Mac Studio on the way!

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by jim1960

Still some work to do on the software side but the studio is physically set up now. The dual monitor is also going to be super helpful when I'm recording because for recording I'll be facing the back of the room and will be able to work my daw without having to turn fully around every time. The PC is still in the room but nothing is connected to it.

The rack on the very right of the photo is where I keep most of my microphones except for my tube mics which have larger cases like the green one on top of the gear rack.

And pardon the crooked painting. It's straight now.

Interesting, looks comfy --are the black thingies at the ceiling corners some type of absorber ? And I forget is the keyboard a midi unit or electric piano ?

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by KevWind

Interesting, looks comfy --are the black thingies at the ceiling corners some type of absorber ? And I forget is the keyboard a midi unit or electric piano ?

Those are left over from my "I don't need to spend more on room treatment than this cheap foam" days. I never pulled them down because nothing was going in that exact spot. The red panels beneath them, however, are GIK monster traps.

[b1j]

Jim, this all looks very satisfying. Congratulations on setting things up just the way you want them.

Now you can start working on lowering the dollars per note.

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by b1j

Now you can start working on lowering the dollars per note.

Such things live amongst the unicorns.

[KevWind]

Pretty nice 6 months of use review

https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/pro...20-%2011080435

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by KevWind

Pretty nice 6 months of use review

https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/pro...20-%2011080435

The decision to do clean installs of everything made my switch a lot more difficult than I anticipated for two reasons:
1. I have a lot more software than I had back in 2017 which was the last time I did this.
2. I'm trying to avoid installing the non-Silicon compliant stuff until it becomes compliant.

The end result is I've spent many hours in front of this computer just working on setting up. On top of that, phasing out my PC added even more work because there was so much from that computer to sort through and organize. I'm still working on that stuff but I'm taking my time with it because I worry about making a critical mistake by rushing (in the past I accidentally deleted a ton of photographs I had taken).

I still need to buy a new backup drive. My old one is an 8gb drive but right now I have 4tb internal, a 4tb external, and an enclosure with 5tb worth of ssd drives ...so, 13tb of storage. My old one was a Seagate and it never gave me a problem so I'll likely go with a Seagate again. The Seagate Expansion 16TB External Hard Drive HDD looks a good choice.

I think I'm also going to need to buy a new printer/scanner as well. I'm using a Pantum laser printer. I have it networked and can use the printer but the scanner software hasn't been updated for Ventura (or any recent OS) so I can't get the scanner to work.

I'm looking forward to some day in the future when I can declare "I'm done."

[Joseph Hanna]

Originally Posted by jim1960

The decision to do clean installs of everything made my switch a lot more difficult than I anticipated for two reasons:
1. I have a lot more software than I had back in 2017 which was the last time I did this.
2. I'm trying to avoid installing the non-Silicon compliant stuff until it becomes compliant.

The end result is I've spent many hours in front of this computer just working on setting up. On top of that, phasing out my PC added even more work because there was so much from that computer to sort through and organize. I'm still working on that stuff but I'm taking my time with it because I worry about making a critical mistake by rushing (in the past I accidentally deleted a ton of photographs I had taken).

I still need to buy a new backup drive. My old one is an 8gb drive but right now I have 4tb internal, a 4tb external, and an enclosure with 5tb worth of ssd drives ...so, 13tb of storage. My old one was a Seagate and it never gave me a problem so I'll likely go with a Seagate again. The Seagate Expansion 16TB External Hard Drive HDD looks a good choice.

I think I'm also going to need to buy a new printer/scanner as well. I'm using a Pantum laser printer. I have it networked and can use the printer but the scanner software hasn't been updated for Ventura (or any recent OS) so I can't get the scanner to work.

I'm looking forward to some day in the future when I can declare "I'm done."

I'm almost finished with converting all but my internal drive to Samsung T7 Shields. You can't touch 16TB of T7s for what the Seagate you mentioned would cost, they are just more expensive, but after talking to the guys at Spitfire Audio and upon their recommendation, I picked up a couple for my Albion libraries. The first two I used were dead silent (obviously) and ran cool, in fact, cool enough to stack, are minuscule, and more than anything, jaw-droppingly fast. That, of course, is not to mention they're SolidState Drives.

Since then, I've converted my main audio drives, softsynth libraries, photo storage, and photo editing to T7s. Unfortunately, to date, the largest T7 is only 4 TB, so I've got a fair amount of drives stacked, and as I said, it won't be as cost-effective as the Seagate you mentioned, but I am personally done with spinning drives, so this solution fits my workflow well.

It's a different path, but I want to mention it nonetheless. Food for thought, as it were

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by Joseph Hanna

I'm almost finished with converting all but my internal drive to Samsung T7 Shields. You can't touch 16TB of T7s for what the Seagate you mentioned would cost, they are just more expensive, but after talking to the guys at Spitfire Audio and upon their recommendation, I picked up a couple for my Albion libraries. The first two I used were dead silent (obviously) and ran cool, in fact, cool enough to stack, are minuscule, and more than anything, jaw-droppingly fast. That, of course, is not to mention they're SolidState Drives.

Since then, I've converted my main audio drives, softsynth libraries, photo storage, and photo editing to T7s. Unfortunately, to date, the largest T7 is only 4 TB, so I've got a fair amount of drives stacked, and as I said, it won't be as cost-effective as the Seagate you mentioned, but I am personally done with spinning drives, so this solution fits my workflow well.

It's a different path, but I want to mention it nonetheless. Food for thought, as it were

That's an interesting option @ 1000 mb/s read and write, can we assume that number is with the supplied USB-C to USB-C 3.2 cable ?

Not as fast as my Samsung EVO 960 M.2 (2280) - PCIe 3.0 x4 NVM Express SSD's @ aprox 2800 mb/s read/write. But honestly don't know if that makes much difference in most real world usage situations

But if they are silent, then they are much more usable while recording. Because the fan in my OWC enclosure is always on full blast and very noticeable and not at all usable while recording.
And given the T7's are $259 for 4 TB-- they are also less money as the EVO 960 were about $150 for 1 TB and then also plus the price of the PCIe enclosure

What I have done with my two HD spinners is relegate them to redundant back up of the SSD backup

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by Joseph Hanna

I'm almost finished with converting all but my internal drive to Samsung T7 Shields. You can't touch 16TB of T7s for what the Seagate you mentioned would cost, they are just more expensive, but after talking to the guys at Spitfire Audio and upon their recommendation, I picked up a couple for my Albion libraries.

The Seagate would be strictly for backup. I wouldn't use the Seagate drive for my libraries. For my libraries I bought an ACASIS Thunderbolt 3 40Gbps enclosure which houses a 4 TB Western Digital SN850X NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD. It's super fast... not as fast as my internal drive but close enough.

I'm using the same exact combo as in this video...

[Joseph Hanna]

Originally Posted by KevWind

That's an interesting option @ 1000 mb/s read and write, can we assume that number is with the supplied USB-C to USB-C 3.2 cable ?

Not as fast as my Samsung EVO 960 M.2 (2280) - PCIe 3.0 x4 NVM Express SSD's @ aprox 2800 mb/s read/write. But honestly don't know if that makes much difference in most real world usage situations

But if they are silent, then they are much more usable while recording. Because the fan in my OWC enclosure is always on full blast and very noticeable and not at all usable while recording.
And given the T7's are $259 for 4 TB-- they are also less money as the EVO 960 were about $150 for 1 TB and then also plus the price of the PCIe enclosure

What I have done with my two HD spinners is relegate them to redundant back up of the SSD backup

You know Kev, I didn't so much shop on spec but relied more on the Spitfire folks for suggestions: that and a bunch of folks on various softsynth-centric forums all pointed almost unanimously towards the T7s. I originally intended to use them strictly for the Spitfire and Heavyocity libraries, but one by one (especially when they'd go on sale), I replaced virtually all of my daily use drives. As I mentioned, they're rock solid, blazingly fast, small, and silent.

[Joseph Hanna]

Originally Posted by jim1960

The Seagate would be strictly for backup. I wouldn't use the Seagate drive for my libraries. For my libraries I bought an ACASIS Thunderbolt 3 40Gbps enclosure which houses a 4 TB Western Digital SN850X NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD. It's super fast... not as fast as my internal drive but close enough.

I'm using the same exact combo as in this video...

I thought that was probably the case, I just wanted to make you aware in case the need arises!

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by jim1960

The Seagate would be strictly for backup. I wouldn't use the Seagate drive for my libraries. For my libraries I bought an ACASIS Thunderbolt 3 40Gbps enclosure which houses a 4 TB Western Digital SN850X NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD. It's super fast... not as fast as my internal drive but close enough.

I'm using the same exact combo as in this video...

Interesting so that set up is also aprox 2500 to 2800 mb/s like mine but I assume with no fan it is also silent and again even two to get to the 8 TB I have still significantly less money than my set up.

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by KevWind

Interesting so that set up is also aprox 2500 to 2800 mb/s like mine but I assume with no fan...

No fan. The case acts as a heat sink.

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by jim1960

No fan. The case acts as a heat sink.

Ya I am guessing that with a single SSD that works with my enclosure with 4 SSD's inside the box I assume the fan is needed.

Inexplicably the OWC advertising left off the last bulleted highlight

. This sucker's fan is intolerably loud for recording

Fortunately I only use it for backup

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by KevWind

Ya I am guessing that with a single SSD that works with my enclosure with 4 SSD's inside the box I assume the fan is needed.

Inexplicably the OWC advertising left off the last bulleted highlight

. This sucker's fan is intolerably loud for recording

Fortunately I only use it for backup

My Thunder3 Quad Mini enclosure holds 4 ssd drives. I couldn't tell you if I've never gotten that unit so hot that the fan came on or if the fan is too quiet to hear, but I never heard that come on. Prior to my new setup, I had all my libraries and sessions stored on three ssds in that 4-bay enclosure.

Now I'm using that enclosure strictly for storage. I have a 1tb drive for all my Photoshop related things (not the program, just the 600gb of backgrounds, skies, overlays, etc., as well as past PS projects), another is for all my photographs, a third will be for all my mp3 files. That leaves me with a 2tb ssd in the fourth slot that still has no set purpose.

Having the 4tb internal drive on the Mac Studio is a bit of a stress reliever. On my 2017 iMac, I opted for just a 500gb internal drive. Since it was a dedicated studio computer, it made sense to store libraries and sessions on separate drives from the Pro Tools program. But 500gb was small enough that I had to be careful and pay attention to what went on there.