Dell XPS 16 (2,8Ghz intel core 2 duo, 4GB DDR3 Sdram 1066Mhz, 320GB HDD, windows vista 64-bit)
the Macbook is 600€ more expensive then the XPS. I was leaning towards the xps because I can use it for more then traktor pro alone. I’m abit afraid of the performance of traktor under windows versus MacOS.
Is Macbook with the same hardware much faster then under windows vista 64bit?
Is there a performance difference of traktor pro under 32 or 64 bit windows?
What laptop would u choose for running traktor pro and why?
I run Traktor Pro on Windows 64-bit and have no issues what-so-ever. It runs in 32-bit compatibility mode, I think, and runs very smooth.
The price difference is what kept me from buying the Macbook. I had a Dell for 3 years and it didn’t give me any issues whatsoever that I didn’t cause myself (downloaded a virus once).
I would save the money, buy the Dell, and use the 600 euros to buy, y’know, music.
But please, in all responses to this, please don’t start with the “Mac is great and PC sucks” cause I’m just going to delete them as being completely unproductive to the conversation.
The Dell XPS are aimed at being gaming laptops, theres really no reason why you need to buy with one of them.
Try the Studio range laptops that are basicly the same thing with a weaker videocard, you will save yourself heaps of $ for a pc that is equally as powerful.
I for instance bought the best dell inspiron i could afford (studio’s wernt out at that stage) and got an equally powerful computer for making music as if i spent $4k on an XPS.
Oh yeah… after tweaking out my Vista instal Traktor pro and other audio programs run like a dream without crashing. Take care of your PC and it will take care of you
First off all thank you for the quick response. I have a couple of reasons for going for the xps 16.
I do play some games and my gamemachine is 6 years old so I can’t play the newer games anymore. With the xps I do not need to invest in a desktop pc. the second reason is that I wanted an intel core 2 duo 2,8Ghz and DDR3 memory and dell has it only on a few models including xps.
The biggest question for me is going mac or pc. I hear from some people that mac offers better performance with equal hardware. Can someone confirm that?
If you wanna play games then get the PC system for sure - the graphics chipset will be better than what you can get on a mac(provided you actaully spend the money to get a decent one). Also the compatibility with games will be much better on the pc system - that said you could bootcamp and use windows on the mac system for gaming purposes.
Also yes, with the exact same specs a mac will our perform a pc that is true, but if you tweak your pc install then the difference is prety marginal. If your bootcamping into windows this becomes nil, they will both perform the same if the hardware is the same.
600 Euro is alot of extra money to be spending for minor performance differences that i highly doubt you would even notice when djing anyway. The only time you would notice a difference djing is if you had well hardcore rig doing something using Traktor + Ableton at the same with more plugins than you can poke a stick at. In which case id still stick with the PC because the choice of VST’s is alot broader, mac is slowly catching up in terms of plugin support - however it will be second to pc’s in terms of compatibility for a long time to come.
If your only using Traktor Pro then it doesnt matter which system you are using(provided you have good hardware and good drivers) - they both will perform equally well.
I would suggest no matter what system that you use your traktor system for music exclusively. Get the system tuned for producing sound and keep it like that.
I used to try and balance out gaming and making music on the same system and I always found myself switching sound devices for good game sound then having the hassle of needing to switch back to the ASIO sound device for using traktor.
In the end I decided that music was a better outlet and use of my time, so I ended up selling all my PC’s and buying a Mac, that way games were not really an option… since then I work on music a lot more.
For the reasons above I am also considering to get a PC, and XPS with Vista-64 looks like a good way to go now…though things will change around mid-year when intel’s new i7 CPUs family for laptops will be released.
I know, I know it’s always greener at some near future
However, If you decide for XPS, there are a few things you might like to check first. I know you can make questions and even negotiate for better features over the phone (depending also on the particular vendor that answered) starting from a given model selected from Dell site, in some cases you may obtain something like 25% discount…
Found that the actual FSB (Front Side Bus) speed the motherboard chipset has. Is the feature you cannot upgrade later, so you are better picky and firm about this one while asking/negotiating. You may upgrade the RAM (with a better FSB max), even the CPU (also bettering its FSB handling speed), but that motherboard speed will stay with you. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2320492,00.asp
CPU choice is quite relevant for Audio. The good news is that XPS’ CPU is usually socketed (not soldered) so you’ll be better by buying not the expensivest one, and then upgrade later on (again, at Mid 2009 prices will likely drop/specs improve). Check CPUs specs http://www.chiplist.com/Intel_Core_2_Duo_mobile_processor/tree3f-section--2205-/
3)If you plan to use the firewire port, there are differences (sometimes issues) with different makers of its processing chip. Even Macs had issues with some models. Texas Instruments Firewire chipset is considered the best with no compatibility issues. the XPS is a new model and I would ask what chipset the firewire port has before getting it.
Finally, a link from a forum you might like to visit:
Hi just a quick heads up about the Dell studio range someone mentioned before in this thread. I bought one a few months back and had terrible issues with audio drop outs tryed every thing I could to sort it out had a nightmare week or so and in the end sent it back. It turns out that the entire range of Dell studios suffer from a massive Latency spike every 4 seconds and it makes the machines a BIG NO GO !!! for Audio use you have been warned. This does not seem to affect their other ranges on mass like XPS and Inspirons though some people on the net have reported the same its something to do with a defective firewire chip on the motherboard.
Just a heads up on that I ended up getting a Toshiba in the end due to me being on a budget and not being able to afford a Mac which is what I will get next time
Btw I installed XP on my Tosh in a dual boot with Vista just use XP for DJing and DAW since I only have 2 gigs of Ram Vista performs ok if you had 4 yeah it will run well but I still find XP more stable
Uff!! I am so glad you wrote this, I was reading the thread saying noooooo nooooo noooooo. The XPS is NO GOOD for audio. I am telling you with experience. I have witness and rechecked the latency issue on the xps. It is totally true. My firend owns one and I have post a couple of threads here on how to solve timecode dropouts and sound dropouts caused by his pc. As a matter of fact he can´t perform live with the xps because it would stop recognizing the cd deck or tts.
This PC is great for gaming, but you must learn that optimization for gaming is completely diferent than audio optimization. Don´t buy this laptop please!!
Also he mentioned he bought a Toshiba laptop but if you look on the NI forum there is a whole thread that talks about why Toshibas are also no good for Music.
Who knows what to believe.
I bought a second hand dell lattitude d630 which so far is so good … no issues here.
The Latency spike issue is true. I used DPC Latency Checker V1.10 and confirmed the spike each 5 seconds. The spike went to the red side of the graph. This is BAD. This reflected on Traktor Pro causing that timecode did not work after a couple of mins and other sound issues. I don´t need to be recomending any brand just giving this folk a good advice so his setup will work nicely.
If i had of listened to everyone before buying my latitude i would have bought a mac because mine was totally incapable of running any music software (aparantly) and dell were a completely incapable company.
All i’m saying is it seems it just takes a couple of people find thee same problem with a certain machine or brand and everyone jumps on the fact and spreads the word that “ALL” that brands machines have the same issue and i’m not overly confident that thats true. eg … look at the guy above that bought a tosh and has no issues but look up toshiba laptops on the NI forum and read what they tell you about toshs on there.
All these problems get fixed (hopefully) by service packs driver upgrades and new models etc …
Did any of you guys actually try and optimise your setups ? Like disabling drivers that you wernt using, closing all the unnessisary windows services ?
If theres a peice of hardware thats causing DPC latency issues the solution is pretty simple - just go into the device manager and turn off the drivers for that device or alternativly get new drivers that done have DPC latency issues.
My Dell came with DPC lattency issues with factory settings, infact nearly all computers come with DPC lattency issues with factory settings. It takes optimisations to bring these into check.
check this link this is a photo uploaded by someone on the net I can comfirm that I had this after disabling nearly every thing in device manager with a Dell studio
alot of users had the same I reinstalled Vista tryed to install XP no joy I am not telling people to Not buy Dell but just warning people about the Studio range I do know how to tweak a system and the Studio really had me running up the wall :eek:
My Toshiba L350 cheap as it is
although this is XP ( vista always has abit more latency but no red spikes on my tosh ) NO Probs
I think its really hit and miss I owned an Inspiron and didnt have any probs I guess I was lucky with my Tosh
its something to do with a defective firewire chip on the motherboard.