, but short of that, everyone else should be fine. Thanks for this video, I thought it was well thought out and informative.
Thank you for the video. Just to clarify some details: 1) I'm on Windows 10 and with the Roland UM-ONE I have no problems with real-time midi sharing to other devices, and Antelope Audio's ASIO allows me to share it in real-time with others DAWs! 2) Just to note that even now free effects and synthesizers appear for Windows and besides there are so many good old plugins that still work at full power, something unusual and disadvantageous for the Apple world ;)
Just a few thoughts: 1) The sheer number of comments by Mac users who are literally BEGGING companies to make M1 native versions of their stuff made me think that it was not a good choice, at least not at the moment. 2) For me, it has a lot to do with CONTROLLING my equipment myself, and not have a manufacturer block everything. I like to have the choice to upgrade RAM or CPU a few years down the road without having to change everything and pay through the nose to improve my system after a few years using it and seeing where bottlenecks truly are for MY work environment and tasks. Apple doesn’t give you this power. 3) the insane issues you get when your OS gets upgraded is way worse on Mac than PC. You end up having to pay again while on PC you don’t have to for a long time.
That is indeed true. I am hugely against apple products for their track record of screwing up previous generation devices via software updates. On the other hand, i've seen pc devices that came out the time of Vista or windows 7 and you're still able to upgrade up to windows 11. Apple, you'll be lucky to get more than 1 os jump/upgrade.
I find that on Windows 10 and 11, my Scarlett 4i4 3rd Gen audio interface keeps crashing. A couple of times a day, the sound becomes "robotic," and I have to restart the interface. Many people complain online about it. I'm going to see if the Mac does this, too.
It seems we're ignoring that you can upgrade your computer when you go with a windows machine. That's not a minor thing. I don't know if this is still the situation, but there were a lot of great free VST plugins that only worked on windows. I'd only recommend a Mac if you're specifically looking to use Logic or work with Logic files.
As a data point: I am on a high-spec Mac Laptop with 3 MOTU AVB interfaces. I'm pleased and working fine. Taken as a whole the system was expensive, but I didn't buy it all at once, I added AVB interfaces over time. As I need more audio IO I will continue to add interfaces. Your milage may vary, but I can work and do what I need to do at this point and have had zero downtime to date. Regardless, thank you for this video and keep 'em coming!
Stumbled upon this trying to do some research for a purchase, ended up so confused on why you seemed so familiar then I realized it, I used to watch the hell of your Destiny content years ago!!!
I hear what you saying but I have to disagree with you with the apple M1 Mac Mini. I bought one a year ago I tried Apple I really tried to like the machine yes Apple silicone is fast but I found Macos very limiting for me. I did buy the 16 gig 256 I just couldn't believe how much of a price jump from 256 to 512 or 1tb would be. So I bought an external 1tb drive clone the main Mac drive to it but then I found out the harsh reality that Apple will not allow you to do upgrades on the external drive even if you type in the password to do the OS upgrades because it's not a mac Drive. Needless to say I bought a used HP Mini PC with an i7 9700 maxed out the RAM and I have a 2tb SSD and I can't tell the difference in performance between the M1 and that setup. The Benchmark says that the M1 should be mopping the floor with the i7 9700 but in real-world use it's not. The only thing the M1 is better at is editing videos and I'm going to keep it around for that purpose and that purpose only. But for audio production I'm going to use my new intel setup. Plus being back on Windows particularly Windows 11 I love the interface of Windows 11 is gorgeous, smooth and the automatic window resizing the effortless control I have is really refreshing for me.
Thunderbolt is made by Intel but used on Mac.. (faster than USB for latency) .. so I built a PC with a motherboard to suit thunderbolt 3 to achieve low latency and bought the presonus quantum 2626 soundcard. I won't be going back to using Mac I have so much power and upgradability now. It just flies.
what about a 2020 5k imac (vs a m1 mac mini) for this sort of thing? Right now a refurb 5k 10th gen i7 imac can be had for about $1200, and with less than $200 you can get 64Gb of RAM. Any comments?
It’s not going to be suppprted forever now they’ve moved to Apple Silicon. For reference. When they switched from PowerPC to Intel Panther (10.3) had Rosetta for running PowerPC code on Intel Macs, Tiger (10.5) was the last OS to support PowerPC and Lion (10.7) dropped Rosetta too. Sonoma could already be considered the current Tiger equivalent. The CPU power of an M2, let alone M2 Pro or M3 is already vastly higher than even the 8-core i9 iMacs and 16-core Xeon Mac Pro from 2019 so getting a brand new M2 Mac Mini as a BTO with 16 or 24GB RAM would be better option than an i7-based Intel Mac.
Reliability, legacy compatibility, noise level, USB speed, cost, multitasking and security were all important considerations for our studio. We ended up settling for a reconditioned HP Z440 Workstation with an 8 core Xeon and 256GB. It needs to run 24/7 in our use model and we cannot afford any kind of hang up or glitch. I know it's not that exciting but real work use cases rarely are. We do hide the box and have some pretty peripherals to try and make it all look a bit sexier 🤣. We also have a first gen Mac Mini lying in the cupboard for people who feel they need it. We run Wavelab etc and it's a professional setting. For non techy types or beginners, Mac may well be the best option.
I still use my old Z600 and it must be 12 years old filled with dual hex Xeons and 64Gb Ram. Recently upgraded one of my old music workstations to the 9600+ with the ASUS Creator board and 64Gb Ram, wow yeah the Z600 is slower but it still does the job !!!
Great talk, and got me thinking. I used Apple from the Mac Classic until the Mac Pro 2010, then changed to Windows in 2015 mainly for gaming. I would not mind doing music production on Mac again, but that means having two systems in my room again. But for those who choose today and start fresh, yeah go Mac all the way!
Before continuing I must commend you for the sheer quality of A. the mic setup you’re using and B. whatever settings youve got going over there. You sound like you’re next to me talking and im using an iPhone 15 Pro.
I like to perform at the riverside sometimes, at the beach, and also at local mountain vistas. iPad Pro and Arturia light mk3 61 keyboard, paired with their mini audio interface can be carried on my back in a case with no issues, with a decent Roland portable speaker and beers in backpack. All battery operated. I can’t bring my very expensive pc there or even the fancy MacBook. Those are basically for home use. The best part of this setup is that if you break any of the hardware devices, they are cheaper to replace.
WOW!... so much useful info here... thank you for sharing... I do have the Mac side as I am a little weak with the gray matter between my ears and I was told a long time ago to go with Mac as it would be easier... to your point with the Mac, the drivers are pretty much a non issue and I also think you are right in regards to instruments like a Cobalt being plugged into your computer for tweeking and using it in Logic as a way forward... Thanks again...
25+ years using Microsoft products, 12 or so on MacOS (OS/X, etc) and recently tried Windows for AV production, mainly to save money. I needed a computer to a) use OBS for streaming/recording, b) edit videos using Resolve and c) audio recording using Reaper. It needs to be able to drive (2) 29” UW IPS displays, offer both wired and wireless and have a buttload of USB ports for all the inputs. For the audio input I have a small 2i4 but am looking at a TASCAM model 12 for it. I went with a decent sized Dell and from the get-go I had issues with video drivers, the usual Nvidia ones, the driver crashed every 3-4 minutes. I tried every fix possible and nobody, Dell included, could get that fixed. Tried to set up an HP LaserJet printer and it still doesn’t work. When I got to the USB side, I added a 10 port powered hub and never was able to make all of them work. I spent 8 weeks reinstalling drivers, cleaning registry keys, swapping cards around and even installing different RAM chips just to see if that was it. It never worked. To try the Mac side I took my previous MacBook Pro from work, they had just upgraded me to a new 16” MBP so I had it sitting around. Plugged all the same hardware in to the MBP and it didn’t miss a beat. All of it just worked. Having spent probably millions of hours on computers, 25 years in the industry (in cyber-security now) I have come to the following: If you want to work ON your computer, buy a PC and run Windows, if you want to WORK on your computer, buy a Mac. Every one of my team at work is issues a MBP, many of them have never used MacOS, the most common thing I hear about the UI is “it’s different, I have to get used to not fighting the computer so much”. Windows users are accustomed to fiddling with, and fixing, their computer OS, to the point that’s their expectation now. MacOS you don’t, focus on actually using your computer now. So, I’m going to go with an M1 Mac Mini, 16GB and 512GB disk. I’ll add a dock to the bottom of it with a 4TB SSD as my “work disk” and backup to the cloud. I’ll add (2) 8 port powered USB hubs and connect the (2) ultra-wide displays via a dock/replicator I already have. Add the Magic keyboard, a USB jog/shuttle dial, all for around $1500. Based on previous experience with Mac’s for work I’ll get 5, possibly 6, and maybe even 7 years out of it. Don’t get me started about how easy it is to back up a Mac using Time Machine, it’s easy and just works. 8 weeks on a PC and never produced a single track. 1 day on the Mac and I had audio recorded. What costs you more, time or money?
I just do home recording, but even for that, I finally got myself a mac to get by all the pc issues, driver problems, incompatibilities. I've been working with PC's professionally for almost 30 years (building, configuring, programming, etc...), and I'm a little tired of spending days troubleshooting pc problems. Mac works out of the box (for the most part). I know that both have issues, but for recording, I find mac to be the easier road to take. best for me: dedicated Mac for music, Pc for everything else ;)
Apple Silicon didn't help to make pricing sane actually, "premium" especially for upgrades of memory or storage is still about 8x more expensive than PC counterparts nowadays, base model Macs with 8GB memory and 256GB storage simply aren't enough for any meaningful work..
I'm pretty new to production and was wondering about the real differences. Like you, I build all my PCs as well so it's all Linux and Windows over here.
When it comes to audio interface drivers on Windows from my experience nothing beats RME. Fab support, low latencies even on USB2, top stability. Since the M1 release I am on the fence to switching, especially for the mentioned reason of aggregate AU, which is great when you need lots of I/O to connect. However, I still have concerns with Macs because of lack ports. I am using c 15 USB ports on my PC - 8 on board, rest connected by Hub. I am not sure how to connect all my gear on these 2 Thunderport connections that e.g. the MacPros have? Great video btw, thumbs up!
my M2 Max MBP has 3x thunderbolt 4 ports, but I still feel what you're saying. Ultimately it'd make sense to have a MIDI hub with several DIN MIDIs _and_ several USB MIDI ports. I've spec'd this out for my future DAWless system
Started with apple in the 90’s, right up until 2014 when my iMac went faulty just outside of warranty. I left apple and went with an i5 windows pc with 8GB ram. Updated over the years but was brilliant for basic music production. Just gone back to apple with a M1 Mac mini, it’s great. I’ve already got an iPhone so it nice for everything g to be synced up. Plus it runs some of my iPad apps like moog, mela, zeeon etc. inside of ableton as au’s. I’ve only gone for native apple silicone plug ins and use Ableton 11 with a push 2. Really happy so far. My only gripe with apple (which covers all their products) is in/outs/storage and ram. Measly port numbers and basic storage with no upgrade. My Mac mini is 512gb/8GB and I use an external nvme 1tb drive for samples and packs. I’ve kept my windows laptop for mobile music as I like having all the ports and extra storage built in with no dongles etc.
me, I use Ableton live. it works on both mac and win. but... as my experience, live and macos were made for ich other. I'm not saying windows is impossible to work with, but specially if you're a laptop producer... windows can be a pain in the ass. the hardware is amazing compared to Macbooks, but the software is where it lies the problem. guess on Desktops is different. but yeah I started with Mac, and it is best to stick what works for you in this area. but I get it... companies don't make it easier to pick
Thanks for sharing your insights and the pros and cons of both PC vs MAC. Am a PC user by choice, mainly for cost, expansion, diversity, external components, but can agree on driver issues, and some others you mention. Also, it seems Apple keeps switching plugs, cost of monitors, and limited memory specially on laptops, for example the MSI Triton in higher end laptops you can slam 128GB of high quality RAM, along with what at least 8 TB of M.2 NVMe 4x4 & likely more soon, and recently support for Thunderbolt 4 & USB 3.2 with A & C slots, at prices far below high end Apple systems. Also, the choices in DAW's, as well as VST's in synths and FX, both offering more choices. Time will tell but think any weaknesses on PC's will be addressed in time.
I am working with windows 11 and RME Fireface UFX +. The computer is connected with Thunderbolt 4 (adapter to 2) but also with USB 3. Nuendo works perfectly. In my opinion, RME cards are the best available today for a professional studio.
Just thought I'd post this. I came across some info on the newer M chips. Apple skimped on the processing cores and added more GPU and efficiency cores to the chips. This is a problem for most DAWs, as they cannot utilize the efficiency cores, with the exception of Reaper and Cubase. So you're actually getting less cores to work with on the newer chips if you're running any other DAW. So, if you're using a lot of plugins, it'd be best to go with an M1 chip. If you're using it for more than just audio, like editing videos, etc. then the newer chips might be the better option.
The best part about working on Windows is that there's a natural emphasis on backwards compatibility. That means OS updates don't break your plugin's dependencies. You can use the same plugin version forever and it'll just keep working. I do wish that Microsoft would overhaul their audio system. It's way overdue. Something like pipewire on linux would be amazing.
The Logic Pro Argument is the only one. ...have been working for 25 years on both plattforms, but the last 5 years with an 11 year old HP Z800 workstation (about 8000 $ then, 600 now) with 2 6-core 3.3 Ghz XEON processors. Now for the first time I have a problem that the new NI Massive synth needs a newer chip generation. I got a 5 year old laptop for this. Folks, buy old workstations for 1/10th the original price and be happy. I recommend anything from the HP Z620. the times when macs where better for music productions endet 2009, in my opinion. yiu just have to know what to do with your windows OS, or where to get and to know debloaking.
How is plugin support on the apple silicon computers? I have lots of older/special plugins that runs fine on my intel iMac, but I have been holding off upgrading because of the specialized equipment I have. (ie plugins for specific older hardware that arent being updated any longer)
Use both! My PC I use for both video editing (divinci) and for my DAW pro tools! This setup is the same as as my MacBook Pro 16 2019 ! Both are of hi spec and both never reach their optimum! My Mac is obviously my portable! Has a 64gb ram a 2tb internal SSD i9. Were as my desktop windows 10 has 128gb of ram with 4 m2 2tb internal SSD’s with a further 12tb of external SSD! Truly bulletproof! Happy camper!
What about for VST realtime playing ? I have never been able to stabilize my Windows pc and I have applied all the possible optimisation tricks. I always stay with some dropouts, not frequent... but still there
switched from an i79850 16gb 512 GBSSD Windows 11 Laptop to a used Macbook pro M1 16GB 512 SSD aletly because i had 1. unstable drivers with focusright 2i2 gen 1(dropouts) and 2. CPU overusage (115%) while producing electronic dance music / trance / techno using only heavy SW plugins and samplers in ableton live 11. On the mac -> driver problems gone (plug and play), CPU usage on the same track went down from 115% to 35%!! I was a PC fan and music producer since the 90ies, but aple silicon convinced me to change. what a good decision! I can´t even see how i can out produce the M1 the next couple of years. Only downside is, that i have to learn all the apple shortcuts..but thats ok. can only recommend M1 apple
Dang we have the same i7. Im still using mine for the forseeable future. Maybe in a year I'll finally bite the bullet and get a new studio rig together.
That thing with having multiple apps open all using the same audio output interface, at different buffer sizes and sample rates, as well as sharing same midi port within multiple open apps on Mac is a game changer in itself.
Too reasonable, watched, enjoyed and liked anyway. Always used Windows, just grabbed a 27” iMac that was $600 off. The info about ASIO was gold, thanks. Going to use the iMac for music and graphics, keep using the PC for gaming. Don’t understand all the grief between users of the two.
I'm doing Large orchestra work in the meantime and been having but have been limited to rhe i7 Laptop I have which runs great but I want to have something that does 3d rendering and video editing for blender, Houdini, Unreal Engine, z brush, and Davinci Pro. Would you recommend AMD threadripper chip, intel 13900 chip, or the ryzen 7000 line? Also any recommendations on brands for the ram, and obviously a good gpu would be 4090 or no? I really enjoy the midi design for windows 10 on the laptop but I want something that can handle lots of Kontakt stuff as much as audio tracks. I appreciate your video great stuff.
I am feeling seen with regard to korg drivers for Windows. I have learned to use the korg driver tools and the registry hacks. My Radias hardware/software and other korg gear are working... but what a pain.
Hey there, thank you very much for this video! Since many years I use motu stuff as an audio interface, in my case an older motu 828 mk2 firewire. Unfortunately, they don´t support newer macs like the m1, which is very dissapointing. So i will stay with my older pc to use it all till the m2 mac mini comes out. I think this will be the perfect silent mac for music production. I bought the mac studio but the high pitched noise issue and permanent runnig fans are ridiculous, returned it back to apple and waiting for M2 mac mini! That will be the time for me to buy a new audio interface..but should be worth it.
Motu not supporting something and a Motu thing not working aren't (necessarily) the same thing - as a company they're very conservative about the range of hardware combinations they officially support but in fact a lot of unsupported configurations do work. This used to be the case with Firewire adapter cards back in the day for example and I happily used an unsupported card without incident for 10 years with my 828 MkI So if you have the means to try it I'd give the 828 a go via a Firewire-Thunderbolt adapter to see if it does work
I feel you with those Korg drivers, had the exact same issues with my Minilogue XD and now I am on 5pin DIN cable too. I can't believe they are still doing this today, had the same headaches with other Korg gear more than 10 years ago
I'm using a Korg Krome with my PC, USB MIDI working perfectly on my system... Maybe check to make sure your keyboard/controller is actually updated to the latest firmware. I had some annoying issues with the Krome before I discovered that I wasn't using the latest firmware. Updated it. It's worked like a champ ever since.
I'm about to purchase the Mac mini and I can't wait! I went to LA Film School back in 2011-12 and used PT and Logic. I love Logic and can't WAIT to start creating again. In the meantime time, however, I did try Studio One and didn't get along with it. Probably because my computer couldn't handle it. (Dell inspiron, yuck!) Great video btw and God bless you for the flack you may have to endure. Glad to be a sub.
@@1TEDSong What made you decide to use a Windows PC/DAW for audio/film production in the first place instead of continuing to work on a Mac from the jump? Seeing you were in film school & already have knowledge in working with Pro Tools & Logic. Things that make you go hmm...?
@@216Numbskull At the time, all I could afford was a PC (Piece of Crap) computer. However, I saved and after a while got a real computer. Tha't was my circumstance.
have used both , but windows drives me round the bend , so now use mac for creative stuff and a linux PC for messing around on the net with .. but this sums it up for me , i plug in a 20yr old epson scanner into windows , no dice , can't find a driver , plug it into a Mac , works straight off the bat , no problem ..
The disadvantage of a Mac with Apple Silicon is the lack of a PCIe card, many sound professionals and musicians switched to a PC for this reason. By the way, ASIO has always been more efficient, it makes less kernel calls per sample than core audio.
I do know that the Mac Pros do have PCIe card slots available, but to me the newer lineup is not good enough when it’s a worse Mac Studio with the same specs.
One thing that makes a mac a no go for me for my main setup (I do have a MacBook Air as my laptop) is the fact that apple keeps breaking stuff. As a person who relies a lot on vst instruments, not being able to load an old project because apple moved to a different architecture can be frustrating. Bouncing to Audio is nice and all, but most of these are unfinished projects.
I disagree about driver obsolescence being less of an issue on macs. If your hardware worked well on windows 15 years ago, it probably works well today. I’m not sure what the issue was, but one of the Mac OS updates just killed the ability to work with the NI Rig Control. Sure, it’s not supported by NI any longer, but it works fine with the latest windows versions. Similar stories abound; MS is far better about backwards compatibility (even to a fault). Definitely agree about the composite audio devices and MIDI support on Mac OS, that part was wonderful.
Totally this. I'm getting into music production, and new someone who was happy to get rid of their older FireWire hardware. At this point, I need only pick up a FireWire PCI Express card, and thanks to Windows driver backward compatibility, I am up and running with hardware that would otherwise be electronic waste. The same hardware is unusable on modern macs today, due to the vendor not supporting newer versions of Mac OS, no apple Silicon drivers available for the hardware, and Apple moving away from allowing third-party kernel drivers.
I now have a USB 2 hub on my Mac Studio with 20 ports, 240 watt external PSU and MTT (essential for this many ports for music use) and have every usb compatible synth connected to that which is using one port on the Studio itself. Flawless! I have 2 Motu microlite on another port with USB A to C adapter. Flawless. I have my old wired Apple keybaord direct into one of the two USB a ports and the other USB A port is used for the above mentioned hub. 6 UAD devices, ALL thunderbolt 2, and they work on the Mac and not one of them would work with thunderbolt 4 on Windows. Just one other port for 3 Apollos and 3 satellites. Then a thunderbolt TS3 plus hub on another USB C port with the through going to LG ultrafine which is used as my second screen. First screen is a G-Sync panel I use for gaming and have the Studio's HDMI port going into that. Perfect. Another port for 8TB of SSD thunderbolt Now I have a ton of free USB ports on the thunderbolt hub and still 3 free thunderbolt ports on the Mac, and each one has it's own dedicated thunderbolt bus, again unlike any Windows motherboard. It's also silent no matter even if all 24 cores are loaded. Where does Windows win in 2024? Cost You can use plugins even from the 90's with jbridge and they still work. So I have a mini PC slave synth that I have an Arturia Minifuse for, that I run at 64 sample buffer in Cantabile and use just one midi port coming out of the Ultralite on Mac into the Minifuse Midi IN on the PC, and I can have up to 16 PC synths in Cantabile off that one port, and can run all my old 32 bit synths. That PC was $799 AUD. I also used it to upgrade my Virus TI2 firmware and things like that, where Windows does have an advantage as actual software compatibility is very high going up to 25 years back. Where does the Mac win? It is completely silent even under 100% load. 6DB and can not be heard even with ear touching metal case Flawless "just works" thunderbolt and lots of it Less ram usage Better DAW performance overall vs 24 core PC Midi is SO much better Aggregate devices Stability Logic Pro which will never be on Windows again I can use all the IOS exclusive audiounits, so many great synths that will never see the light of day on PC Pro Tools is SO much better on Apple silicon than on X86. Even at 32 buffer, when tracks or instruments are record armed, the CPU meter does not spike. On PC even arming one track at 32 buffer will spike all 24 cores. It works but there's so much less overhead. Nuendo also performs better on Mac DP performs better on Mac Ableton and Bitwig are much of a muchness And so on. I went to PC exclusively from 2019 to 2024, and now I am back on Mac. It took all of 5 minutes with a Mac Studio to know that Apple silicon was the future of music production computers. Bought one then and there.
I’m seriously considering getting a 16” M1 MacBook Pro (32 gb ram, 1TB SSD). But I’m brazilian and the US dollar to Brazilian currency exchange rate is just depressing (like four times the original price) Can anyone tell me if it’s worth the extra money?
I have a Core i7-12700K desktop PC which is faster than an M2 Pro MAC. Two 1TB drives and 32GB of DDR5 RAM (faster than DDR4 but DDR4 is very cheap). Build an x86 Intel or AMD PC, RAM and storage on Apple Sillicon is very expensive and you don't have nowhere near the same options for future proof and backups. Apple Macbooks also suffer from thermal throttling on the CPU because they are laptops, you lose perfomance.
I'm having serious audio drop issues with my Focusrite Clarett 4Pre USB on my PC running Windows 11. Been troubleshooting for last 2 days and I'm sick of it. Could anyone please let me know which brand makes the most reliable audio interface for PCs? Which one has the history of the most solid drivers for their interfaces? Thanks in advance!
One important thing to keep in mind is that high quality audio interfaces for Windows will come with really well written custom drivers (not ASIO), and those smoke CoreAudio any day in every way. For instance, the RME drivers are insanely fast and stable on Windows machines, and have negligible latency. CoreAudio comes with a cost, and that is latency. Even if you do pick a Mac, look for an audio interface that provides it's own drivers for professional level performance. I have an i9 8 core PC with RME drivers for a UFX+ and I can run it at 32 or 64 sample buffer size for tracking. This produces essentially zero detectable latency. Drop back to 512 samples to mix with less load, or play games etc. CoreAudio is nowhere near that. On either platform, custom drivers every time. (btw, if a driver runs poorly on a PC, it's CRAP programming on the developers part, not a Windows issue) Also, the need to gang up multiple audio interfaces in CoreAudio is a non issue, because it goes away when you just buy an interface with more inputs, plus expansion through MADI, ADAT, etc. Even then, some audio drivers do support multiple interfaces. Again, RME will let you run multiple interfaces at once. You don't get one total mix workflow, but you can track them all in/out to a DAW. One more tip... you have ZERO issues moving files between Mac and PC if you use VST plug ins instead of AU. I use both Ableton Live and Bitwig regularly between my desktop PC and M1 Macbook, and it's seamless. Again... just skip AU since those don't run on PC, and everything loads fine on both platforms.
I've been running 32 sample buffer size on my Mac over FireWire using Core Audio since 2010. And from a professional perspective, if a driver runs poorly I really don't care if it's a developer issue or an OS issue.
Hi Tefty, Sorry to bother you. I’m looking to go from windows to Mac. Been running Cubase 5 for many years. I have loads of writing projects saved in windows. I had to stop the writing\ recording process due to lack of headroom in my laptop. When I go Mac I will want to continue working on these songs. Could you say if this going to be possible to transfer the projects and understood byMac ??? Best regards, Dunx.
I have one question unrelated to the video..can you mix and master your songs in ableton? I heared ableton isnt good for it,so i wanna know before dropping big money on it.
Yes, easily. If you're mixing a live Orchestra against a movie score, then I don't recommend Ableton. But for most productions it works just fine and the stock plugins sound great.
The MIDI issue you mention is a big deal for me. I frequently want to move from my DAW to some other MIDI app (most often a small sysex librarian, but occasionally other stuff). You know, to transmit different patch banks, or run something like the Behringer Neutron app. I I need MIDI from multiple apps simultaneously. Well, that and I've stuck with Logic for the past 30 years. Also something you don't really mention (maybe it's not an issue like it used to be?) is Thunderbolt compatibility, which AFAIK is usually a horror show on Windows for some reason. I admit I used to hate Windows but I really don't any more, particularly since Windows 10 which I use all the time for work. I would have no problem in principle switching to Windows, but I love Logic and I am also spoiled by Apple's MIDI and audio support. Also in the laptop realm MacBooks offer an unparalleled combination of performance and battery life, so ... I'm sticking with Apple for the foreseeable future.
i am glad you mentioned ram .It is hard to find a reasonable priced laptop with more than 4gig if ram . They want thousands of dollars for only 4 gig and even 8gig is not all usable . Ram is not that expensive and makes a big difference with music production. Also hard to find 500gig hard drive for a good price. Tablet memory in most pcs now.
Thanks for this. Just wondering, what in your opinion would be a good choice of a mid range audio interface for a Windows machine. Mainly from a driver perspective. Would Steinberg be a good bet.
My first "music" pc was the Beige Mac Power G3 in 98, after that I have had 2 Mac Minis, 2 iMacs and the Black MacBook, so after 3 mayor chip architecture changes, I switched to PC 4 years ago. The Value to Performance ratio is not even comparable. I think it is great to start with Macs, learn about drivers, software setup, PC parts, etc, then switch to PC. Just go with an audio card manufacturer that has good Drivers, like Audient. Arturia hardware works great too. If you are not curious nor interested in how your machine works, then stick with Apple. If you like to tinker and get your money's worth then go with PC. Just remember, whatever helps your creativity is what you should be loyal to, not brands.
+1 on the MOTU interfaces. I’m also running an 828es as well as a 24Ai connected via AVB with an Ethernet cable. Computer is an M1 Max Mac Studio with 64GB RAM and 2TB internal SSD.
Lunux!.. still not doing very well with audio software stability, but actually made decent progress recently. Still my choise. Hopefully you will be able to add it to the comparison some day.
The argument that persuaded me to buy my first MacBook Pro (back in 2012), was that because there are less Apple products in the line, the architectures are all the same or very similar. Therefore, compatability was easier and more stable for them. With a PC, you have many different chipsets, RAM manufacturers, and thousands of hardware configurations. This would create possible instabilities within different DAW and hardware configurations in terms of connectable devices. Errors may or may not occur because of this, but the overall feeling was that Apple hard ware was more reliable from a recording standpoint. Is this still an issue or was it ever? I pretty much use my apple laptops when I am doing anything music related. They have issues here and there, but every time I go back to use one of my Windows laptops they just annoy me. I am also a person that was a die-hard PC guy for years. I still build my own desktops for gaming and other stuff. Just curious what your opinions are on this.
I've been thinking of switching to Mac due to the reasons you've stated. I have 2 fairly new laptops from Dell and Lenovo and yet they've each experienced a bit of glitchiness, the worst being several Windows updates that caused severe issues (laptops won't start, keep restarting and crashing on start up)...several times on each laptop over the last few years. And of course, the search for drivers, dll files, and the right settings to fix compatibility issues and sounds suddenly not working. I also don't appreciate the forced updates (I turned off automatic updating and yet they magically update whenever they feel like it). Also currently exhibiting issues with one laptop randomly turning on when it's in sleep mode. Again, I don't know how much of this is just the hardware itself (Dell vs Lenovo, Intel vs AMD... etc) but there's no way quality control should be this bad across Windows platforms.
What you tell to the people? It is not a problem to use vsts and midi Instruments at same time with an windows computer. When you tried it last time? With Windows 7? I have alot hardware synths and i not have any problems with them in Windows 11. The only plus goes to the Mac, for the core audio. ASIO4All isn't a great solution. There also exist FlexASIO, have to check If it runs better than A4A.
We were going to add a bunch of broll for this vid but we've got too many projects that need to be finished .... so treat this vid like a mini podcast ❤
Also! If you're planning on subscribing and want more 'Music Tech' related content, then sub to our new tech channel 'Tefty Music Tech' here: th-cam.com/channels/_0rGx4ifn3dufNhicjh06g.html
All future technical music related content will be on that channel going forward. All future music 'performance' related content will stay on this channel!
Cheers 🙏
Tefty & Meems
I think it can be simpler; if the budget is relatively small or limited, don't think about mac
So if I'm using Logic with a bunch of third-party plugins that another Logic user doesn't have, would I not still have to do an audio bounce from the relevant track to make it useful for them?
I've watched quite a few Mac vs Win video's when it comes to music production. This is the first video that factually and specifically explains why this or that OS is better, or less suited. thanks for the knowledge. I've been using an M1 for about 2 years now (before Windows), and for everyday, non-professional use the user experience sure is sweet. My favorite feature by far on Macs is the way plugins install. You don't have to think about, just a few clicks and it's done. They are always installed on exact the same location, ready to use in your DAW. No more fiddling about in the folder/data management of your DAW to point your DAW to all the different folders where plugins were installed.
good point !
Making music on a Windows PC for a long time. No major Issues to report. I am using many VST instruments and physical synths. Windows 11, Studio one 6, N.I. library, Izotope processing amongst many more. Again, very happy and see no reasons to switch
Same here, though I'm on Windows 10. From what I've seen of 11, I'll pass. But yeah, I've had no major issues with Windows, and I've been producing music on Windows since the turn of the century.
PC 1992-2005 Mac 2005-2015 PC 2015- to date.
Reason? RAM.
I run 256mb RAM.
NO ONE can afford Apple RAM.
As I don’t use the music PC for anything other than music production. Absolutely no issues with windows or any software integration.
Have you tried Apple?
@@JTPiano2011 Good point, RAM is so important. I just looked at the Apple website and choose the biggest RAM option, just to have a look at the price... well, compared to the 24gb RAM option, Apple charges 1.600$ for the upgrade to 128gb of RAM. This is a crime.
I used to be a Mac user; what really drove me to using a Windows PC for music was waiting for plugin vendors to update whenever a new OS comes out. Legacy plugins on a MAC? Pain in the ass. On windows? Everything works, with jBridge also really, really old stuff. Opening a session from 2005? Not a problem, all the plugins will (or can) be there.
I used to need to use my computers for a lot more than music production. Gaming, Analysis software, CAD, etc so it was PC all the way because you were extremely limited in what Apple supported for outside of standard productivity , video editing, and music composition. Now I have a dedicated music production laptop and desktop and stayed with Windows. Everything works just fine for me. Drivers aren’t a problem and both are user upgradeable (a must for me). Apple isn’t flexible. Repair and upgrades aren’t going to happen. I need to have control of my hardware.
Facts! 8-12-23
Exactly!
If you have no upgrades or repairs then you're basically stuck with ONE configuration..
This Video is about music production, not about all you want to do with a computer. I started 2004 with music production on a PC/Windows. After 2 years I switched to a Mac. That was way more flexible in things of music production. A few years later I switched back to Windows, because a new Mac was too expensive for me. 1 year ago I switched again back to Mac, because of the new Mac Mini M1 machines. And they are brilliant for music production and the prices now are also very good for what you get…thunderbolt 4 for example. The only thing a PC is better is for gaming, nothing else. I know a lot of people who make video productions, not one of them are using a PC for this. Mac all the way for media production these days, no question.
@@axoplanet6081 False, I’m not a bottleneck myself to hardware, it is optimized better for music media? Yes is it the only and best option? Subjective 8-21-23
I find myself thinking along similar lines - regardless of all the specification details, RAM is always the most important for what I do as well as touch screens - touch screen dj laptops, 4 touchscreens in the studio and 128gb of ram for the studio ($2.5k for the Alienware), laptops with 64gb ram $2k, maybe $1.5k used - Macs will never have touchscreens or upgradable ram to levels available elsewhere so that is that. LOL - Its really hard to pay the same or more for way less in both of these areas - limitations of ram and no touchscreens on desktops/laptops is a deal breaker for me.
The big problem with Apple is that it breaks compatibility with almost every OS update. If you have Waves plugins, be prepared to buy their Waves Update Plan every year because the plugins will no longer work after an OS update. You can of course choose not to update your OS, but then after a few years you can't use new plugins anymore because your OS is outdated.
The same with DAWs, if you want to keep running an old version of a DAW because you don't want/need the latest paid upgrade, then don't update your Mac OS because your DAW will no longer run.
Windows doesn't have this problem, I still run some V10 Waves plugins without any issues and if I want I can run a 10 year old version of any DAW and it will just work.
My Man
I never had any of these issues. I have a mac mini from 2012 that was updated to Catalina (2019) and is able to use new plugins and old plugins from old OS. Also, updating to Catalina did not affect my old plugins nor my DAW. I'm still able to user an older version of GB. Sounds to me like a user problem.
@@nightfightsday I second this
fuck waves lol
Its well known when you update Mac os many things it wont work. Well I have friends that say they dont have issues but they end in tech support anyway😅@@nightfightsday
I have been doing MIDI stuff since the mid-80s. Started with Atari STs, and in the 90s, switched to PC and have been all PC ever since. Recently upgraded my $300 off-lease Dell 4th Gen i5 PC with 16GB RAM and 1TB HD to a brand new Ryzen 7 5700G with 32GB of memory and dual NVME internal drives: 1TB and 512GB. The total cost of the new PC was sub $1000. The only new Mac M1 you could get for around the same price is a 8GB RAM/512GB SSD. I have used Behringer interfaces for quite a while and have never run into problems with their UMC drivers. I have had no need for multiple audio interfaces, so ASIO has worked just fine for me. I use 7 or 8 different DAWs and tons of VIs and effects and everything works really smoothly.
This....
damn
I know this is a year old, but it may be worth considering the project SynchronouseAudioRouter, if you're on Windows.
Basically it's a low levl C++ lib that emulates aggregation without using Asio4All, but rather leveraging the Asio driver on the audio interface itself.
Ran into this problem on windows recently, using my RME Fireface UCX II, which only has 1 x 8 ADAT IO. So extending my IO using a second interface was fine, but what I really wanted was to get 16 input/outputs so that I could use my cranborne on one and my eurorack on the other.
If you’re moving from PC to M1 Mac and do large orchestra mock-ups, get VE Pro 7 and keep your orchestra samples on your PC and DAW on your Mac.
Another big advantage from the Mac side with respect to hardware MIDI is that Core MIDI supports audio timestamping so MIDI interfaces which support this (like my Edirol UM-880) are much more accurate in terms of outputting stable MIDI clock and again you're not reliant on proprietary drivers.
I’m glad I found your video because this is a topic that hits home for me because I’ve always been that rare person who has been using windows, Mac and Linux for the past 20 years because i just never thought of it as a mutually exclusive choice. I’m a server software architect so Linux, Mac and Windows was always just necessary platforms to have around.
When I put together my latest gaming rig I did it on windows because games.
When I put tighter my music production studio I used my MacBook Pro, because I didn’t want to clutter my gaming space with music stuff.
I have 3 MacBook pros all from 2019, 32 gb intel core I-9. Top of the line but not Apple silicon because I didn’t want to waste more money on buying another MacBook when I already had 3 that were only a few years old.
I’m starting to wish I made a new pc for the production studio based on the things you mentioned. Despite these MacBooks having core I-9 and 32gb, I can make a pc that has a better proceseor and more ram for cheaper, and it won’t affect my workflow to switch os at all.
It kind of doesn’t really make sense to use Mac unless you prefer Mac for whatever reason. Just use what you like.
This is a fantastic video! I would have gone with mac if mac's could be troubleshooted and build/rebuilt. I don't like proprietary nonsense, I like the ability to take a panel off and make an upgrade if needed or even fix something rather than send it back and wait two weeks to hear "It's borked, buy another one". I've worked with a couple artists that had mac's that crapped out, and had friends with PC's that crapped out. Electronics will be electronics, at the end of the day since I'm an avid "Hybrid" Hardware-Software user. I'll stick with windows, purely because I use an apollo x8p that handles all of my outboard gear and a modified windows system that uses a Thunderbolt workaround.
Either way, I agree, both have their drawbacks and their advantages and I'm glad you went in depth to the issues with both systems!! This needs to be heard everywhere!
@@chokocat9064 Apple and Microshaft both should be held responsible as monopolies and be forced to design backward compatibility and repairability into EVERY area possible. ANY efforts to prevent repair or update should be treated as a criminal act against our economy, against our ecology, against our kids, against our sustainability.
This is the exact video I have been looking for. Thank you for shooting this informational video without showing any bias. Your perspective is very specific to our industry and helpful in 2023.
Always been a Mac user from the late 90's. Work as a producer and sound engineer ( both Live and studio, ) and also lecture music production and live sound in a Uni that is all Mac based, never even considered a PC. Why would I. Not even an industry standard in my world.
Until a few years ago when I started to learn motion graphics, CGI, generative graphics, Unreal engine and 3D (and very quickly found that a Mac doesn't cut it in that world. ) So I installed a custom Ryzen 9 3950x 2080ti PC in my studio. To cut a long story, one day ( just for shits and giggles ) decided to instal Ableton on the PC to see how it faired. Basically I was totally blown away by the sheer power of the machine over my Macbook Pro ( yes it's a desktop vs a Laptop ) but still, I loved it from the get go. Just ridiculously powerful. And, for some things I actually preferred the windows environment over OSX, especially the file management. I connected the PC to my modular setup via my expert sleeper/RME baby face combo ( which is solid ) installed Bitwig and haven't looked back. Now I absolutely love it.
FTR my PC cost my around £4K here in the UK, the equivalent Mac Pro ( at the time, 3 years ago ) would have cost me around £12K and it wouldn't have run the renderers needed for the 3D work I was doing.
Anyway, I still use the Mac for teaching and the odd project but I'm loving the PC all the way ( never thought I'd say that sentence either )
My only real issue ( and I agree here ) it that the PC is awful with aggregate devices, core audio is way better for bigger setups. It also can't run Logic Pro, Pro Tools looks crap on it ( which is surely an avid thing ) and I can't run the Dolby renderer for Atmos mixing on the PC which is a pain as it's something I'm learning ( again, an avid thing )
And to top it all off I get to run Microsoft Flight sim in my downtime which is amazing.
At the Uni I get to work on the new Mac studio computers too, I find them a little frustrating to be honest now, especially with file management. The M1 chips are not as great IRL as people make out either, lots of issues over the intels, especially with plugins and older interfaces. I don't really like Ventura either, Apple IMO keep making the OS worse by trying to make it simpler.
Anyway, that's my take. PC's though are definitely not the dogs they used to be though, that I'm absolutely positive about.
Hey, thanks for the great writeup. Would you mind explaining in what way file management bugs you on Mac? I keep hearing this, and I don't quite get it. I'm really curious.
I've used Mac, Windows, and Linux Desktops in workplaces and at home in the past and they all worked well for me. I like and dislike them all in some way, so I'm not trying to be glib or anything. Thanks 🙂
Similar story for me. Used Mac until the mid 2000;s then you realise how much more audio processing power is available on PC than a Mac. Arguably you pay a little with less stability, but it's usually just a settings issue. The latest DAWBench results show just how much M1 & M2 is underperforming for similar or more money.
I got a new MacBook with Ventura and wanted to toss it and ProTools out the window the first day..complete disappointment. Yes Apple build quality is supreme but the operating system on the MacBook feels like I went back in time. I have to take and extra step to get simple things done. Graphics are great but doesn’t matter if I’m frustrated with the system..even my cheapest windows laptop does the functions the MacBook can’t..I’m all in on windows. Just easy to navigate..once you learn all the short cuts on windows you’ll see how much more you get. Apple is a great phone..earplugs..watches etc..but MacBook is not for me. Sorry Apple. 👎
> Apple IMO keep making the OS worse by trying to make it simpler
to be fair, same with windows
@@masterflitzerThats the reason most advanced software is not for mac.
I started years ago in the same way you did, I was a Pro Tools engineer in Nashville from 2000 to 2005 and I owned 2 full Pro Tools TDM systems and rented them out to artists so they could record at home. Back then you still couldn't mix in the box since most CPUs were single core, but you could do 90% of your tracking at home. I switched to using a Mac in 2004 simply because of core audio. I still have both Windows for some things but I use Macs for music because of Core Audio, which replaced the ASIO standard that everyone (Mac, PC & BSD) used back then and Windows still uses it. Core Audio put the driver standard in the actual OS Kernel making the need for a driver for 90% of interfaces a thing of the past and it integrated nicely with the operating system and your DAW. Also your DAW doesn't take over your computer's entire audio system like ASIO when using the Core audio which is nice if I want to refrence a song on TH-cam during a mix session. Most (not all) Windows drivers are the standard USB Ploytec driver which is just class compliant USB passthrough, which isn't that great. So it can be hit or miss with some interfaces. Others like RME and Motu have built their own drivers with most engineers saying they are rock solid. Thunderbolt drivers are pretty much rock solid on a Mac while I hear tons of engineers complain about how terrible most Thunderbolt drivers for Windows. I like Windows for engineering apps like solidworks. But I find myself moving more and more toward Linux over Windows but I use Macs for audio production in my studio everyday and for live audio nothing has been as stable as MacOS when using live audio production apps like Mainstage or even Waves Soundgrid. But over all It's like a car, some people have great experiences with Chevy cars while other people have better experiences with Ford so you stick with what you are most comfortable with.
WASAPI is essentially CoreAudio for Windows, it bypasses the OS kernal like ASIO. End of the day ITB is all happening on the CPU so CoreAudio, ASIO or WASAPI all perform pretty much the same in my testing.
@@SamHocking WASAPI only works in USB class 1 mode which is Kernel streaming with an endpoint buffer even in exclusive mode, on the other hand ASIO works in USB Class 2 mode only and has NO dependency on the Kernel for audio whatsoever. WASAPI is using the Kernel audio you can see this in Microsoft's own diagram on WASAPI audio in a article called "User-Mode Audio Components". So whether in Shared mode or Exclusive mode the audio is moving through the OS Kernel to stream the audio back to the device making it more prone to audio distortions and higher latency depending on the type of CPU. ASIO on the other hand bypasses the Kernel and allows for the lowest latency possible this is why no audio interface company builds a WASAPI driver they all build ASIO drivers. There are a couple DAWs that have implemented WASAPI options into their apps like Reaper or Mixcraft but it still is prone to Kernel distortions from aliasing and endpoint buffers. If Microsoft would just fix the operating system to handle correctly this wouldn't be so convoluted for the end user to understand but because Microsoft want to support legacy devices going back over 35 years they will not fix it anytime soon. Even Linux has a better implementation. For years Linux used Jack-Audio for pro audio but they have now switched to an API called called Pipewire which is basically a clone of the Mac's core audio system. Pipewire is a transparent audio implementation of Class 2 USB audio for professional devices "driver-free". So to answer your question WASAPI is nothing like core audio and No WASAPI does not bypass the kernel in windows. These are just facts from Microsoft. But at the end of the day use whatever operating system you like and are comfortable with and make great music. Cheers!
@@joesalyers I can only go by my own testing, I saw no difference in DAWBench stress testing re. Latency or DSP performance. Of course having a common interface from Windows itself and my DAW is also useful whereas ASIO requires a bridge to WDM to work. End of the day it all works for a typical ITB studio.
If you have a link to exclusive mode using windows kernel, I'd be interested, I couldn't see anything. Seems to bypass WAE entirely and direct to hardware driver?
I see the conversion to 32 float and dither is avoided in WASPI exclusive and it locks the driver same as ASIO too?
@@SamHocking There are 2 types of class compliant audio devices for USB WASAPI is a class 1 device and only ASIO drivers and Thunderbolt drivers are class 2 which is the professional standard that does not use the internal USB clock. USB Clocking causes jitter since data streams are in packets and not direct streaming like Class 2 which uses the audio interface's clock or if you use a wordclock with your interface ASIO will use the external Wordclock timing.
Just took the plunge and got an M1 MBP. It's Ramen Noodles for awhile, but (re)starting (after 20+ years) and after tons of research and talking to folks who do music production, it just seemed the best bet. My Windows machine was a boss and ostensibly for gaming as well, but truth be told I'd collected a large Steam library that gathered dust.
It's kind of a weird feeling now. Like when I finally gave up a landline (I'm over 50, so that was really daunting!). Your vid helped confirm that I made the right choice (for me). Cheers!
Congrats! Hopefully the transition goes well. It can be very awkward for a few months when you switch systems. Macs have a different approach to things, but ultimately all the typical stuff can be done just as effectively.
Outstanding video. One thing I’m curious to hear your thoughts on that I see as a major negative with Apple is how frequently they update the OS-and I don’t mean that from a windows has a security update comparison standpoint, I mean from an OS versioning issue. So many plugins (sometimes even DAWs as a whole) break with an upgrade from one Mac OS to another and require an expensive upgrade for the plugins (Waves is known for this). With Windows I have both old and new plugins running and have never been forced to buy a plug-in upgrade due compatibility. I can even run old pro tools versions using the compatibility modes windows has (such as run in windows 8 compatibility mode). I see that as a huge plus. Especially for hobbyist. What do you think?
…oh and to expand on that negative you can only avoid it for so long as when you get a new Apple computer you have to upgrade to a minimum of the OS that device ships with.
@@musictechdude8 THIS is why i refuse apple . THIS .
@@peteytwofinger thanks man. It’s a shame but I’m surprised how few people mention this major pain point. Especially considering the cost of plugin and saw upgrades by companies that charge.
@@musictechdude8On the flip side, if you want to make the most of the last generation or so of both AMD and Intel hardware on the PC side, you have to use Windows 11.
@@TheMuso28 true but it’s not a breaking change. I’ve never even had a major version of windows cause issues with compatibility and if it does they have “run in windows __ compatibility mode”
Thanks for your interesting perspective on this emotive issue. To use a British expression it's 'horses for courses'. At present I think Mac has the lead in terms of music production. However, I bought a 2007 Mac Book Pro for Cubase 4 controlling Reason 4 by Rewire. I'd only had it 5 months and then along came a new OS and the expectation that I'd willing splash out more cash now my wallet had been assimilated by the MacBorg. I never upgraded it, I froze the system in time and it still works fine today with Cubase, Reason and firewire and my wallet dodged a bullet. I'm used to building my own PCs (it's fun for me) and I know where I am with Windows and Cubase 11 & 12. I usually write retro synth pop (no symphonic orchestral stuff) and I like to keep the track count under 30, which means it's less resource hungry on my modest 64bit Win10 i7 laptop. I still use an old 2015 AMD A10 Win10 with Cubase 5 using older 32bit VSTs/VST2s and bounce between the two. I guess Tefty, at 57 I'm stuck in my ways, but if I was new to Music Production I probably would go the Mac mini route.
Thanks for sharing. I use an smaller MiniM1 as my Music only computer.
aspects on MacMini specifically
a.) it is silent/tiny/easy to tug away- no fans
B) hard drive space on those - too small for my liking and bigger ones are uneven more expensive. You can get around with an external drive but really wish the internal would start at 512GB to have room for libraries.
I got the Mac Mini M1 for music. I'm going to get the M3 Studio when it comes out and use the M1 Mini for mobile use and backup, B rig.
I finally decided to look into this topic and when I saw the search results, I instinctively chose your video first because I can always trust your input to be fair and nuanced.
Yeah when I first started making music it was on hardware sequencers. Around the mid 00s I was looking to go DAW. Everyone I knew used an apple, so when I went to see what was on offer, I was floored by how little you got for the price. I'd used and built PCs all my life, and could build a PC with the same hardware for less than half the price. Architecture can play a role, but I'm still not sure that what you get with the M series is worth the money. This can also be true if you're using it for more than just DAW. Like if you're using it for video production or content creation, etc. If you're strictly a beat maker or on the EDM scene in music production then I'd say it might be ok, but I don't know, I'm just used to building my PCs because I know exactly what's in it, and can fix/replace those parts if need be. As for the windows issues, I think most people will not notice these. If you get to where you're going to open a pro studio type of environment then you'll likely need to consider those limitations, but short of that, everyone else should be fine. Thanks for this video, I thought it was well thought out and informative.
The best advice on VST demand for either Mac or Windows. Thanks for the detailed review.
Thank you for the video. Just to clarify some details:
1) I'm on Windows 10 and with the Roland UM-ONE I have no problems with real-time midi sharing to other devices, and Antelope Audio's ASIO allows me to share it in real-time with others DAWs!
2) Just to note that even now free effects and synthesizers appear for Windows and besides there are so many good old plugins that still work at full power, something unusual and disadvantageous for the Apple world ;)
Which windows laptop do u use?
I think he talked about aggregation of few interfaces like one. Because yeah, ASIO is multiclient at least for 10 years now.
Just a few thoughts: 1) The sheer number of comments by Mac users who are literally BEGGING companies to make M1 native versions of their stuff made me think that it was not a good choice, at least not at the moment. 2) For me, it has a lot to do with CONTROLLING my equipment myself, and not have a manufacturer block everything. I like to have the choice to upgrade RAM or CPU a few years down the road without having to change everything and pay through the nose to improve my system after a few years using it and seeing where bottlenecks truly are for MY work environment and tasks. Apple doesn’t give you this power. 3) the insane issues you get when your OS gets upgraded is way worse on Mac than PC. You end up having to pay again while on PC you don’t have to for a long time.
That is indeed true. I am hugely against apple products for their track record of screwing up previous generation devices via software updates. On the other hand, i've seen pc devices that came out the time of Vista or windows 7 and you're still able to upgrade up to windows 11. Apple, you'll be lucky to get more than 1 os jump/upgrade.
I find that on Windows 10 and 11, my Scarlett 4i4 3rd Gen audio interface keeps crashing. A couple of times a day, the sound becomes "robotic," and I have to restart the interface. Many people complain online about it. I'm going to see if the Mac does this, too.
It seems we're ignoring that you can upgrade your computer when you go with a windows machine. That's not a minor thing. I don't know if this is still the situation, but there were a lot of great free VST plugins that only worked on windows. I'd only recommend a Mac if you're specifically looking to use Logic or work with Logic files.
Thanks for your perspectives on this vid. So great to hear a measured, eyes (ears!) wide open take on this.
As a data point: I am on a high-spec Mac Laptop with 3 MOTU AVB interfaces. I'm pleased and working fine. Taken as a whole the system was expensive, but I didn't buy it all at once, I added AVB interfaces over time. As I need more audio IO I will continue to add interfaces. Your milage may vary, but I can work and do what I need to do at this point and have had zero downtime to date. Regardless, thank you for this video and keep 'em coming!
Nice! One of the reasons I use MOTU is for the AVB IO expansion. Currently rocking 48in/32out for my hybrid system.
@@TeftyMeems 40 in / 16 out - I don't do much external processing, just consuming a lot of synths.
Stumbled upon this trying to do some research for a purchase, ended up so confused on why you seemed so familiar then I realized it, I used to watch the hell of your Destiny content years ago!!!
I hear what you saying but I have to disagree with you with the apple M1 Mac Mini. I bought one a year ago I tried Apple I really tried to like the machine yes Apple silicone is fast but I found Macos very limiting for me. I did buy the 16 gig 256 I just couldn't believe how much of a price jump from 256 to 512 or 1tb would be. So I bought an external 1tb drive clone the main Mac drive to it but then I found out the harsh reality that Apple will not allow you to do upgrades on the external drive even if you type in the password to do the OS upgrades because it's not a mac Drive. Needless to say I bought a used HP Mini PC with an i7 9700 maxed out the RAM and I have a 2tb SSD and I can't tell the difference in performance between the M1 and that setup. The Benchmark says that the M1 should be mopping the floor with the i7 9700 but in real-world use it's not. The only thing the M1 is better at is editing videos and I'm going to keep it around for that purpose and that purpose only. But for audio production I'm going to use my new intel setup. Plus being back on Windows particularly Windows 11 I love the interface of Windows 11 is gorgeous, smooth and the automatic window resizing the effortless control I have is really refreshing for me.
Thunderbolt is made by Intel but used on Mac.. (faster than USB for latency) .. so I built a PC with a motherboard to suit thunderbolt 3 to achieve low latency and bought the presonus quantum 2626 soundcard.
I won't be going back to using Mac I have so much power and upgradability now. It just flies.
lol i need your help friend could you message me on ig? @ jui_dv i’m trying to build a set up for the first time and need guidance
what about a 2020 5k imac (vs a m1 mac mini) for this sort of thing? Right now a refurb 5k 10th gen i7 imac can be had for about $1200, and with less than $200 you can get 64Gb of RAM. Any comments?
It’s not going to be suppprted forever now they’ve moved to Apple Silicon. For reference. When they switched from PowerPC to Intel Panther (10.3) had Rosetta for running PowerPC code on Intel Macs, Tiger (10.5) was the last OS to support PowerPC and Lion (10.7) dropped Rosetta too. Sonoma could already be considered the current Tiger equivalent. The CPU power of an M2, let alone M2 Pro or M3 is already vastly higher than even the 8-core i9 iMacs and 16-core Xeon Mac Pro from 2019 so getting a brand new M2 Mac Mini as a BTO with 16 or 24GB RAM would be better option than an i7-based Intel Mac.
I run Windows and Mac OS so I’m covered. ❤ I do love the M series by Apple. Simple, small, and low power.
Reliability, legacy compatibility, noise level, USB speed, cost, multitasking and security were all important considerations for our studio. We ended up settling for a reconditioned HP Z440 Workstation with an 8 core Xeon and 256GB. It needs to run 24/7 in our use model and we cannot afford any kind of hang up or glitch. I know it's not that exciting but real work use cases rarely are. We do hide the box and have some pretty peripherals to try and make it all look a bit sexier 🤣. We also have a first gen Mac Mini lying in the cupboard for people who feel they need it. We run Wavelab etc and it's a professional setting. For non techy types or beginners, Mac may well be the best option.
I still use my old Z600 and it must be 12 years old filled with dual hex Xeons and 64Gb Ram. Recently upgraded one of my old music workstations to the 9600+ with the ASUS Creator board and 64Gb Ram, wow yeah the Z600 is slower but it still does the job !!!
I use two audio interfaces for Windows just fine. It's called ADAT Mode. 🤗
Great talk, and got me thinking. I used Apple from the Mac Classic until the Mac Pro 2010, then changed to Windows in 2015 mainly for gaming.
I would not mind doing music production on Mac again, but that means having two systems in my room again.
But for those who choose today and start fresh, yeah go Mac all the way!
Before continuing I must commend you for the sheer quality of A. the mic setup you’re using and B. whatever settings youve got going over there. You sound like you’re next to me talking and im using an iPhone 15 Pro.
I like to perform at the riverside sometimes, at the beach, and also at local mountain vistas. iPad Pro and Arturia light mk3 61 keyboard, paired with their mini audio interface can be carried on my back in a case with no issues, with a decent Roland portable speaker and beers in backpack. All battery operated. I can’t bring my very expensive pc there or even the fancy MacBook. Those are basically for home use. The best part of this setup is that if you break any of the hardware devices, they are cheaper to replace.
WOW!... so much useful info here... thank you for sharing... I do have the Mac side as I am a little weak with the gray matter between my ears and I was told a long time ago to go with Mac as it would be easier... to your point with the Mac, the drivers are pretty much a non issue and I also think you are right in regards to instruments like a Cobalt being plugged into your computer for tweeking and using it in Logic as a way forward... Thanks again...
25+ years using Microsoft products, 12 or so on MacOS (OS/X, etc) and recently tried Windows for AV production, mainly to save money. I needed a computer to a) use OBS for streaming/recording, b) edit videos using Resolve and c) audio recording using Reaper. It needs to be able to drive (2) 29” UW IPS displays, offer both wired and wireless and have a buttload of USB ports for all the inputs. For the audio input I have a small 2i4 but am looking at a TASCAM model 12 for it.
I went with a decent sized Dell and from the get-go I had issues with video drivers, the usual Nvidia ones, the driver crashed every 3-4 minutes. I tried every fix possible and nobody, Dell included, could get that fixed. Tried to set up an HP LaserJet printer and it still doesn’t work. When I got to the USB side, I added a 10 port powered hub and never was able to make all of them work. I spent 8 weeks reinstalling drivers, cleaning registry keys, swapping cards around and even installing different RAM chips just to see if that was it. It never worked.
To try the Mac side I took my previous MacBook Pro from work, they had just upgraded me to a new 16” MBP so I had it sitting around. Plugged all the same hardware in to the MBP and it didn’t miss a beat. All of it just worked.
Having spent probably millions of hours on computers, 25 years in the industry (in cyber-security now) I have come to the following:
If you want to work ON your computer, buy a PC and run Windows, if you want to WORK on your computer, buy a Mac. Every one of my team at work is issues a MBP, many of them have never used MacOS, the most common thing I hear about the UI is “it’s different, I have to get used to not fighting the computer so much”. Windows users are accustomed to fiddling with, and fixing, their computer OS, to the point that’s their expectation now. MacOS you don’t, focus on actually using your computer now.
So, I’m going to go with an M1 Mac Mini, 16GB and 512GB disk. I’ll add a dock to the bottom of it with a 4TB SSD as my “work disk” and backup to the cloud. I’ll add (2) 8 port powered USB hubs and connect the (2) ultra-wide displays via a dock/replicator I already have. Add the Magic keyboard, a USB jog/shuttle dial, all for around $1500. Based on previous experience with Mac’s for work I’ll get 5, possibly 6, and maybe even 7 years out of it.
Don’t get me started about how easy it is to back up a Mac using Time Machine, it’s easy and just works. 8 weeks on a PC and never produced a single track. 1 day on the Mac and I had audio recorded. What costs you more, time or money?
This is wrong on so many levels.
I just do home recording, but even for that, I finally got myself a mac to get by all the pc issues, driver problems, incompatibilities. I've been working with PC's professionally for almost 30 years (building, configuring, programming, etc...), and I'm a little tired of spending days troubleshooting pc problems. Mac works out of the box (for the most part). I know that both have issues, but for recording, I find mac to be the easier road to take.
best for me: dedicated Mac for music, Pc for everything else ;)
Apple Silicon didn't help to make pricing sane actually,
"premium" especially for upgrades of memory or storage is still about 8x more expensive than PC counterparts nowadays,
base model Macs with 8GB memory and 256GB storage simply aren't enough for any meaningful work..
I'm pretty new to production and was wondering about the real differences. Like you, I build all my PCs as well so it's all Linux and Windows over here.
We are starting to use Linux for Reaper and some open source sequencers. It's an experiment but it does look promising!
When it comes to audio interface drivers on Windows from my experience nothing beats RME. Fab support, low latencies even on USB2, top stability. Since the M1 release I am on the fence to switching, especially for the mentioned reason of aggregate AU, which is great when you need lots of I/O to connect. However, I still have concerns with Macs because of lack ports. I am using c 15 USB ports on my PC - 8 on board, rest connected by Hub. I am not sure how to connect all my gear on these 2 Thunderport connections that e.g. the MacPros have?
Great video btw, thumbs up!
my M2 Max MBP has 3x thunderbolt 4 ports, but I still feel what you're saying. Ultimately it'd make sense to have a MIDI hub with several DIN MIDIs _and_ several USB MIDI ports. I've spec'd this out for my future DAWless system
I LOVE your stuff! I want to build this same PC but I am not a hardware guy. Do you have step by step instructions?
Started with apple in the 90’s, right up until 2014 when my iMac went faulty just outside of warranty. I left apple and went with an i5 windows pc with 8GB ram. Updated over the years but was brilliant for basic music production.
Just gone back to apple with a M1 Mac mini, it’s great. I’ve already got an iPhone so it nice for everything g to be synced up. Plus it runs some of my iPad apps like moog, mela, zeeon etc. inside of ableton as au’s. I’ve only gone for native apple silicone plug ins and use Ableton 11 with a push 2. Really happy so far.
My only gripe with apple (which covers all their products) is in/outs/storage and ram. Measly port numbers and basic storage with no upgrade. My Mac mini is 512gb/8GB and I use an external nvme 1tb drive for samples and packs.
I’ve kept my windows laptop for mobile music as I like having all the ports and extra storage built in with no dongles etc.
Concise and to the point.
me, I use Ableton live. it works on both mac and win. but... as my experience, live and macos were made for ich other. I'm not saying windows is impossible to work with, but specially if you're a laptop producer... windows can be a pain in the ass. the hardware is amazing compared to Macbooks, but the software is where it lies the problem. guess on Desktops is different. but yeah I started with Mac, and it is best to stick what works for you in this area. but I get it... companies don't make it easier to pick
Thanks for sharing your insights and the pros and cons of both PC vs MAC. Am a PC user by choice, mainly for cost, expansion, diversity, external components, but can agree on driver issues, and some others you mention. Also, it seems Apple keeps switching plugs, cost of monitors, and limited memory specially on laptops, for example the MSI Triton in higher end laptops you can slam 128GB of high quality RAM, along with what at least 8 TB of M.2 NVMe 4x4 & likely more soon, and recently support for Thunderbolt 4 & USB 3.2 with A & C slots, at prices far below high end Apple systems. Also, the choices in DAW's, as well as VST's in synths and FX, both offering more choices. Time will tell but think any weaknesses on PC's will be addressed in time.
I am working with windows 11 and RME Fireface UFX +. The computer is connected with Thunderbolt 4 (adapter to 2) but also with USB 3. Nuendo works perfectly. In my opinion, RME cards are the best available today for a professional studio.
Just thought I'd post this. I came across some info on the newer M chips. Apple skimped on the processing cores and added more GPU and efficiency cores to the chips. This is a problem for most DAWs, as they cannot utilize the efficiency cores, with the exception of Reaper and Cubase. So you're actually getting less cores to work with on the newer chips if you're running any other DAW. So, if you're using a lot of plugins, it'd be best to go with an M1 chip. If you're using it for more than just audio, like editing videos, etc. then the newer chips might be the better option.
Thanks. Nice comparison.
The best part about working on Windows is that there's a natural emphasis on backwards compatibility. That means OS updates don't break your plugin's dependencies. You can use the same plugin version forever and it'll just keep working. I do wish that Microsoft would overhaul their audio system. It's way overdue. Something like pipewire on linux would be amazing.
The Logic Pro Argument is the only one.
...have been working for 25 years on both plattforms, but the last 5 years with an 11 year old HP Z800 workstation (about 8000 $ then, 600 now) with 2 6-core 3.3 Ghz XEON processors.
Now for the first time I have a problem that the new NI Massive synth needs a newer chip generation.
I got a 5 year old laptop for this.
Folks, buy old workstations for 1/10th the original price and be happy.
I recommend anything from the HP Z620.
the times when macs where better for music productions endet 2009, in my opinion. yiu just have to know what to do with your windows OS, or where to get and to know debloaking.
How is plugin support on the apple silicon computers?
I have lots of older/special plugins that runs fine on my intel iMac, but I have been holding off upgrading because of the specialized equipment I have.
(ie plugins for specific older hardware that arent being updated any longer)
Use both! My PC I use for both video editing (divinci) and for my DAW pro tools!
This setup is the same as as my MacBook Pro 16 2019 ! Both are of hi spec and both never reach their optimum! My Mac is obviously my portable! Has a 64gb ram a 2tb internal SSD i9.
Were as my desktop windows 10 has 128gb of ram with 4 m2 2tb internal SSD’s with a further 12tb of external SSD!
Truly bulletproof! Happy camper!
What about for VST realtime playing ? I have never been able to stabilize my Windows pc and I have applied all the possible optimisation tricks. I always stay with some dropouts, not frequent... but still there
switched from an i79850 16gb 512 GBSSD Windows 11 Laptop to a used Macbook pro M1 16GB 512 SSD aletly because i had 1. unstable drivers with focusright 2i2 gen 1(dropouts) and 2. CPU overusage (115%) while producing electronic dance music / trance / techno using only heavy SW plugins and samplers in ableton live 11. On the mac -> driver problems gone (plug and play), CPU usage on the same track went down from 115% to 35%!! I was a PC fan and music producer since the 90ies, but aple silicon convinced me to change. what a good decision! I can´t even see how i can out produce the M1 the next couple of years. Only downside is, that i have to learn all the apple shortcuts..but thats ok. can only recommend M1 apple
Really, really, really good video ... sincere and objective ... thank you!!
Actually newer version of asio support multiple audio interface in windows 🙂
Please explain, because I am not seeing this option outside of asio4all. And it is difficult to work with reliably.
@@spectre.garden th-cam.com/video/CwsZPeYFse4/w-d-xo.html
Thanks appreciated for myself I will stick with my iMac Pro 2020 for now.
Dang we have the same i7. Im still using mine for the forseeable future. Maybe in a year I'll finally bite the bullet and get a new studio rig together.
Very informative and straight to the point! Thank you!
That thing with having multiple apps open all using the same audio output interface, at different buffer sizes and sample rates, as well as sharing same midi port within multiple open apps on Mac is a game changer in itself.
Too reasonable, watched, enjoyed and liked anyway. Always used Windows, just grabbed a 27” iMac that was $600 off. The info about ASIO was gold, thanks. Going to use the iMac for music and graphics, keep using the PC for gaming. Don’t understand all the grief between users of the two.
I'm doing Large orchestra work in the meantime and been having but have been limited to rhe i7 Laptop I have which runs great but I want to have something that does 3d rendering and video editing for blender, Houdini, Unreal Engine, z brush, and Davinci Pro. Would you recommend AMD threadripper chip, intel 13900 chip, or the ryzen 7000 line? Also any recommendations on brands for the ram, and obviously a good gpu would be 4090 or no? I really enjoy the midi design for windows 10 on the laptop but I want something that can handle lots of Kontakt stuff as much as audio tracks. I appreciate your video great stuff.
I am feeling seen with regard to korg drivers for Windows. I have learned to use the korg driver tools and the registry hacks. My Radias hardware/software and other korg gear are working... but what a pain.
Extremely helpful and well presented,thank you...
Hey there, thank you very much for this video! Since many years I use motu stuff as an audio interface, in my case an older motu 828 mk2 firewire. Unfortunately, they don´t support newer macs like the m1, which is very dissapointing. So i will stay with my older pc to use it all till the m2 mac mini comes out. I think this will be the perfect silent mac for music production. I bought the mac studio but the high pitched noise issue and permanent runnig fans are ridiculous, returned it back to apple and waiting for M2 mac mini! That will be the time for me to buy a new audio interface..but should be worth it.
Motu not supporting something and a Motu thing not working aren't (necessarily) the same thing - as a company they're very conservative about the range of hardware combinations they officially support but in fact a lot of unsupported configurations do work. This used to be the case with Firewire adapter cards back in the day for example and I happily used an unsupported card without incident for 10 years with my 828 MkI
So if you have the means to try it I'd give the 828 a go via a Firewire-Thunderbolt adapter to see if it does work
I feel you with those Korg drivers, had the exact same issues with my Minilogue XD and now I am on 5pin DIN cable too. I can't believe they are still doing this today, had the same headaches with other Korg gear more than 10 years ago
I'm using a Korg Krome with my PC, USB MIDI working perfectly on my system... Maybe check to make sure your keyboard/controller is actually updated to the latest firmware. I had some annoying issues with the Krome before I discovered that I wasn't using the latest firmware. Updated it. It's worked like a champ ever since.
I'm about to purchase the Mac mini and I can't wait! I went to LA Film School back in 2011-12 and used PT and Logic. I love Logic and can't WAIT to start creating again. In the meantime time, however, I did try Studio One and didn't get along with it. Probably because my computer couldn't handle it. (Dell inspiron, yuck!) Great video btw and God bless you for the flack you may have to endure. Glad to be a sub.
What program is “pt”?
@@thecooltactition81 Pro-Tools
@@1TEDSong What made you decide to use a Windows PC/DAW for audio/film production in the first place instead of continuing to work on a Mac from the jump? Seeing you were in film school & already have knowledge in working with Pro Tools & Logic. Things that make you go hmm...?
@@216Numbskull At the time, all I could afford was a PC (Piece of Crap) computer. However, I saved and after a while got a real computer. Tha't was my circumstance.
Dude - don't forget - Logic (Notator Logic) was available on Mac way before on PC - and before that - (Notator/Creator) on Atari ST.
Very helpful and objective, thanks
have used both , but windows drives me round the bend , so now use mac for creative stuff and a linux PC for messing around on the net with .. but this sums it up for me , i plug in a 20yr old epson scanner into windows , no dice , can't find a driver , plug it into a Mac , works straight off the bat , no problem ..
Yep, that used to be the case. 15 years ago.
The disadvantage of a Mac with Apple Silicon is the lack of a PCIe card, many sound professionals and musicians switched to a PC for this reason.
By the way, ASIO has always been more efficient, it makes less kernel calls per sample than core audio.
I do know that the Mac Pros do have PCIe card slots available, but to me the newer lineup is not good enough when it’s a worse Mac Studio with the same specs.
One thing that makes a mac a no go for me for my main setup (I do have a MacBook Air as my laptop) is the fact that apple keeps breaking stuff. As a person who relies a lot on vst instruments, not being able to load an old project because apple moved to a different architecture can be frustrating. Bouncing to Audio is nice and all, but most of these are unfinished projects.
hello, I'm using an i5-13500 win11 and I 'll pull the trigger on buying a motu 828es... are the drivers ok? Or the motu 828 (2024)?
I disagree about driver obsolescence being less of an issue on macs. If your hardware worked well on windows 15 years ago, it probably works well today.
I’m not sure what the issue was, but one of the Mac OS updates just killed the ability to work with the NI Rig Control. Sure, it’s not supported by NI any longer, but it works fine with the latest windows versions. Similar stories abound; MS is far better about backwards compatibility (even to a fault).
Definitely agree about the composite audio devices and MIDI support on Mac OS, that part was wonderful.
Totally this. I'm getting into music production, and new someone who was happy to get rid of their older FireWire hardware. At this point, I need only pick up a FireWire PCI Express card, and thanks to Windows driver backward compatibility, I am up and running with hardware that would otherwise be electronic waste. The same hardware is unusable on modern macs today, due to the vendor not supporting newer versions of Mac OS, no apple Silicon drivers available for the hardware, and Apple moving away from allowing third-party kernel drivers.
Try a firewire audio interface and tell me again
I now have a USB 2 hub on my Mac Studio with 20 ports, 240 watt external PSU and MTT (essential for this many ports for music use) and have every usb compatible synth connected to that which is using one port on the Studio itself. Flawless!
I have 2 Motu microlite on another port with USB A to C adapter. Flawless.
I have my old wired Apple keybaord direct into one of the two USB a ports and the other USB A port is used for the above mentioned hub.
6 UAD devices, ALL thunderbolt 2, and they work on the Mac and not one of them would work with thunderbolt 4 on Windows. Just one other port for 3 Apollos and 3 satellites. Then a thunderbolt TS3 plus hub on another USB C port with the through going to LG ultrafine which is used as my second screen. First screen is a G-Sync panel I use for gaming and have the Studio's HDMI port going into that. Perfect.
Another port for 8TB of SSD thunderbolt
Now I have a ton of free USB ports on the thunderbolt hub and still 3 free thunderbolt ports on the Mac, and each one has it's own dedicated thunderbolt bus, again unlike any Windows motherboard.
It's also silent no matter even if all 24 cores are loaded.
Where does Windows win in 2024?
Cost
You can use plugins even from the 90's with jbridge and they still work. So I have a mini PC slave synth that I have an Arturia Minifuse for, that I run at 64 sample buffer in Cantabile and use just one midi port coming out of the Ultralite on Mac into the Minifuse Midi IN on the PC, and I can have up to 16 PC synths in Cantabile off that one port, and can run all my old 32 bit synths. That PC was $799 AUD. I also used it to upgrade my Virus TI2 firmware and things like that, where Windows does have an advantage as actual software compatibility is very high going up to 25 years back.
Where does the Mac win?
It is completely silent even under 100% load. 6DB and can not be heard even with ear touching metal case
Flawless "just works" thunderbolt and lots of it
Less ram usage
Better DAW performance overall vs 24 core PC
Midi is SO much better
Aggregate devices
Stability
Logic Pro which will never be on Windows again
I can use all the IOS exclusive audiounits, so many great synths that will never see the light of day on PC
Pro Tools is SO much better on Apple silicon than on X86. Even at 32 buffer, when tracks or instruments are record armed, the CPU meter does not spike. On PC even arming one track at 32 buffer will spike all 24 cores. It works but there's so much less overhead.
Nuendo also performs better on Mac
DP performs better on Mac
Ableton and Bitwig are much of a muchness
And so on.
I went to PC exclusively from 2019 to 2024, and now I am back on Mac. It took all of 5 minutes with a Mac Studio to know that Apple silicon was the future of music production computers. Bought one then and there.
I’m seriously considering getting a 16” M1 MacBook Pro (32 gb ram, 1TB SSD). But I’m brazilian and the US dollar to Brazilian currency exchange rate is just depressing (like four times the original price) Can anyone tell me if it’s worth the extra money?
I have a Core i7-12700K desktop PC which is faster than an M2 Pro MAC. Two 1TB drives and 32GB of DDR5 RAM (faster than DDR4 but DDR4 is very cheap).
Build an x86 Intel or AMD PC, RAM and storage on Apple Sillicon is very expensive and you don't have nowhere near the same options for future proof and backups.
Apple Macbooks also suffer from thermal throttling on the CPU because they are laptops, you lose perfomance.
Is mac mini m2 pro 16gb ram and 512
SSD sufficient fir music production? I will use 4TB external Hard disk or SSD with that for vst tones.
Nicely presented, thank you
I want a computer for recording my drum set. I’m planning on using ~13 microphones. Are you saying that I should use a PC for that?
I'm having serious audio drop issues with my Focusrite Clarett 4Pre USB on my PC running Windows 11. Been troubleshooting for last 2 days and I'm sick of it. Could anyone please let me know which brand makes the most reliable audio interface for PCs? Which one has the history of the most solid drivers for their interfaces?
Thanks in advance!
RME audio interfaces have the most solid drivers for PC.
My MacBook M1 Max logic board is messed up. Apple is charging 2k to fix. I Spent 4k on the thing now I’m thinking about switching to pc.
Applecare plus is definitely worth it. Sucks you didn't get it
One important thing to keep in mind is that high quality audio interfaces for Windows will come with really well written custom drivers (not ASIO), and those smoke CoreAudio any day in every way. For instance, the RME drivers are insanely fast and stable on Windows machines, and have negligible latency. CoreAudio comes with a cost, and that is latency. Even if you do pick a Mac, look for an audio interface that provides it's own drivers for professional level performance. I have an i9 8 core PC with RME drivers for a UFX+ and I can run it at 32 or 64 sample buffer size for tracking. This produces essentially zero detectable latency. Drop back to 512 samples to mix with less load, or play games etc. CoreAudio is nowhere near that. On either platform, custom drivers every time. (btw, if a driver runs poorly on a PC, it's CRAP programming on the developers part, not a Windows issue)
Also, the need to gang up multiple audio interfaces in CoreAudio is a non issue, because it goes away when you just buy an interface with more inputs, plus expansion through MADI, ADAT, etc. Even then, some audio drivers do support multiple interfaces. Again, RME will let you run multiple interfaces at once. You don't get one total mix workflow, but you can track them all in/out to a DAW.
One more tip... you have ZERO issues moving files between Mac and PC if you use VST plug ins instead of AU. I use both Ableton Live and Bitwig regularly between my desktop PC and M1 Macbook, and it's seamless. Again... just skip AU since those don't run on PC, and everything loads fine on both platforms.
I've been running 32 sample buffer size on my Mac over FireWire using Core Audio since 2010.
And from a professional perspective, if a driver runs poorly I really don't care if it's a developer issue or an OS issue.
Great video bro i appreciate your time
Hi Tefty, Sorry to bother you. I’m looking to go from windows to Mac. Been running Cubase 5 for many years. I have loads of writing projects saved in windows. I had to stop the writing\ recording process due to lack of headroom in my laptop. When I go Mac I will want to continue working on these songs. Could you say if this going to be possible to transfer the projects and understood byMac ??? Best regards, Dunx.
Very good discussion!
hi ,.what laptop do you recommend for music production, dell gaming laptop or lenovo gaming laptop or macbook pro 16?
I have one question unrelated to the video..can you mix and master your songs in ableton? I heared ableton isnt good for it,so i wanna know before dropping big money on it.
Yes, easily. If you're mixing a live Orchestra against a movie score, then I don't recommend Ableton. But for most productions it works just fine and the stock plugins sound great.
The MIDI issue you mention is a big deal for me. I frequently want to move from my DAW to some other MIDI app (most often a small sysex librarian, but occasionally other stuff). You know, to transmit different patch banks, or run something like the Behringer Neutron app. I I need MIDI from multiple apps simultaneously. Well, that and I've stuck with Logic for the past 30 years. Also something you don't really mention (maybe it's not an issue like it used to be?) is Thunderbolt compatibility, which AFAIK is usually a horror show on Windows for some reason.
I admit I used to hate Windows but I really don't any more, particularly since Windows 10 which I use all the time for work. I would have no problem in principle switching to Windows, but I love Logic and I am also spoiled by Apple's MIDI and audio support. Also in the laptop realm MacBooks offer an unparalleled combination of performance and battery life, so ... I'm sticking with Apple for the foreseeable future.
i am glad you mentioned ram .It is hard to find a reasonable priced laptop with more than 4gig if ram . They want thousands of dollars for only 4 gig and even 8gig is not all usable . Ram is not that expensive and makes a big difference with music production. Also hard to find 500gig hard drive for a good price. Tablet memory in most pcs now.
Thanks for this. Just wondering, what in your opinion would be a good choice of a mid range audio interface for a Windows machine. Mainly from a driver perspective. Would Steinberg be a good bet.
RME and Merging Technologies are the better choice.
@@Ishitoko_Tukoshita K thanks.
My first "music" pc was the Beige Mac Power G3 in 98, after that I have had 2 Mac Minis, 2 iMacs and the Black MacBook, so after 3 mayor chip architecture changes, I switched to PC 4 years ago.
The Value to Performance ratio is not even comparable.
I think it is great to start with Macs, learn about drivers, software setup, PC parts, etc, then switch to PC. Just go with an audio card manufacturer that has good Drivers, like Audient. Arturia hardware works great too.
If you are not curious nor interested in how your machine works, then stick with Apple. If you like to tinker and get your money's worth then go with PC.
Just remember, whatever helps your creativity is what you should be loyal to, not brands.
+1 on the MOTU interfaces. I’m also running an 828es as well as a 24Ai connected via AVB with an Ethernet cable. Computer is an M1 Max Mac Studio with 64GB RAM and 2TB internal SSD.
Lunux!.. still not doing very well with audio software stability, but actually made decent progress recently. Still my choise. Hopefully you will be able to add it to the comparison some day.
The argument that persuaded me to buy my first MacBook Pro (back in 2012), was that because there are less Apple products in the line, the architectures are all the same or very similar. Therefore, compatability was easier and more stable for them. With a PC, you have many different chipsets, RAM manufacturers, and thousands of hardware configurations. This would create possible instabilities within different DAW and hardware configurations in terms of connectable devices. Errors may or may not occur because of this, but the overall feeling was that Apple hard ware was more reliable from a recording standpoint.
Is this still an issue or was it ever? I pretty much use my apple laptops when I am doing anything music related. They have issues here and there, but every time I go back to use one of my Windows laptops they just annoy me. I am also a person that was a die-hard PC guy for years. I still build my own desktops for gaming and other stuff. Just curious what your opinions are on this.
I've been thinking of switching to Mac due to the reasons you've stated. I have 2 fairly new laptops from Dell and Lenovo and yet they've each experienced a bit of glitchiness, the worst being several Windows updates that caused severe issues (laptops won't start, keep restarting and crashing on start up)...several times on each laptop over the last few years. And of course, the search for drivers, dll files, and the right settings to fix compatibility issues and sounds suddenly not working. I also don't appreciate the forced updates (I turned off automatic updating and yet they magically update whenever they feel like it). Also currently exhibiting issues with one laptop randomly turning on when it's in sleep mode.
Again, I don't know how much of this is just the hardware itself (Dell vs Lenovo, Intel vs AMD... etc) but there's no way quality control should be this bad across Windows platforms.
What you tell to the people? It is not a problem to use vsts and midi Instruments at same time with an windows computer. When you tried it last time? With Windows 7?
I have alot hardware synths and i not have any problems with them in Windows 11.
The only plus goes to the Mac, for the core audio. ASIO4All isn't a great solution. There also exist FlexASIO, have to check If it runs better than A4A.