At 08:47 AM 2008-10-15, Craig Breaden wrote:
According to the systems folks I've talked to here at UGA, Boot Camp has caused some pretty severe failures over time due to dual booting.
I would like that to be better explained by them before taking it as true. I have found some computer retailers to have a good deal of bluster and will say anything to get you to come around to their view--not necessarily out of maliciousness but rather out of ignorance or just having heard something through the grapevine.
using either Boot Camp or Parallels is probably not my best choice, that I should be thinking more towards software made for Mac or going to an external flash recorder.
I don't know what options you have, but I've found competent PCs in the under $400 range, used, and you don't need a hugely top-of-the-current-line PC for audio - I'm using 3 GHz hyperthreading (turned off) processors for audio and, depending on what I'm doing, it's still reasonably fast. I have 2 GB of RAM, but I generally see Samplitude and Algorithmix Noise Free Pro working well within 1 GB of RAM.
So, for not much money, you could get two used PCs (Dell used to have a refurb outlet in the U.S. and I find a local computer store here obtains off-lease Dells--I just got an Optiplex 3.2 GHz machine with 1 GB of RAM for $350 plus I added 2 GB of RAM and a second HDD which brought it up with our 13% tax to $604 or something like that). This application didn't require a sound card (it got a Nikon Coolscan 5000 ED (new) instead), but the least expensive stereo soundcard that is top-notch is the DAL CardDeluxe, at least as far as I'm aware.
All of this should work on your network, but check with your system administrator. As I've said, if I were to get seriously into video editing, I would seriously consider FCP and buy a Mac to use it on. If I were relying on it, the cash stream would need to justify it, but I'd probably get two Macs...as I believe in redundancy. (I have 8 Win XP boxes here plus NASes).
So, I think the option is to choose your software and then the platform. You're cost-horsepower ratio is better for you if you choose a PC rather than if I choose a Mac for a future use.
I don't look at computers as general-purpose tools these days. For high-work-load specific applications and considering the ability to purchase competent-for-the-task used computers (with XP Pro rather than Vista) I like dedicated machines.
i still like the concept of the stand-alone recorder for ingest, especially if you have to train someone to do it.
Cheers,
Richard
Richard L. Hess email: richard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Aurora, Ontario, Canada (905) 713 6733 1-877-TAPE-FIX
Detailed contact information: http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.