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Jeff
April 12th, 2010, 12:00 PM
What is now the best notebook / OS for music?

A nephew is about to finally graduate college, and part of the delay in that was his ambition to be a "Club DJ". That apparently cost lotsa sleep. And now he wants to get serious about it, and bring all the evenings music pre selected, sliced, diced, and recorded on a notebook to be then plugged in. I'm thinking about getting him a graduation present to do that. I'm guessing a HD the size of the cloud, more memory than an elephant, and a processor faster than a speeding bullet. What else? Who makes it? Would that be akin to a Mac for graphics? Do I really have to mortgage the house?

- Jeff

Dan in Saint Louis
April 12th, 2010, 03:52 PM
I'd wager that the most important thing to decide is "PC" or "Mac." Find out what his favorite is so it doesn't sit in a corner, lonesome.

Judy G. Russell
April 12th, 2010, 10:34 PM
What is now the best notebook / OS for music?Jeff, this shouldn't be a real problem. Anything that's fast, has a big hard drive and runs whatever OS he prefers should be fine.

Jeff
April 14th, 2010, 11:30 AM
Jeff, this shouldn't be a real problem. Anything that's fast, has a big hard drive and runs whatever OS he prefers should be fine.

Thanks Dan & Judy. I thought that maybe that kind of special use would require some kind of special machine.

- Jeff

Judy G. Russell
April 14th, 2010, 08:47 PM
Thanks Dan & Judy. I thought that maybe that kind of special use would require some kind of special machine.I really don't think so. Even the "basic" notebooks today have more power than the computers that took the first manned flights to the Moon and back.

davidh
April 15th, 2010, 01:39 AM
Thanks Dan & Judy. I thought that maybe that kind of special use would require some kind of special machine.

- JeffEven with not-on-the-motherboard sound cards on full blown desktop PC's are you unlikely to get sophisticated sound mixing and sound effects capabilities unless you go for somewhat high end sound cards, e.g. in the range of $100 or above just for the sound card. Currently I think most of the Sound Blaster high end cards are short slot serial PCI (not sure I got the right words) in the range $100 to $300. The $200 and $300 models include various peripheral high tech gizmos (not speakers and mics, but maybe hand held IR remote controllers).

So, for example, you are not very likely to be able to do such things as various forms of reverb, chorus, flange, etc. in voice overs on top of recorded (e.g. MP3) music. Furthermore one would need specialized hard ware ports/jacks for digital mic/speakers or for surround sound speaker systems.

If one were going to do karaoke one might also consider what types of large screen displays one might want to display words and images on.

If the karaoke is on DVD one might consider copying the DVD's en masse to one or more drive stations connected by USB. Drive stations possibly of size one terabyte or larger. (I think 1 DVD is about 4GB.)

My limited experience is with a couple Sound Blaster cards. I'd say installing the software and learning how to use it is rather intimidating. However, for an audiophile, probably worth it. The cards actually belong to my wife. I'm just the computer lackey guy.