Re: [ARSCLIST] DAW computer

[Eric Jacobs <EricJ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Friday, February 15, 2008 6:13 AM, Tom Fine wrote:

> I looked at the options from Sweetwater and from Dell. 
> It seems like the Dell workstations are a much better value 
> (larger drives, built-in RAID, better video cards, built-in 
> firewire as an option, etc) when you get into the $2000 range. 
> Am I missing something about the Sweetwater boxes? What other 
> PC options are there out there.

FWIW, Cube-Tec has standardized on Dell workstations for their 
AudioCube DAW (at least in North America).

I've been very happy with the performance of my AudioCube, which is
running on a Dell Precision 670 which was spec'd by Sascom in Canada,
the North American distributor for Cube-Tec.  Not inexpensive ($2600 
for the computer at the time), but worth it - I've already gotten 3 
years out of my current AudioCube, and don't feel any need to upgrade 
the hardware.

I also have several Dell Dimensions of the same vintage - which work 
well, too.  The Dimensions are single CPU machines, and if I had to 
do it over again, I would get dual CPU machines.  My dual CPU 
Precision is far faster than my Dimensions for audio processing.  If 
you configure the computer well, you can actually capture to one disk
and process files at the same time on another disk without any 
glitches or other problems (we tested heavily to make sure this 
could be done).  I do this with the AudioCube (Dell Precision), but 
cannot do this with the single CPU Dell Dimensions.  My Dimensions 
are primarily capture stations and do some processing (SRC and 
encoding), with the AudioCube doing equal amounts of capture and 
audio processing, and sometimes both at the same time.

Some details of our 3-year old Dell Precision running the AudioCube:

Dual Xeon processors (2.8 GHz)
800 MHz Front Side Bus
1 GB SDRAM
Dual monitor graphic card (very, very useful)
SATA Hard Drives (7200 RPM)

From a reliability point of view, we have not had any - not one - 
failure or maintenance issue to date with any of our Dell commputers,
which were all purchased new.  I mention this because I've heard of
people purchasing the refurbished Dells and having mixed results
when it comes to reliability.

Our PCs are on 24/5, and are processing audio 8-16 hours per day
(processing and FTP uploads).  We power down on the weekends,
and we turn off the monitors at night.

We have standardized on the Lynx AES16-XLR card to interface with 
our ADCs.  We are very happy with this, too.  I'm sure there are 
other interface cards that work just as well.

Eric Jacobs

The Audio Archive, Inc.
tel: 408.221.2128
fax: 408.549.9867
mailto:EricJ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx