Mac versus Windows

[BadCat]

Checked if there is a lot of info out there on the net but couldn`t find too much so i try here since we guitarists have special requirments regarding recording and videoediting software.
I have earlier on used windows but need a new PC. Have used windows moviemaker and audacity and thought to upgrade to cubase.
Does it matter which solution (Mac or PC) one chooses or is the one as good as the other when it comes to ease of use, quality, videoediting, etc.
Checked prices and found that a Mac with I7, graphic card, etc cost about 3000 USD while a PC with the same features costs half as much.
Thanks for every good advice!!!

 

[godgrinder]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

 

[BadCat]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

Thanks a lot for the advice! I looked for laptops too and the price differences here for laptops are as i wrote. For desktops it is even worth. The cheapest mac book pro here goes for around 1800 USD. And the salesperson who adviced me told that these macbooks do not have especially good graphic cards, only 128 GB Storage, etc. So he recommended me this mac pro book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook- ... B00XZGUL8W but unfortunately the price here is enormous since i would pay 3200 USD for it. That would be almost as expensive as a New Friedman BE I would definitely prefer the Friedman
http://www.elkjop.no/product/data/barba ... jerm-mjlt2

 

[maddnotez]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

Thanks a lot for the advice! I looked for laptops too and the price differences here for laptops are as i wrote. For desktops it is even worth. The cheapest mac book pro here goes for around 1800 USD. And the salesperson who adviced me told that these macbooks do not have especially good graphic cards, only 128 GB Storage, etc. So he recommended me this mac pro book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook- ... B00XZGUL8W but unfortunately the price here is enormous since i would pay 3200 USD for it. That would be almost as expensive as a New Friedman BE I would definitely prefer the Friedman
http://www.elkjop.no/product/data/barba ... jerm-mjlt2

What do you need a graphics card for? Are you playing video games?

I would say Mac may be designed more as a workstation where a Windows PC is designed for the everyday face booker and YouTuber but I think the importance is the hardware VS the OS.

If I had the money sure, get a mac. Otherwise the internal parts can be the same, if you get an I7 CPU and a good amount of nice RAM (16gb or more) you'll be set.

An I7 isn't going to run any better on a Mac than it would on Windows or Linux. Build your own and with the money saved get a SSD to put the os on.

 

[8len8]

PC - adaptable and many options as far as software.
MAC - not flexible, and fewer applications available, but optimized for music and graphics applications.

 

[BadCat]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

Thanks a lot for the advice! I looked for laptops too and the price differences here for laptops are as i wrote. For desktops it is even worth. The cheapest mac book pro here goes for around 1800 USD. And the salesperson who adviced me told that these macbooks do not have especially good graphic cards, only 128 GB Storage, etc. So he recommended me this mac pro book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook- ... B00XZGUL8W but unfortunately the price here is enormous since i would pay 3200 USD for it. That would be almost as expensive as a New Friedman BE I would definitely prefer the Friedman
http://www.elkjop.no/product/data/barba ... jerm-mjlt2

What do you need a graphics card for? Are you playing video games?

No. Salesman adviced that the graphic card in the less pricey macs would not do the trick for videoediting. He showed me the videoediting program which follows the macbook (i Movie). I couldn`t see that this program has the same options as Sony`s Vegas Movie studio which i use now. Vegas Movie studio is an extremely userfriendly program to edit videos and add ones own audio tracks to a video. http://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/de ... che-daten/

 

[thisguy]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

Thanks a lot for the advice! I looked for laptops too and the price differences here for laptops are as i wrote. For desktops it is even worth. The cheapest mac book pro here goes for around 1800 USD. And the salesperson who adviced me told that these macbooks do not have especially good graphic cards, only 128 GB Storage, etc. So he recommended me this mac pro book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook- ... B00XZGUL8W but unfortunately the price here is enormous since i would pay 3200 USD for it. That would be almost as expensive as a New Friedman BE I would definitely prefer the Friedman
http://www.elkjop.no/product/data/barba ... jerm-mjlt2

What do you need a graphics card for? Are you playing video games?

No. Salesman adviced that the graphic card in the less pricey macs would not do the trick for videoediting. He showed me the videoediting program which follows the macbook (i Movie). I couldn`t see that this program has the same options as Sony`s Vegas Movie studio which i use now. Vegas Movie studio is an extremely userfriendly program to edit videos and add ones own audio tracks to a video. http://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/de ... che-daten/

Well, Vegas costs money and iMovie comes with the operating system.

 

[BadCat]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

Thanks a lot for the advice! I looked for laptops too and the price differences here for laptops are as i wrote. For desktops it is even worth. The cheapest mac book pro here goes for around 1800 USD. And the salesperson who adviced me told that these macbooks do not have especially good graphic cards, only 128 GB Storage, etc. So he recommended me this mac pro book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook- ... B00XZGUL8W but unfortunately the price here is enormous since i would pay 3200 USD for it. That would be almost as expensive as a New Friedman BE I would definitely prefer the Friedman
http://www.elkjop.no/product/data/barba ... jerm-mjlt2

What do you need a graphics card for? Are you playing video games?

No. Salesman adviced that the graphic card in the less pricey macs would not do the trick for videoediting. He showed me the videoediting program which follows the macbook (i Movie). I couldn`t see that this program has the same options as Sony`s Vegas Movie studio which i use now. Vegas Movie studio is an extremely userfriendly program to edit videos and add ones own audio tracks to a video. http://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/de ... che-daten/

Well, Vegas costs money and iMovie comes with the operating system.

Which video editing program would you recommend for a MAC and what specifications in terms of processor, memory speed and graphic card should the MAC have to run all the video and audio editing smoothly- meaning what specifications should the macbookpro at least have so that one can make high quality audio and video tracks!? Is Logic the easiest to adapt software for a newbie or would you recommend others like Cubase, etc? The main focus to me is that the software has to be userfriendly and i read a lot of comments on Pro Tools and Cubase that people who are not pro`s find these software too complicated.

 

[rokket2005]

iMovie is shit, Vegas is better, especially if you already use it and know it. For video editing you'll want an nvidia card for the cuda. AMD cards are fine for gaming, but nvidia card are much faster and more efficient for video work. As far as cubase on windows vs cubase on Mac I think Steinberg have good support on either platform. It's not quite the pro tools on windows fiasco

 

[maddnotez]

I use both. I found that Mac OS seems a bit more efficient and macs have better integration between hardware and OS generally. But Windows is good enough, especially when you can have much better specs at the same price.

For laptops, similarly spec'ed macs and PCs aren't that different price wise so I picked up a macbook pro. But for desktops you definitely get more bang for your bucks with an assembled PC.

Thanks a lot for the advice! I looked for laptops too and the price differences here for laptops are as i wrote. For desktops it is even worth. The cheapest mac book pro here goes for around 1800 USD. And the salesperson who adviced me told that these macbooks do not have especially good graphic cards, only 128 GB Storage, etc. So he recommended me this mac pro book https://www.amazon.co.uk/Apple-MacBook- ... B00XZGUL8W but unfortunately the price here is enormous since i would pay 3200 USD for it. That would be almost as expensive as a New Friedman BE I would definitely prefer the Friedman
http://www.elkjop.no/product/data/barba ... jerm-mjlt2

What do you need a graphics card for? Are you playing video games?

No. Salesman adviced that the graphic card in the less pricey macs would not do the trick for videoediting. He showed me the videoediting program which follows the macbook (i Movie). I couldn`t see that this program has the same options as Sony`s Vegas Movie studio which i use now. Vegas Movie studio is an extremely userfriendly program to edit videos and add ones own audio tracks to a video. http://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/de ... che-daten/

Oh sorry, I missed that part. Was too early for me

I guess one of the Quadro cards are best for video editing if you do not plan to do any gaming. I would also assume that Vegas is much better than imovie or any free program however imo, you need to decide if that is the official program that you are going to use. Once you decide that then research that program. Some Video editing software is slower with NVDIA and better with ATI.

You should really go to some PC forums and get some advise there. I am not too keen with advanced video editing so I only know basic things. This is probably going to cost you a good amount of money and you should be building your PC based off exactly what you will use it for. I feel you will get better info for video editing elsewhere. No offense to Rig Talkers but come on we talk gear all day and there is better knowledge out there. Also I will repeat myself. Build your own PC. Do not buy a prebuilt PC. You will save so much money building your own and it is very easy.

 

[neilli]

I started to dip my toes into these waters a while ago, mainly because my buddy has an (expensive) Mac and uses Logic Pro on it, and I was just blown away at how he could drag and drop samples and build some sort of sensible song in a few minutes. And that is super appealing to me because I'm not remotely techy, and being able to create my own backing tracks is interesting to me.

However, I've always been a PC guy so I tried my hand at doing the Windows equivalent and it was a nightmare - I got Reaper, Revalver, EZ Drummer and so on, and just couldn't get them to 'talk' to each other, and so that killed my interest real fast. Admittedly not helped by the my aforementioned techno-fear, and also not having anyone local to me to show me how to figure it all out.

So, I'm left pondering if I should just suck it up and join the cult of Apple just for this, but it's still summer (just!) so not really the time to get into it.

 

[maddnotez]

I started to dip my toes into these waters a while ago, mainly because my buddy has an (expensive) Mac and uses Logic Pro on it, and I was just blown away at how he could drag and drop samples and build some sort of sensible song in a few minutes. And that is super appealing to me because I'm not remotely techy, and being able to create my own backing tracks is interesting to me.

However, I've always been a PC guy so I tried my hand at doing the Windows equivalent and it was a nightmare - I got Reaper, Revalver, EZ Drummer and so on, and just couldn't get them to 'talk' to each other, and so that killed my interest real fast. Admittedly not helped by the my aforementioned techno-fear, and also not having anyone local to me to show me how to figure it all out.

So, I'm left pondering if I should just suck it up and join the cult of Apple just for this, but it's still summer (just!) so not really the time to get into it.

Do you mean you can't get ez drummer to open in reaper? If not ignore, if yes read below.

Create a track, open fx and go to options then VST. Set the path of where the programs are located and Reaper will load them.

 

[JamesPeters]

I started to dip my toes into these waters a while ago, mainly because my buddy has an (expensive) Mac and uses Logic Pro on it, and I was just blown away at how he could drag and drop samples and build some sort of sensible song in a few minutes. And that is super appealing to me because I'm not remotely techy, and being able to create my own backing tracks is interesting to me.

However, I've always been a PC guy so I tried my hand at doing the Windows equivalent and it was a nightmare - I got Reaper, Revalver, EZ Drummer and so on, and just couldn't get them to 'talk' to each other, and so that killed my interest real fast. Admittedly not helped by the my aforementioned techno-fear, and also not having anyone local to me to show me how to figure it all out.

So, I'm left pondering if I should just suck it up and join the cult of Apple just for this, but it's still summer (just!) so not really the time to get into it.

If you want help with Reaper, check out the Reaper forums. I'm on there too.

 

[lll]

I have over 36 years total (22 years professional) in IT experience.

In 1980, our middle school was using Apple IIs and we had to learn to program in BASIC.

I bought my first PC (with my own $$$) in 1988 - an IBM PS/2 Model 50z.

Needless to say, I've seen it all.

Anyways - here's the deal:

If you need to be spoon-fed technology and want the least responsibility for owning a computer, get a Mac. Keep in mind, however, that your options will be limited; especially with what software packages are available. Anything that comes out on PC, you'll more than likely have to wait for the Mac version (if it ever comes).

If you have a good idea of what you're doing and don't mind a bit of responsibility owning a computer, get (or build) a PC. You will enjoy the biggest pool of resources available, including software. When companies write software, 99 times out of 100 they write it for the PC first. You will also have a lot of options to pick from for DAW interfaces, etc...

Of course there's also Linux, but I'd recommend that only to advanced users and you would be very limited once again. But if they did have something software-wise, chances are it would be free.

What do I use? Well I actually use all of these operating systems but on the same computer (using VMWare Workstation). I have my OS X Yosemite (screw El Capitan), my Windows 7, 8 , 10 - my Ubuntu Linux server, my Windows 2012 R2 Server, yadda yadda... but my main system is Windows 7 Professional x64 with an EMU 1820m interface using either Reaper, Pro Tools or Adobe Audition.

 

[155]

I wouldnt take a windows based computer for free..been on macs for 10 years and its the best without a doubt , you can have a 8 year old computer that still works perfect, show me a windows POS that can do that it wont happen youll be virused out by then. Theres plenty of available software out there for mac if its not then well idk...

 

[maddnotez]

I wouldnt take a windows based computer for free..been on macs for 10 years and its the best without a doubt , you can have a 8 year old computer that still works perfect, show me a windows POS that can do that it wont happen youll be virused out by then. Theres plenty of available software out there for mac if its not then well idk...

There are anti virus programs available out there like Bit Defender and Malware Bytes.

 

[dirtyfunkg]

I'd just quickly mention that there are hardware manufacturers that do not make PC compatible stuff. Apogee comes to mind.

I'm in a similar boat right now. I am comfortable with Mac and PC (work is on PC, but my personal computers have been Macs for a long time).

I have been hesitant to move back over to PC since it's a lot harder to find a PC laptop these days that's current and gives me any type of option to be backwards compatible with my RME Fireface 400. Thunderbolt is still not really catching on as well with PC's. I hope that changes very soon.

I also don't want to buy a MacBook Pro until they update it--always sucks to buy a product at end of life cycle.

I've thought about building a tower but would really prefer the portability of a laptop at this time.

 

[JamesPeters]

I wouldnt take a windows based computer for free..been on macs for 10 years and its the best without a doubt , you can have a 8 year old computer that still works perfect, show me a windows POS that can do that it wont happen youll be virused out by then. Theres plenty of available software out there for mac if its not then well idk...

Lol. I had one virus on my computer, once. The same virus everyone I know (using Windows at the time) got...must've been in 2001 or something.

I don't use anti-virus software at all. I scan once in a while "just in case" but never find anything. I never leave a scanner running in the background.

Ad blocker + script blocker, and only allow scripts for sites you trust. Don't open suspicious emails and/or have your mail client set to automatically block any kind of executable or web-hosted content.

Yes you might have to think once in a while when using a PC. I'm used to thinking though.

 

[Ventura]

All Mac, never going back... MS and Windoze can GTFO.

 

[GuitarGuyLP]

I repair medical equipment for a living, at home I want things to work without having to update every other day,
so as they say...once you go Mac you never go back