Advice on hackintosh for music production

[rwlkr]

I need advice on a hackintosh for music production/photography/graphic design/video editing.

Im using mine for the exact same thing. I am running Logic 9 on Lion with a MOTU Firewire interface.
I would highly recommend the Cooler Master CM690II case. For the money, it is incredible. What I like most is that it has a hot swap 'cradle' on the top of the case in the event you have a "bare" drive that you want to use. Also, go with a Cooler Master power supply. They are so silent that you wouldn't know it was on... no exaggeration. I was highly impressed with it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6811119216

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[pedrofa]

Hello,
I would like to know if i can plug with any problem any external sound card that usually is mac compatible in a hackintosh without drivers problems etc
thanks
P

 

[grimsbymatt]

I have a Roland Quad-Capture USB2 audio interface - I installed the drivers from the CD on my Hackintosh and it seems to work fine so far. Not sure if all are easily compatible.

 

[lore]

I went with bluray drive cause ill also have windows and linux on this machine so i can take advantage of bluray that way. The CD/DVD part will still work in OSX right?

BD drive works OOTB with Lion on my computer; I can burn Blue Ray.

 

[yfzmaniac]

rwlkr: It seems we have a similiar build going on. Is there any way you could post your whole build so i can compare? Im especially curious since we are doing the same thing.

 

[yaren]

I am no expert on music production but I reckon you could do easily with a i3-core processor, or does any professional music software require more than 4 cores?

I3 core processor would work fine...

I am using pro tools , logic, ableton and some plugins and software stuff like from native instruments with no problems... also all of a laptop...

specs:

dell 5010 inspiron

i3 first gen (so not sandybridge)
4 gig of ram
680 gig hdrive (sata 2)
onboard realtek/intel hd audio in WASAPI

dont get any problems whatsoever...

how hard do you guys plan to push your machines?

going all out in $$ on a protools rig will be a waste of money... unless you really are using it to its full specs... which most people dont.

 

[yfzmaniac]

yaren: I am currently going to school for production (second year) and have about 3 years of experience before that. I want build a machine capable of whatever I need it to do. I tend to run a lot of Virtual Instruments and some plug ins when working on my own music, and depending on the need I will use them during clients recording processes too. So the faster/more powerful the better. It also has to be able to do video work, which comes into play too.

 

[rwlkr]

I tend to run a lot of Virtual Instruments and some plug ins when working on my own music, and depending on the need I will use them during clients recording processes too. So the faster/more powerful the better. It also has to be able to do video work, which comes into play too.

We are definitely in the same boat.
I use Spectrasonic's Omnisphere for the majority of my stuff. 3 instances of this alone will take up around 4GB or RAM. Mix in Addictive Drums and Trillian and my CPU was constantly pegged (I used to get the "out of memory" error all the time on my old 4GB iMac). Not anymore!! This doesn't even include my processing plugins, i.e.- waves, sound toys, etc.

I also do photo and video editing. As we all know, rendering can sometimes require an overnight run. With my hackintosh build, most renders are finished within a few minutes. The longest one took about 10 minutes (so far).

To answer your question about my setup, it is as follows:

Cooler Master RC-692 case = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6811119216

i7-2600k = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819115070

16GB of Corsair RAM = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820145347

Cooler Master CPU cooler = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6835103065

Gigabyte UD3H-B3 (F9 bios) = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813128498

Cooler Master silent pro power supply = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6817171036

2 western digital 1TB black caviar drives 6.0GB 64mb cache (I got these on sale for $180) = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136533

Gigabyte Radeon HD 6850 video card = http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814125353

I just need to get a couple of IPS monitors and I'll be good to go!

Good luck with your build man! Please let us know how it turns out!

 

[yaren]

hey just wondering how you guys went on this build???

Long time but hoping you 2 still view this...

 

[rwlkr]

hey just wondering how you guys went on this build???

Long time but hoping you 2 still view this...

So far, mine is still working great! I finally added two IPS monitors and am running 10.7.3.
The only problem that I've had so far is occasionally the system will crash because of the RAM. For some reason, the BIOS wants to keep the RAM set to 1333 mhz instead of 1600. Once I left it at 1333mhz, it doesn't crash anymore. I never looked into why this happens since its been running great for what I need it for.