Does anyone use Spectral computers?

[not_so_new]

Originally Posted by Greg Wells

I got a flyer from Guitar Center the other day.... I like the concept of a computer ONLY built for audio.... anyone?

Ohhhh long story. Everyone has a take on that one.

My side is take a day and build your own computer, get what you want, save a bucket of money and build something better. Spectral is "built for audio" with off the shelf parts ("built for audio" which you can read as "Marketing Hype").



If you have any brains at all (and I think you do judging from your posts around these parts) you can learn how to build a computer in a few hours, it's not hard at all.

[dwdrummer]

I have a spectral rm7000. Great computer! the PS is a little loud, so I have it in another room. Great system, had a couple of problems with the motherboard but other than that it runs SUPER SUPER fast. definitely optimized differently than a normal computer would. I would have built my own one, but couldn't pass up the deal on it. got it for $1500. it was a NAMM show demo.

[Jay Kahrs]

Yup...I bought a Spectral RM5000 last August after I left Mercenary & needed a DAW "NOW" to do a gig...GC (which is the ONLY dealer) had 'em on sale & just KILLED the other cats for pricing on the whole rig(without a quote even!) and had most of what I wanted in stock so I rolled with their rig.

Other then the front USB ports being DOA all was well until a few weeks ago when the 'puter decided that it HATED my mix SOOOOO much that it pulled the Hari-Kari bit and committed suicide.

In reality the thermal controller went down for the count & that little R2D2 unit had it's circuits fried.

I called up "Digital Corp" on Monday morning and got an RA# with no problems, boxed it up & shipped it out ASAP (FedEx Overnight) so it could be fixed with zero downtime while I was at TapeOp Con & have the whole shooting match either fixed or replaced & back in my hands by 6/26...I even wrote 'em a wonderful letter and described all the problems that plagued the thing.

Well, I talked to them on Tuesday and they said it was going out THAT day ground so all was well in my world.

Then I got a call this afternoon from the front office chick who gave me a FedEx tracking number and informed me that it left 'ground' TODAY.

Well nukkin' futter! I'm supposed to start mixing some other cats project on Tuesday & have it DONE by Friday...take July 4th weekend...come back & start another record.

Now that this thing isn't going to arrive here until next Thursday or Friday it's gonna stack up a good part of the month as I shift things around & scramble to catch up.

Whatever. At least it's started the journey home!

I'll let ya'll know how the repairs work out but right now they're running about a C- for customer service.

In my case, I didn't/don't want to muck around with building a computer and being that kind of geek...'nor did I want to have to get a Dell or whatever & go through the BS of formatting the drive & dealing with all the bios stuff even though I know how to do that.

I just want something that WORKS.

The Spectral was great until it melted, never any problems or weirdness. But really, past a certain point a computer is a computer.

Personally, if I had to do it over again I'd either get one of those new Mac's that can run Windows too or maybe get a Sweetwater or Rain box.

[Jay Kahrs]

I gotta follow up on this thread!

My precious droid returned from Spectral Computers, aka..."Digital Corp" today...

The horror...

The horror...

For starters, when I cracked the box open and removed the top I saw my R2D2 sitting there totally covered inside & out with packing peanuts and NOT covered in a plastic bag or anything to protect it.

It gets WORSE...when I pulled it from the box I heard things rattling & shifting inside the case, loose washers & screws that upon further inspection are some or all of the screws tha are missing from the motherboard!

But get this...

IT WAS MISSING A DRIVE!!!

Not only that, but it wouldn't boot either!!!

WTF!?!?

I called Spectral, aka 'Digital Corp' immediatly after discovering all this and talked to Gil, who in previous conversations regarding the repair of my droid said he was the 'owner' and that's where things REALLY got ugly.

He said he'd call me back in short while & he did return the call in about 20-30 minutes...

After I told him about the problems, Gil was feeding me a line that they had shipped someone else's computer to me by accident and was reading me some foreign serial number and saying that I wrote that on the RA form. So after a few minutes of that BS, he changed his story and said that they had shipped the computer back to me in a new box.

Ok Einstein...then tell me why's it got my handwriting ALLLLLLLLL over the box and how my handwriting also ended up on the shipping label...

...crickets...

On the missing drive, he "doesn't know HOW that happened" and was swearing up & down that it's in the middle slot of the CPU, couldn't I see it?!? After all, the computer went through a three person, 75 point inspection!

I kept blinking my eyes.

Nope.

Not there! LOL

I guess two of the three guys slept through the inspection & the third dude skipped 73 of the 75 points!

The booting or lack thereof?

"Isn't there a disc inside the machine?! There MUST be!"

Still blinking...still not there.

He asked; "Am I sure?"

Yeah buddy, I'm calling you & saying this becuse I have nothing better to do! HAHAHAHA!!!

"That's impossible!"

And at that point I asked if he was callng me a liar...

ehhhhhhhh

Mr. Gil said that it all sounded like 'shipping damage' (huh?!) and he wanted to file a claim with FedEx and really...whuz FedEx gonna say about the missing drive or the dead boot??? Anyway, a FedEx claim would take weeks & weeks to settle once they pick up the DAW & inspect the boxes and really...it would be totally denied since the box showed ZERO signs of shipping damage and the 'g-shock' hadn't been tripped.

In effect...he's trying/wants to file a fradulent FedEx claim.

Can we say "not cool?"

I thought so!

The conversation got really really ugly when I told him that I didn't want it repaired because I didn't trust them to "fix" it, they already had a shot at that.

I said I wanted a new machine.

At that point, to cut it REAL short...Gil (the supposed owner) said;

"I'd rather see you in court then deal with this."

I shit you not!!!

My RM5000 is under a year old, it's going back to Guitarget tomorrow.

Thanfully the salesweasel I bought it from (Dave Cox at GC Springfield, NJ) is a good guy & has been amazing with everything I've thrown at & requested from him in the past. When the computer commited suicide a few weeks back (I guess it hated my mix! LOL) he had ZERO hesitation digging into it in the middle of a busy Saturday afternoon. When I called the store today to leave a messge for him, the guy I spoke to remembered my coming in with the box & was horrified when I gave him the three minute version of this so I have no doubt they'll make it right.

At least I hope so!!!

Needless to say, there's no f'in way that I'm going to deal with "Digital Corp" for the remainder of this saga...

In the meantime I've got people waiting for mixes and now my July is starting to backup and look kinda ugly...

Great.

[Greg Wells]

yikes...yikesity yikity yikes.

[Andi Rauscher]

ooooh shit.
I feel your pain, man.
not cool.

[redddog]

If you're looking to avoid all of that BS....and you decide NOT to build your own.. call Guy at Sonica Audio Labs. They are awesome, reliable and fast and work tirelessly to get things right. They also happen to be cheaper than anyone I've seen.

www.sonica-x.com

[not_so_new]

For Pete's sakes people... take half an hour and order the parts on line then built it yourself. I hate, absolutely hate seeing good people wasting hard earned money on something that you can do so easily.

Come on guys, it's not rocket science and it ain't magic, if you learned how to do what we do you can do this. Can you hook up a patch bay to outboard equipment? Ever hooked up a converter or a headphone amp with db 25 cables? Ever used a screw driver? Ever plugged in a monitor or a mouse before? Ever put in a 500 series card in an API rack? Ever installed any software? Ever put an audio card in your machine? Then you can build a computer.

I got the parts and built a computer that will smoke the Spectral for exactly 1/2 the money. It took me all of one night to have it up and running and... if it goes bad I don't have to ship it back to have some loser who skips 75 points on some made up "75 point inspection"....



If money is no object then be my guest but you are always going to have the run around dealing with someone else. Besides learning new things is good for you, puts hair on your chest.

Come on now, you guys are smarter than this.

[Jay Kahrs]

Originally Posted by not_so_new

For Pete's sakes people... take half an hour and order the parts on line then built it yourself. I hate, absolutely hate seeing good people wasting hard earned money on something that you can do so easily.

Come on guys, it's not rocket science and it ain't magic, if you learned how to do what we do you can do this. Can you hook up a patch bay to outboard equipment? Ever hooked up a converter or a headphone amp with db 25 cables? Ever used a screw driver? Ever plugged in a monitor or a mouse before? Ever put in a 500 series card in an API rack? Ever installed any software? Ever put an audio card in your machine? Then you can build a computer.

Yeah...but it's not quite that easy to pick out parts that are totally compatible with each other. 'Ya gotta use this X with that Y and that H...OR...pick W H and maybe X will work, but in some cases you gotta pick Z instead...

I'd rather spend my time making music then being a computer nerd.

Though right now I'm not doing much of that! HAHAHAHAHA!!!!


Ehhhhhhh.

That's why I've been posting so much on here for the last few days...can't mix bubkis!

Super Dave at GC is in at 1pm...I'll be there by 1:15 with the boxed & 'dead' computer in hand.

'Ya know what REALLY irks me though?

Besides that he was arguing with me and saying my missing drive MUST be there and I just can't see it even after blinking my eyes and breaking out the magic dust...

Two things.

The fradulent FedEx claim and the fact that the 'owner' said he'd rather see me in court then deal with this!

What kind of service is that?!?!?

I don't care if he's talking to a 'pro' who uses the droid to pay his bills or someone who uses it twice a month to make music & escape from work...that's gotta be the crappiest of crappy service!

[dwdrummer]

man that sounds horrible. I did have to send my computer back to Gil, only because it was a DEMO model at Namm, whenever I put my wireless card in, the whole motherboard fried, so I sent it back once to him, he was very cool about it, replaced the motherboard. He sent it back, I put in the same network card, fried again! All the PCI slots were dead. This time when I called, he was very defensive in his response to this but low and behold now I do have a nicely running computer.

[Jay Kahrs]

But from what I gather he kept repairing it right?

My stance was that hey, ya'll already had a chance to repair it & granted...it was DEAD when it left my hands but at least I could run it for a minutes at a time & get the last bit of non-backed up data off there...

It came back with parts rattling around the inside & a missing drive.

I dunno. Would you trust anyone to "fix" it again? LOL

Anyway, I gotta split...hop in the car & drive to GC in a short while.


To be continued...

[not_so_new]

Originally Posted by Jay Kahrs

Yeah...but it's not quite that easy to pick out parts that are totally compatible with each other. 'Ya gotta use this X with that Y and that H...OR...pick W H and maybe X will work, but in some cases you gotta pick Z instead...

I'd rather spend my time making music then being a computer nerd.

Though right now I'm not doing much of that! HAHAHAHAHA!!!!

I know exactly what you are saying but give a man a fish and he can eat for a day, teach a man to fish and he can eat for life yadda yadda.....

You don't have to be a complete computer geek to put a computer together.. not in the least bit and if you do it once you will be able to do it again. People think you have to read manuals and study charts and graphs, it's not like that at all. Actually if you had taken the day or so to learn about it before you would not be stuck now right?

If you have a Comp USA or a Best Buy around in your area most of the parts on your computer are off the shelf, you could be up in the time it would take to go to the store.

If you are worried about what parts are going to go with what parts I am more than happy to post all the parts that I used when building my machine last year. The parts would be a little old now but they would probably also be cheaper. The computer cost me about $900 when all as said and done, got a LCD 19" for another $250 and I am rocking.

[Jay Kahrs]

Originally Posted by not_so_new

I know exactly what you are saying but give a man a fish and he can eat for a day, teach a man to fish and he can eat for life yadda yadda.....

You don't have to be a complete computer geek to put a computer together.. not in the least bit and if you do it once you will be able to do it again. People think you have to read manuals and study charts and graphs, it's not like that at all. Actually if you had taken the day or so to learn about it before you would not be stuck now right?

Truth.

I had thought about building a computer for a while...the more I read into it the more I decided against it. The horror stories of people that had picked components that didn't/wouldn't play well together was enough to 'scare' me off that idea. Since I rely on the thing day in & day out I didn't want to take a chance of things blowing up in my face a few months into it.

Plus I had procraintated on the various choices for sooooooo long that it reached a point where I HAD to do something! I had a live recording gig for some pretty high-profile guys coming up and about a week & half to go...

Build one...order one...build one...order one...

I decided to go with what I considered to be the lessor of two evils...buy one from someone local. My second choice was a Slickwater box but I figured that with GC...well...at least they're local & I knew Dave was a computer nerd who can build his own rigs and I'd NEVER had a problem with GC service in the past. Well, once I found someone who was worth dealing with that is!

FWIW I was replacing a DAW I built in 1998 & was based on a Dell PIII 500 with a Adat Edit & Lucid PCI 24 cards & Logic 3.whatever; Sound Forge 4.0 & CD Architect! That rig NEVER touched the interknot & ran flawlessly until the day I bought the current rig ($7K+!) and replaced it's original 6 gig (!!!!!!!) drive with a 40 gig and turned it into the office machine.

So anywhoo!

I brought the Spectral into GC, Springfield NJ early this afternoon.

Dave Cox man...he rocks hard!

Called me probably like 10 minutes after he got into the store and I was already just three blocks away!

Just to jump ahead a bit...I thanked him profussly on my way out of the store for all his help, not just with this but with everything I've tossed at him over the years & he said; "It's no problem. I don't like having angry customers. They scream a lot."

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

How true...how true...

I had already copied Dave on the emails when this idjit..."Gil" at Spectral requested pictures of the missing drives and all that stuff, and he had to talk to the store manager (Josh Kates) for authorization on EVERYTHING this afternoon. I think Dave would've GLADLY tossed me a new machine out of store stock or a big stinky check...

Anyway...the store manager...this dude Josh Kates...MAN did he EVER piss me off this afternoon...and it takes A LOT to get me going!!!

While I'm attempting to explain the situation to him, HE STARTS WALKING AWAY!!! Tells Dave to call Spectral & get an RA...get it fixed. THEN he come back and starts trying to sell me a new computer!!!

So Dave does what he can...calls Spectral and talks to Gil. Apparently I irked him something good from the other day! HAHAHAHAHAHA!

But eeehhhh...can 'ya blame me for NOT being happy???

Gil was maintaining his 'version' of the story...that it's ALL shipping damage.

He was telling Dave that 'he thinks' either;

a) I pulled the missing drive out in an attempt to get a free drive. (I just wanna get back to work!)

b) Someone at FedEx, while this R2D2 unit was in transit...cracked the box, removed the top of the computer...removed ALL the screws from the internal trappings, yanked the drive...and stuck it ALL back together before it was delivered on my doorstep.



Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh....
































If someone at FedEx wanted to swipe computer parts why wouldn't the whole box have fallen off the back of the truck?????

Damn...the processor alone is worth more then some stupid 160 gig IDE drive!!! LMAO

(deep exhale)

As always...long story short...

My RM5000 was left at GC.

Gil at Spectral is REFUSING to replace the machine and said he'd repair it.

It was shipped BACK to Digital Corp/Spectral overnight on Guitargets tab and according to the power that be, get fixed & sent back to Guitarget for me to pick up on Wednesday or Thursday which honestly...isn't that bad since Monday & Tuesday are shot with the 4th of July weekend.

But to say I'm STILL NOT FUKKING HAPPY would be a HUGE understatement.

I asked Dave if I could take their older floor model as a loaner...he told me it was all screwed up, needed a fresh install of XP and blah blah blee blee.

No worries I assured him. It would most likely come back in BETTER shape then it left 'cause I just GOTTA get back to work!

The word from Josh?

No dice. Gotta wait for my box to come back from Spectral.

Thanks SOOOOOO much for supporting 'yer local pro customers & users!

So ok...

I guess I'm kinda licked.

As long as this thing comes back in 110% functional condition I'll be as happy as a pig in shit!

If it doesn't...I'm gonna DEMAND a refund and they'll have to haul me out in cuffs if they don't comply.

In the meantime, Jeff at MMedia...the guy who designed & hosts not just my website but Euphonic Masters & Mixermans...offered to ship me his old audio PC, a maxed out PIII so that no matter HOW all this poo shakes out I can get back to work even if that R2D2 isn't as bitchin' as I'd need or like it to be which really, is AMAZING!

Jeff's a freakin' saint in my book!!!

To be continued...

[audioalchemy]

this is nothing new with the Digital Corp. I used to work for GC a while back as a "salesweasel" and I have seen this type of thing before. In all honesty you are way better off building your own machine. It is not very difficult, and can save you alot of hassle.

when these things came out alot of people were interested in them, and after selling a few and hearding nothing but negative remarks i stopped reccomending them to my custys. long story short, what you have heard isn't the worst of it.

peace, and happy CPU building,
AudioAlchemy

[Greg Wells]

So.... does anyone have an opinion about Spectral computers?

That's my idea of humor. In Canadian, that's humoUr.

Holy crap. I'll be sticking with my Mac. Thanks, everyone.

[C/G]

Originally Posted by Greg Wells

In Canadian, that's humoUr.

Colour as well. Dont forget we use that pesky metric system and say aboot a lot.

[TREMORS]

Originally Posted by Jay Kahrs

Personally, if I had to do it over again I'd either get one of those new Mac's that can run Windows too or maybe get a Sweetwater or Rain box.

My two cents.
I've been very happy with my Sweetwater dual 3.2ghz.
Comes with 2gigs RAM, with two more slots avail, three drives, asus mobo, etc.
About 3grand.

They even sent me the box flap with the Pentium D serial# on it, and all the original documentation from the parts they used.
Been very impressed so far.


So, if not sure of building your own, I think it's a good idea.

[Tibbon]

All of these problems seem to be taken care of, if you just buy an Apple Quad G5 (or the new intel one soon). Get Applecare. It's great, and pretty quick. Plus, most audio apps are Mac first priority, and you'll find macs in most studios anyway.

[not_so_new]

Originally Posted by Greg Wells

Holy crap. I'll be sticking with my Mac. Thanks, everyone.

Hey Greg.... I think you are joking here as well but you never know with you Canadians... something in the water up there makes your heads go all funny...

(just kidding)

In this case let's not go about blaming the problem on the PCeeeee. This really is not an issue with the platform as I am sure you agree with.

[lefthando]

Originally Posted by not_so_new

In this case let's not go about blaming the problem on the PCeeeee. This really is not an issue with the platform as I am sure you agree with.

I think he was refering more to the MAC hardware. Macs, for the most part, really do work well right out of the box.

[not_so_new]

Originally Posted by lefthando

I think he was refering more to the MAC hardware. Macs, for the most part, really do work well right out of the box.

Oh no... here we go...

And PCeeee's don't? I have been around thousands of servers and desktops (I am being literal here) as a sr. IT consultant to recording studios and cooperate America. In the last 9 or so years I have seen exactly ZERO PCeee's that have not worked just fine out of the box. One server last year came in with a SCSI cable that got lose in shipping, I had to plug it in..

PCeee's are fine, Macs are fine I don't mind either. What is not fine is believing marketing hype from a TV commercial. Don't believe what someone is trying to tell you when they want to make money off of you.

Research on your own. My research says buy either, they both "for the most part, really do work well right out of the box."

[zlatan]

Lately I've been customizing my computers myself...and I think
as long as you use your machine "dedicated" and you have the proper components..you will be fine..

between PC and Mac...I recently bought two macbook pro's and I'm running
windows on them... an XP machine with A components (like in a MAC)
would smoke an OSX machine anytime..IMHO....

I'm not a "fan" of osx nor xp ...I just like to make music ...but the XP environment
definatley improved my workflow...

[Jay Kahrs]

Originally Posted by lefthando

I think he was refering more to the MAC hardware. Macs, for the most part, really do work well right out of the box.

I dunno, in the last 14 or 15 years I've seen just two DOA PC's and both of them were HP machines. The DOA bit might happen more often with PC's because there's more of 'em out there then MacIncrash's...

On the flip side...if ya'll were talking about PC's being wonky because of all that preloaded software...especially that AO-Hell poo that everyone seems to preinstall, well...I can feel your pain. Better to wipe the drive & start fresh then try uninstall all that crap!!! LOL

So anyway...

Dig this!!!

I called GC's corporate office on Friday afternoon...basically to kvetch about the store manager shrugging me off & to tip them on the situation in case things got worse. He listened to me ramble for a bit & was pretty cool about it, said if there were any further problems to just call him back.

A couple three hours later Gil (from Spectral) called while I was on the other line & I hesitated at calling him back...but I did...

Not only did he apologize about a bajillion times for his behavior the other day...they fixed my PC...REEEAAAAAAL good!

Check this out!

Not only did the missing 160gig hard drive get replaced with a 250, but they tossed in another gig of RAM so now we've got a total of 2 gigs in there!!!

Plus, since my one-year warranty was going to expire at the end of August, he's extended it out to the end of the year! Ya' know...just in case. Hopefully we won't need to act on that! LOL

Oh yeah...

And just to top all that off...not only did they stick the thing in a whole new box (that only seems right!) they shipped it back to Guitarget not just overnight for Monday...but Saturday!!!

'Ya get the feeling they wanted me to be happy & NEVER hear about this thing again?!?



So I'm pretty fukkin' happy now!!! My 'puters back!!! I spent yesterday down at the shore and today I got all the tunes for this record loaded onto the drive & the first mix is already framed out on the console.

(huge sigh of relief!)

But I dunno...it just kind of irks me that something like this could happen in the first place. I didn't want to come on here & complain...I'd rather be talking to you guys...my buds...about making cool records, getting good sounds & all that jazz.

But whatever. Even though it was frustrating as hell for a while it's all good now!

[max cooper]

Originally Posted by Greg Wells

Holy crap. I'll be sticking with my Mac. Thanks, everyone.

...Nice post, Jay. I was wondering how those things were.

Probably be fine now, huh?

[Jay Kahrs]

Originally Posted by max cooper

...Nice post, Jay. I was wondering how those things were.

Probably be fine now, huh?

Yup!

Been running it for a couple three days since it came back & all appears to be well.

It was actually cool before it blew up too!

Just to show that Mac's aren't immune to this kinda crap...yesterday I was playing bass on a session in NY & they had a dedicated G4 running Toolz. After my 3rd or 4th take...it locked up & wouldn't restart! We tried everything for about an hour to make it roar back to life but with no luck.

She was dead.

What can I say? Poo happens! LOL

[not_so_new]

Originally Posted by Jay Kahrs

Yup!

Been running it for a couple three days since it came back & all appears to be well.

It was actually cool before it blew up too!

Just to show that Mac's aren't immune to this kinda crap...yesterday I was playing bass on a session in NY & they had a dedicated G4 running Toolz. After my 3rd or 4th take...it locked up & wouldn't restart! We tried everything for about an hour to make it roar back to life but with no luck.

She was dead.

What can I say? Poo happens! LOL

Exactly! Nothing is prefect in our imperfect world.... I am glad that your machine is back up and running Jay!