The Perfect Windows XP DAW setup

io · Post by io » 25/06/2006 - 16:51

Ok, so recently I bought some new hardware to my studio-computer; a new mobo (intel), new processor (Intel P4D 3ghz), some new memory and 2 WD Raptor disks.

My ambition was to completely dedicate the computer to music production as my basement is flooded with other machines that I use for games, pron surfing and other essential things. Well, I've done some tweaking including disabling services that are not needed on my system, followed the steps that are described at http://www.musicxp.com and removed components from the system that I don't need.

Well, I'm still not pleased. My sequencer hangs occationally and sometimes the CPU gets overloaded even when I have only a few VSTs running, and when testing the same project with the same VSTs on my mates' box (which has half ammount of memory and not as good processor) it runs much better.

Does anyone have links to other good sites that can describe how to tweak a studio-computer to perfection? Or tips in general?

Cheers

Analog-X64 · Post by **Analog-X64** » 25/06/2006 - 17:00

You never mentioned what your sound card/interface is? I dont think Processor or Memory have anything to do with your freezes and crashes.

I'm using an Athalon Barton 2500+ XP processor with an 1.8Ghz Processor and Asus Motherboard with the NVidia sound chip built into it and its rock solid.

io · Post by io » 25/06/2006 - 17:30

Ah yes, sorry.

So the soundcard I am currently using is the M-Audio Audiophile Firewire. I also have a MOTU PCI-424, but the PC drivers are known to be really awful. I guess the MOTU card is better than the M-Audio, but should I really have to use ASIO drivers (they work better than the WDM)? Isn't ASIO not-as-efficient as WDM?

My mates' soundcard is the PCI version of the Audiophile.

trace · Post by **trace** » 26/06/2006 - 14:42

I prefer ASIO casue it is great and you can have low latency

What does you mate have? do he have ASIO?

Try ASIO and see if it works better

io · Post by io » 26/06/2006 - 15:14

Hi Trace,

No he works with WDM aswell.. I was under the impression that WDM was faster than ASIO but it appears that's not really the case.

Romeo Knight · Post by **Romeo Knight** » 26/06/2006 - 16:05

ASIO 2.0 is the way to go! Don't dare to even think about other drivers.

Everything else you'll find here: http://musicxp.net/
It's not really up to date but basically useful.

gibs · Post by **gibs** » 27/06/2006 - 6:53

if you sequencer hang, perhaps you should contact the support (if it's not an unoffcicial version)

wich sequencer do you use ?