Mac Pro Core 8 Vs PC Q9450 / Q9300

[CJ1973]

Can someone please advise which way is forward, considering the budget is about 3K.
I currently use PC with XP and Nuendo and a Multiface II. However with all the virtual plugins, I need to upgrade.
I have been checking out the MacPro and also a custom made 4u racked Q9300 quad core. MacPro starts at 2,800US and the quadcore with 2 Hard drives, and 4 gig of ram would cost around $1700. Thats a 1300 saving and that could be a nice mono preamp of some sort.
I also want to run Protools LE on the system along with the PCI card for the Multiface II.
Could someone give me the pros and cons of this as Im very confused which way to go. IF I go MacPro, can I still run XP on it (32bit) and get the best out of the system? Or is it geared to more Vista? Are there limitations? Would all softwares run on MacPro? Especially plugins such as Waves and instruments such as Ivory, Symphonic Orchestra, Addictive Drums etc. The question also is is 8core with 2.8Ghzx8 so big and powerful that its not even worth looking into quad core with 2.66Ghz x 4 speed?

[slaves666]

Get a PC, buy more gear.

[Farshad]

I second that. More flexible and budget-friendly.

[CJ1973]

How about in terms of potentially using Protools? Would MBox LE work with the PC with XP well? Also in terms of performance, can someone give me an idea on how they work? Would I be losing on potential performance if I was purchase the PC with quad core than an 8 core mac? as the PC with dual quad core would be fairly expensive anyway. Also does Nuendo 3.1 run on Mac Pro with XP 32bit?

[CJ1973]

Also my friends who use Mac who are in the industry keep saying to go Mac as Mac with Protools is the industry standard and Mac also has logic etc. But I dont feel I will go to Logic knowing i know Nuendo/Cubase well.

[tamasdragon]

Mac is far from industry standard. Actually they have more problems now than microsoft.
I mean there are big hiccups with leopard considering proaudio. Also many post house uses pecees, because the price/performance/compatibility ratio.
Protools is rockstable on xp, both hd and le.
Today I think macs are not worth the price difference. For the record, I'm in europe, so macs here are more expensive than in the usa.
Both platforms has it's advantages and disadvantages, but if you're learn a bit, you can use both to write/record/mix great music.
Tamas Dragon

[CJ1973]

Have you heard of the power of the 8 core though? Are you saying that would be unstable as well? In terms of high end audio, would getting an 8 core (PC or Mac) be better and would that yield a better performance than having a quad core? If so, how much performance? Also, are softwares like Nuendo (3? 4?) rockstable on MacPro with 8 core 3Ghz than how they are on say XP on PC with quad core?

[joris de man]

Originally Posted by CJ1973

Have you heard of the power of the 8 core though? Are you saying that would be unstable as well? In terms of high end audio, would getting an 8 core (PC or Mac) be better and would that yield a better performance than having a quad core? If so, how much performance? Also, are softwares like Nuendo (3? 4?) rockstable on MacPro with 8 core 3Ghz than how they are on say XP on PC with quad core?

As Mac's use a PC-like architecture these days the stabillity comes down to the OS. XP has been around for a long time and is at this point very stable.
So dual quadcores are just as stable.
With software like Nuendo and Cubase, from what I've read they tend to be somewhat more stable on the PC than on the Mac by a small margin, since these appear to be developed PC first.

In terms of benchmarking those applications seem to be a bit faster under XP than under Mac Os X.
Since Logic doesn't run on PC it is hard to do a comparison on its CPU efficiency, though when i used to work with it on a Mac it was one of the most efficient packages around.

No need for two or even 3 threads on this though?

Cheers,

Joe

[CJ1973]

Hi
THanks for that! I appreciate your input. Could you please then answer my first few questions if possible...


I also want to run Protools LE on the system along with the PCI card for the Multiface II.
IF I go MacPro, can I still run XP on it (32bit) and get the best out of the system? Or is it geared to more Vista? Are there limitations? Would all softwares run on MacPro? Especially plugins such as Waves and instruments such as Ivory, Symphonic Orchestra, Addictive Drums etc. Or Would I have to install XP Pro with 32bit to run all these softwares?
The question also is is 8core with 2.8Ghzx8 so big and powerful that its not even worth looking into quad core with 2.66Ghz x 4 speed?

Originally Posted by joris de man

As Mac's use a PC-like architecture these days the stabillity comes down to the OS. XP has been around for a long time and is at this point very stable.
So dual quadcores are just as stable.
With software like Nuendo and Cubase, from what I've read they tend to be somewhat more stable on the PC than on the Mac by a small margin, since these appear to be developed PC first.

In terms of benchmarking those applications seem to be a bit faster under XP than under Mac Os X.
Since Logic doesn't run on PC it is hard to do a comparison on its CPU efficiency, though when i used to work with it on a Mac it was one of the most efficient packages around.

No need for two or even 3 threads on this though?

Cheers,

Joe