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Forums - Computer music & technology
Subject: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
Viewing all 7 messages - View by pages of 10: 1
Original Message 1/7 10-Jan-99 @ 11:36 PM - Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
Hi, I am building a pc to work as an optimum system for Pulsar, and could desperately use input from current users, reps, or other qualified individuals. I think this thread will be valuable to many others interested in the card, and would appreciate if we could refrain from newbie-questions, sales propaganda, and flaming that has littered the other pulsar threads.
Celeron 300a overclocked to 450: is it really worth spending the extra $30 to get a 450-tested cpu from www.minotaur.com (also a hassle, they're always back-ordered), or can I pretty much trust any off-the-shelf cpu for overclocking? I'm using a fan-card II, so hopefully heat won't be a problem.
AGP video card: do extra's like TV-output or 16mb (instead of 8 mb) really matter for us musicians? Kilo has posted some "VGA kills" threads in the past about video cards slowing audio performance, does this matter w/ AGP?
PCI-bus performance: since being on the pulsar-dsp list, I've read about several individuals having problems clogging up their pci buses (improved performance from ide drives than scsi, for example). Now I'm paranoid, I was hoping to run pulsar in tandem w/ my event gina, along w/ my pci scsi card. Should I spend the money on a motherboard w/ built-in scsi (so it avoids pci) and ditch the scsi card I'm already using? Does this matter if the card won't be in use while using pulsar (like w/ a pci modem, for example)?
I've got more questions, but I'd like to see comments on the above first.
Celeron 300a overclocked to 450: is it really worth spending the extra $30 to get a 450-tested cpu from www.minotaur.com (also a hassle, they're always back-ordered), or can I pretty much trust any off-the-shelf cpu for overclocking? I'm using a fan-card II, so hopefully heat won't be a problem.
AGP video card: do extra's like TV-output or 16mb (instead of 8 mb) really matter for us musicians? Kilo has posted some "VGA kills" threads in the past about video cards slowing audio performance, does this matter w/ AGP?
PCI-bus performance: since being on the pulsar-dsp list, I've read about several individuals having problems clogging up their pci buses (improved performance from ide drives than scsi, for example). Now I'm paranoid, I was hoping to run pulsar in tandem w/ my event gina, along w/ my pci scsi card. Should I spend the money on a motherboard w/ built-in scsi (so it avoids pci) and ditch the scsi card I'm already using? Does this matter if the card won't be in use while using pulsar (like w/ a pci modem, for example)?
I've got more questions, but I'd like to see comments on the above first.
Message 2/7 11-Jan-99 @ 06:49 AM - RE: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
For pretested 300a's at 450 try www.compucheap or compunerd.
Message 3/7 12-Jan-99 @ 06:10 AM - RE: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
Hi Hilevelt:
Lemme see what I can offer for you - since you were kind enough to invite me in the first place.
Subject: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
From: Hilevelt
Date: 10-Jan-99
>Celeron 300a overclocked to 450: is it really worth spending the extra $30 to get a
>450-tested cpu from www.minotaur.com (also a hassle, they're always back-ordered), or
>can I pretty much trust any off-the-shelf cpu for overclocking? I'm using a fan-card II, so
>hopefully heat won't be a problem.
I have resisted the current rage to experiment with this possibility - regardless of how many "success" stories I read. Over-clocking, by definition, runs the chip faster than it was "spec'd" - theoretically. I have heard so many perspectives on this Celeron theme from so many different folks, I'm just going to sit back and watch them all. I sincerely hope that everyone gets a full measure from their efforts. Truly. For my own part, I'm going to save my dough for another month or two and go with whatever is the hottest, fastest, rockinest chip at the time. Lots of SDRAM, LVD SCSI, Cheetah arrays, hopefully DLT archiving, multiple monitors (maybe a couple of flat screens!)
>AGP video card: do extra's like TV-output or 16mb (instead of 8 mb) really matter for us
>musicians? Kilo has posted some "VGA kills" threads in the past about video cards
>slowing audio performance, does this matter w/ AGP?
It shouldn't. AGP is supposed to get out of the way of PCI. Whatever you do, you should try to strip your studio system to lean and mean and just a noise-makin' machine. TV tuners? Lose 'em.
>PCI-bus performance: since being on the pulsar-dsp list, I've read about several
>individuals having problems clogging up their pci buses (improved performance from ide
>drives than scsi, for example). Now I'm paranoid, I was hoping to run pulsar in tandem
>w/ my event gina, along w/ my pci scsi card. Should I spend the money on a
>motherboard w/ built-in scsi (so it avoids pci) and ditch the scsi card I'm already using?
There has been no indication from Creamware that there is substance attributable to Pulsar with respect to this situation. Appearances are not always what they seem. That said, if you have a system that accepts UDMA drives, I would definitely start with those and see what I could achieve before I started adding SCSI drives. Face it - 10 GB of UDMA for about 3 bills is tough to beat. That's about 1/3 the price of the drive alone for UW SCSI. It'd be worth it to look into "Promise" IDE RAID controller or equivalent as well. Then you could really look for some throughput on the cheap.
I'm not so sure I could recommend the built-in SCSI over the PCI card. PCI Bus Mastering should make these cards work fairly effectively. I don't think there's been any problem on my system, and I use a 2940UW. I have only a narrow drive hooked up to it at the moment though - so it's no where near to what it could be. I want several Cheetahs, ya know!! ;o)
I hope to spend a little time with some of the techs face to face during the next couple of weeks. Actually, I am flying up to Vancouver next week, and then driving down with the trade show equipment. So, I'll be in rare appearance for about three weeks. But, I expect to get some good information, too. ;o)
As far as using other audio interfaces... It is absolutely possible and part of the design intent of Pulsar. But, since those cards are dealing more with MME drivers and inherent latency derived from all of the software layers they must go through, they are recommended primarily to be reserved for things like mastering outputs where synchronous timing is not required. Effects loops are not going to work there.
>Does this matter if the card won't be in use while using pulsar (like w/ a pci modem, for
>example)?
If the card is not in use, it should have NO EFFECT WHATSOEVER on anything else.
>I've got more questions, but I'd like to see comments on the above first.
Well, I hope that was a good start, then!
Best of Luck!! And don't be afraid to contact Creamware for suggestions and info exchange. They should be happy to oblige!!
Jeff White
President - White Noise Marketing
http://www.whitenoisemarketing.com - - -New web content soon, but not yet.
Lemme see what I can offer for you - since you were kind enough to invite me in the first place.
Subject: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
From: Hilevelt
Date: 10-Jan-99
>Celeron 300a overclocked to 450: is it really worth spending the extra $30 to get a
>450-tested cpu from www.minotaur.com (also a hassle, they're always back-ordered), or
>can I pretty much trust any off-the-shelf cpu for overclocking? I'm using a fan-card II, so
>hopefully heat won't be a problem.
I have resisted the current rage to experiment with this possibility - regardless of how many "success" stories I read. Over-clocking, by definition, runs the chip faster than it was "spec'd" - theoretically. I have heard so many perspectives on this Celeron theme from so many different folks, I'm just going to sit back and watch them all. I sincerely hope that everyone gets a full measure from their efforts. Truly. For my own part, I'm going to save my dough for another month or two and go with whatever is the hottest, fastest, rockinest chip at the time. Lots of SDRAM, LVD SCSI, Cheetah arrays, hopefully DLT archiving, multiple monitors (maybe a couple of flat screens!)
>AGP video card: do extra's like TV-output or 16mb (instead of 8 mb) really matter for us
>musicians? Kilo has posted some "VGA kills" threads in the past about video cards
>slowing audio performance, does this matter w/ AGP?
It shouldn't. AGP is supposed to get out of the way of PCI. Whatever you do, you should try to strip your studio system to lean and mean and just a noise-makin' machine. TV tuners? Lose 'em.
>PCI-bus performance: since being on the pulsar-dsp list, I've read about several
>individuals having problems clogging up their pci buses (improved performance from ide
>drives than scsi, for example). Now I'm paranoid, I was hoping to run pulsar in tandem
>w/ my event gina, along w/ my pci scsi card. Should I spend the money on a
>motherboard w/ built-in scsi (so it avoids pci) and ditch the scsi card I'm already using?
There has been no indication from Creamware that there is substance attributable to Pulsar with respect to this situation. Appearances are not always what they seem. That said, if you have a system that accepts UDMA drives, I would definitely start with those and see what I could achieve before I started adding SCSI drives. Face it - 10 GB of UDMA for about 3 bills is tough to beat. That's about 1/3 the price of the drive alone for UW SCSI. It'd be worth it to look into "Promise" IDE RAID controller or equivalent as well. Then you could really look for some throughput on the cheap.
I'm not so sure I could recommend the built-in SCSI over the PCI card. PCI Bus Mastering should make these cards work fairly effectively. I don't think there's been any problem on my system, and I use a 2940UW. I have only a narrow drive hooked up to it at the moment though - so it's no where near to what it could be. I want several Cheetahs, ya know!! ;o)
I hope to spend a little time with some of the techs face to face during the next couple of weeks. Actually, I am flying up to Vancouver next week, and then driving down with the trade show equipment. So, I'll be in rare appearance for about three weeks. But, I expect to get some good information, too. ;o)
As far as using other audio interfaces... It is absolutely possible and part of the design intent of Pulsar. But, since those cards are dealing more with MME drivers and inherent latency derived from all of the software layers they must go through, they are recommended primarily to be reserved for things like mastering outputs where synchronous timing is not required. Effects loops are not going to work there.
>Does this matter if the card won't be in use while using pulsar (like w/ a pci modem, for
>example)?
If the card is not in use, it should have NO EFFECT WHATSOEVER on anything else.
>I've got more questions, but I'd like to see comments on the above first.
Well, I hope that was a good start, then!
Best of Luck!! And don't be afraid to contact Creamware for suggestions and info exchange. They should be happy to oblige!!
Jeff White
President - White Noise Marketing
http://www.whitenoisemarketing.com - - -New web content soon, but not yet.
Message 4/7 13-Jan-99 @ 07:45 PM - RE: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
Compucheap, very cool, especially his celery report on
Anund's site. ASUS UW2scsi boards $269!
Jeff, thanks a ton. BTW, 10 gb UDMA drives advertised for
$195 in the LA Recycler. I've already got 5 gigs worth of
wide scsi laying around my house not being used, plus 2.2
Gig UW2 drives are around the $100 mark, so it's a tough
call.
Can Pulsar take advantage of dual processors (on a single
motherboard)? If not, is there a way to assign processors
to separate duties, pulsar to one and cubase etc. to the
other?
Dual monitors, I've never done it, will Pulsar take
advantage of this to full-effect? Can one window stay
permanently the mixer, while the other switches between
everything else?
Syncronization, mtc has always failed me in the past, and
s/w developers have told me it's because of inherent flaws
in pc's. I'm hoping Pulsar resolves all that, am I
dreaming? I don't want to bother w/ black burst, smpte,
striping, etc etc just to sync my pc to an mpc3000.
I'll pose the questions to Creamware, but Germans scare
me. I almost got
Anund's site. ASUS UW2scsi boards $269!
Jeff, thanks a ton. BTW, 10 gb UDMA drives advertised for
$195 in the LA Recycler. I've already got 5 gigs worth of
wide scsi laying around my house not being used, plus 2.2
Gig UW2 drives are around the $100 mark, so it's a tough
call.
Can Pulsar take advantage of dual processors (on a single
motherboard)? If not, is there a way to assign processors
to separate duties, pulsar to one and cubase etc. to the
other?
Dual monitors, I've never done it, will Pulsar take
advantage of this to full-effect? Can one window stay
permanently the mixer, while the other switches between
everything else?
Syncronization, mtc has always failed me in the past, and
s/w developers have told me it's because of inherent flaws
in pc's. I'm hoping Pulsar resolves all that, am I
dreaming? I don't want to bother w/ black burst, smpte,
striping, etc etc just to sync my pc to an mpc3000.
I'll pose the questions to Creamware, but Germans scare
me. I almost got
Message 5/7 13-Jan-99 @ 07:55 PM - RE: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
Also,
The Korg 168 digital mixer seems like the perfect Pulsar
combo, seeing as it has also has 16-channels of adat i/o,
anyone have an impression? Anyone seen cheaper than $600?
What are the spec's of the a8 & a16? Couldn't find 'em on
the creamware site, what's the msrp on these? Any new
adat-analog convertors coming out s
The Korg 168 digital mixer seems like the perfect Pulsar
combo, seeing as it has also has 16-channels of adat i/o,
anyone have an impression? Anyone seen cheaper than $600?
What are the spec's of the a8 & a16? Couldn't find 'em on
the creamware site, what's the msrp on these? Any new
adat-analog convertors coming out s
Message 6/7 14-Jan-99 @ 07:43 PM - RE: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
Hi:
re: Dual Monitors - Yeppers! Cool way to go. Many don't know that there is a way for dual monitor support in Win95. It ain't exactly cheap as it involves hardware - but it can be done. Since Win98, all of Creamware's Pulsar public presentations, (trade shows,) have been dual monitor. Makes for pretty compelling viewing! ;o)
re: Dual Processors - No. Not multi-threaded. Not too many music/audio apps are at this point. I addressed this in slightly more detail on the other thread (here).
re: Sync - Remember, no one has ever needed to synchronize a synthesizer to incoming MTC or SMPTE timecode. At this time, that is all there is, (effectively,) in Pulsar. Pulsar software does not contain a recording application. Users wishing to record audio or MIDI are using their favorite applications to do so. Pulsar just becomes one more component in your scheme.
Creamware's tripleDAT production suite syncs to MTC quite reliably. Connecting a MIDI cable from your sequencer - whether it be hardware like your MPC or a computer of whatever flavor - works just peachy. Pulsar, technically speaking, does not have such a requirement at this time. NOw, that said, soon they expect to release their "Automizer" module which will record Pulsar device-automating performances within the Pulsar domain and THAT WILL need to synchronize to an external clock.
The only synching going on right now is to word clock via the digital connecters and THAT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH POSITIONAL (time) sync. ;o)
Do keep something in mind, however. The more and more digital equipment you begin incorporating into your rig, the more and more you are going to need to improve the devices which are to provide the "Master" sources. Ultimately, you will be MUCH better off having a single clock source that EVERYTHING syncs to - both for word clock and timecode. It is possible it might even be the same device. The point is, consistancy. Reference points, and easy ones to trace back to. If everything is directly connected and clocking to a single clcok source, than everyone is working a little less and performs a little more reliably.
Best of Luck!!
Jeff White President White Noise Marketing http://www.whitenoisemarketing.com
re: Dual Monitors - Yeppers! Cool way to go. Many don't know that there is a way for dual monitor support in Win95. It ain't exactly cheap as it involves hardware - but it can be done. Since Win98, all of Creamware's Pulsar public presentations, (trade shows,) have been dual monitor. Makes for pretty compelling viewing! ;o)
re: Dual Processors - No. Not multi-threaded. Not too many music/audio apps are at this point. I addressed this in slightly more detail on the other thread (here).
re: Sync - Remember, no one has ever needed to synchronize a synthesizer to incoming MTC or SMPTE timecode. At this time, that is all there is, (effectively,) in Pulsar. Pulsar software does not contain a recording application. Users wishing to record audio or MIDI are using their favorite applications to do so. Pulsar just becomes one more component in your scheme.
Creamware's tripleDAT production suite syncs to MTC quite reliably. Connecting a MIDI cable from your sequencer - whether it be hardware like your MPC or a computer of whatever flavor - works just peachy. Pulsar, technically speaking, does not have such a requirement at this time. NOw, that said, soon they expect to release their "Automizer" module which will record Pulsar device-automating performances within the Pulsar domain and THAT WILL need to synchronize to an external clock.
The only synching going on right now is to word clock via the digital connecters and THAT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH POSITIONAL (time) sync. ;o)
Do keep something in mind, however. The more and more digital equipment you begin incorporating into your rig, the more and more you are going to need to improve the devices which are to provide the "Master" sources. Ultimately, you will be MUCH better off having a single clock source that EVERYTHING syncs to - both for word clock and timecode. It is possible it might even be the same device. The point is, consistancy. Reference points, and easy ones to trace back to. If everything is directly connected and clocking to a single clcok source, than everyone is working a little less and performs a little more reliably.
Best of Luck!!
Jeff White President White Noise Marketing http://www.whitenoisemarketing.com
Message 7/7 15-Jan-99 @ 09:18 AM - RE: Configuring a New PC around Pulsar
PULSAR MANUAL IN ENGLISH
http://perso.club-internet.fr/calm/pulsar.htm
If u want, you can get some of my tracks on
http://perso.club-internet.fr/calm/
MED
The pulsar manual will stay there until jan 30, then it may be deleted cause i need space for my tracks
http://perso.club-internet.fr/calm/pulsar.htm
If u want, you can get some of my tracks on
http://perso.club-internet.fr/calm/
MED
The pulsar manual will stay there until jan 30, then it may be deleted cause i need space for my tracks
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