Mac vs Windows on Traktor Pro

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Mac vs Windows on Traktor Pro

Hi.
Guess there as been a lot of this treads over the time, so sorry if I`m spaming with this one!

I have dj for a while with my S4 and traktor pro, considering to go over to some midi controllers with traktor pro and HID on the pioneer players. But anyways..

Until now I have been using Windows 7 laptop with my mixer and I have never had any issues. I bought a macbook pro 13" retina with the purpose of using it with traktor pro, but since there has been a issue with traktor and Maverick it has never been stable for me, the hole machine freezes after one or two hours and I have to do a reboot..

Now Im thinking of renewing my mac, but at this time Im also considering a new laptop. My whole idea was to have one computer for everything, work, dj, and producing.

Today I have one large laptop for dj, I use my mac for work (os x / Windows ) FL Studio, or at least trying to learn, and that requires windows so I have bootcamp on my mac, and the thought was traktor on os x..

My question being, is it really that much difference between a windows laptop and mac for traktor? FL requires windows, traktor runs on booth and my work also does that.. but a windows computer can be a lot cheaper.. and I don`t see that much more reasons for buying a mac anymore..

Thinking ex. a lenovo Yoga, with that you have a flexible computer that dosent need to take that much place in booth either.. Yoga Laptops, 2-in-1s, and All-in-One PCs | Lenovo US

And of course if it`s safe to run all those things together on one laptop, dont wont to be afraid that traktor will crash..

sorry for my long and boring post, thanks for any replies!

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FL is coming out for OSX soon, maybe make sure you are running the latest versions of Traktor and OSX before you consider getting new hardware?

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The latest update that I have found on FL for OSX is from 2013, dosent seem that it has happened so much since then?

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I run Traktor, Adobe Audition and Reason on a Windows laptop with no problems. The only thing I would add is that Reason is known to be a very stable DAW as it doesn’t make use of VST’s.

5

I DJ on both PC and Mac with no issues. I know more DJs that use PCs than Macs, mostly because of the cost, and they don’t have problems either. The only times I’ve had problems is when the computer was so old that it couldn’t keep up with the software. As long as you have a system with good enough specs you should be fine.

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Seems that a new PC seems to be my solution then and not a mac.

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Dude Im running TP2 and Serato DJ on my Win 8.1 machine and loving it. Of course you cant run all those things at once but I dont really think you were going there. Heck I even run Ableton on this laptop and no problems yet running anything. I like that convertable I thought about it but wound up with an Acer Aspire V5. Just dont under power it you want an I5 or I7 8gigs of ram and as much hardrive space you can afford. I have no idea what a M series is at all but it sounds not as fast as an I5 or I7. Good luck tell us what you wind up doing in the end.

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As apple showed us with the latest 3 major OSX updates, you should NEVER EVER update to the latest version of OSX as soon as it comes out…
Got so many friends who can’t use their ableton or pro tools anymore cuz of the new OSX…
I always wait about 3-4 months before updating, just to make sure all glitches and bugs are fixed and my DAWs give green light for the update.

For using Traktor it doesn’t matter whether you’re using mac or pc, both run it very smooth.
For using DAWs and also combining Traktor with a DAW, mac will always win, cuz of the ease with MIDI controllers, sound drivers, and lower latency than windows.
Also mac can route all MIDI(clocks) internally between programs w/o the use of any 3rd party software

Tho there is no FL studio for mac so windows would win on that..

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Like you say @Tada, when using a midi controller like I am, a mac will win. Is there a big difference there enough to stay with the mac?

I have no plans for combining Traktor with a DAW at the moment.. but I play with S4 that is a midicontroller.. and are also considering ordering a few midifighters..

How big is that advantage that the mac has on the mentioned above?

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In general a mac will always be faster with MIDI controllers because of it’s OS.
The difference is not really noticeable when you’re just using 1 controller, in your case the S4.
However when you connect more MIDI controllers windows will get slower and slower with every controller you add, while you want it to react immediately.

Especially when you play with cue points and samples you’ll notice the difference.

This is mostly because a mac doesn’t need drivers for most MIDI controllers like windows does.

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okay, so if Im planning to use more than one midi controller than its mac, otherwise I`m fine with a windows computer then.

That`s the conclusion?

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I’m not sure I believe the part about windows getting slower with each MIDI device added. I regularly run with 2 midi devices connected to my laptop, and sometimes up to 4, and they all function perfectly with no slowdown.

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I don’t think I believe it either. I run 3 devices whenever I gig and there’s no slow down.

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Sorry, but this is superstitious nonsense. Theres no evidence of more midi devices ‘slowing down’ in windows. Both Mac and PC need tuning to run at best performance for audio.

Devices that are class compliant do not need drivers on either platform.

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hehe. thanks for all the tips and comments here! I guess its just what Im most comfortable with then since there is no huge difference between windows and osx..

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Just to pile on, me too.

My main computer (Win7) usually has…

Kontrol S4 + Kontrol F1 + MFTwister + MF3D plugged up for Traktor use
AND
QuNeo + QuNexus + Launchkey + MFSpectra + Balance (Reason user) + L6 Pod Studio GX

And my workflow for Reason is pretty much built around finger drumming.

All of them stay hooked up as I hate dealing with wires/cables.

It’s possible there is an inherent latency with Windows, but its not somethign that has ever effected me, whether finger drummming, or strumming, or working on the keys, on multiple devices, at the same time. Me personally (ironically in the market for a new laptop), am pretty much ‘heck no’ to a mac, I can’t justify the cost and have yet to see an actual reason to make the switch, if there was somethign tangible then maybe, but Windows hasn’t prevented me from doing anything, made it ‘harder’ if you will, or hurt my performances.

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