Whew! Flame-suit ON!!!
O.K. -- the 1/10 street price thing...I'm just visualizing stacks of unsellable ADAT's -- the moment the 002 (maybe even the 001) came out, that thing was history. Actually, the moment PT hit 24-bit, "how could you not go there" (not my words, Glen Ballard's). At least an old CPU can be sold to a college student. If we are at a maturation pont for the MDM (24 tracks, random access), then maybe the "shelf life" of one of these will be indefinite -- like the RADAR systems. Strike one for me. I hope I'm proven wrong. Still, I know a lot of folks who wouldn't be happy with a $1500 budget just for converters, let alone HD's, etc., but if they can pack it all in at that price point, cool.
As for the budgetary thing - if you're micing a full band, running 4 headphone mixes, etc., etc., then you have a significant investment going over and above the $1500 for an MDM. I'd pop the extra $$$ and run 3 888/24's with a fast G4 and mix plus -- I have used plenty of stable PT systems, and I think the benefits outweigh the drawbacks. For one thing, you can track 24 and then go back and track ten more. Or just use it as a "tape machine" like RADAR, keep one monitor in the corner, and do the rest of your work on a controller with FF, REW, a scroll wheel, and some LED's.
If the street price of an HD 24 (the cheaper option) is $1500, then a G4, mix plus, and 3 888/24's is $4k, give or take $500. One "I just wanna fire up my PT files so you can mix the album" client represents that entire difference. Get the extra $1k and buy a Big Ben, then the 888's are competing with anything short of the Rosetta 800 price point. Heck, I remember being at Enterprise and seeing a machine room for a certain J-series console that hit after hit had been mixed on -- 64 channels of 888/24's (around the time HD came out -- the room was later switched to 192's).
Running a monolithic system puts your studio in the "niche" category -- for better or for worse -- heck, if you make the most of it, the inflexibility may be a GOOD thing (if I never do another f'n drum edit or vocal tuning I wouldn't miss it one bit), but I have a hard time believing that you're not losing clients. Do you have a DAW anywhere? Trust me, I'd love open an all-analog (or non-DAW based) studio and use the "this is the place where we DON'T edit tracks" M.O. as a selling point, but I think, as a business decision, it would lead me to a life of poverty, esp. since I would have to tell clients that we were going to forego some significant options which would help place them in the best light -- without the ability to say "we're keeping it analog." If your clientele doesn't demand this, then more power to you.
I mean, I work with live bands sometimes, too, and a lot of them like to bring in their MBox demos to work with. Some wanna take the PT files home and overdub keys, etc. or cut up the arrangement (all you non-digital types: people cut tape, too...). If you get a 002 and a decent CPU (to do ethernet transfers/PT setups from the HD24), you're halfway to buying a DAW.
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As for the "analog 24 track"/"everybody knows you can't make records that way," I stand by my comments. If we could have a world without DAW's, I'd be first in line. I have a music degree, and I'm a lifelong player -- production and engineering was a means to an end that ended up growing into a career (no small thanks to a voracious appetite for reading about audio and a few key gigs that functioned as apprenticeships).
Everybody knows that 99% of the kids who play clubs these days can't make a radio-ready record "that way," and, even if they COULD, would it really be a selling point anymore when they're shopping for a deal? "O.K., we're gonna build this house -- with NO POWER TOOLS!"
It's music, it's business, but the one thing it's not is a pissing contest. The "I cut the track on analog in one take" attitude is beat -- I wanna hear the MUSIC, not how you got there. I know world-class players who will sit there and nudge parts WITH you because they want the groove to be at its absolute best. Heck, even Donald Fagen was known for adjusting digital delays in milliseconds (on drum machine parts) to perfect the swing -- and that's pre-DAW. Top artists making big analog records with legendary producers used to have to patch in a Harmonizer to fix a "wrong" note in an otherwise great vocal take. Click-click-"process"-done. If I'm gonna sacrifice that kind of versatility and power, there had better be a damn good reason.
P.S.: Unlike you, I >HAVE< seen an HD-24 crash. If it goes down, you're projects are toast until you can locate another one.