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Glad it got sorted, AM!

Cheers,
Cory

spacef wrote:by the way, about pushing the ram hard: I guess you have opened the "security" brackets on the ram slots ? (i am sure you did).
But it is not abnormal that you have to push hard (except if you have to use a hammer)....
On my gygabyte mobo, it is the pci slots that are a bit too tight and have to be violented a little bit...
bloody computers

Thanks for the response and the tips.

Yes, I did open the "security" brackets.

By the way, is there any advantage to using SATA drives over IDE? I use IDE on this machine and I have just realised that my motherboard supports SATA too. Plus would changing to SATA change my computer ID in the sense that I might have to reauthorise and get new challenge codes for my software that is associated with that particular PC? Or could I use an Acronis image to just transfer to a SATA drive?

Finally, it is a six/seven year old machine, so is it worth spending the money on "old" equipment? A guy I spoke to in a computer shop didn't think it was worth doing, but I wonder whether he said that so I could just buy things from him. After all, when he said most computers have a life cycle of three years, I began to doubt his credibility. Is he talking nonsense or is he right? My "old" machines still do the job, maybe not as powerful as today's machines and yes, I would like to have the flexibility that comes with more power, but there are always ways around.

Thanks

A SATA drive is good for recording audio as they are a little bit faster that pata drives. That way, they don't need to be your C drive and will not change challenge codes (i never record or install samples on C drive, to leave the speed of the disk for windows and swap files: it is better to have a different hard drive for each of those (one for windows, one for samples/soundbanks, 1 for recording... all this on 150/200 GB partitions, with the secondary partitions (slower) for your mp3, videos, downloads etc).

You have sata III soon, but i think there is no HD that is able to use the full SATA I or SATA II bandwidth anyway so... may be it is useful for RAID setups....

the lifespan of computer ? depends, it can be zero seconds if it's about "outdatedness" comparing to "what's new" or "what's coming next" on this market . but for most users they would keep a computer between 2 and 5 years. Depends if you are a power user or regular user.

It is also about "what the heck am i gonna do with all this power"..... I am on a core2duo and don't think i need more for the moment. If i upgrade it would be for luxury and personal pleasure, which is fine too... other people would truely need upgrading depending on what they do with the computer (video editing etc....).

spacef wrote:A SATA drive is good for recording audio as they are a little bit faster that pata drives. That way, they don't need to be your C drive and will not change challenge codes (i never record or install samples on C drive, to leave the speed of the disk for windows and swap files: it is better to have a different hard drive for each of those (one for windows, one for samples/soundbanks, 1 for recording... all this on 150/200 GB partitions, with the secondary partitions (slower) for your mp3, videos, downloads etc).

You have sata III soon, but i think there is no HD that is able to use the full SATA I or SATA II bandwidth anyway so... may be it is useful for RAID setups....

the lifespan of computer ? depends, it can be zero seconds if it's about "outdatedness" comparing to "what's new" or "what's coming next" on this market . but for most users they would keep a computer between 2 and 5 years. Depends if you are a power user or regular user.

It is also about "what the heck am i gonna do with all this power"..... I am on a core2duo and don't think i need more for the moment. If i upgrade it would be for luxury and personal pleasure, which is fine too... other people would truely need upgrading depending on what they do with the computer (video editing etc....).

I have two drives in my PC. As you say, one for Windows and programs (though any associated sample libraries with a program I keep in the C Drive too-dunno if that is good or bad thing to do) and my second drive is for recording and audio files. I myself don't partition drives. I leave them whole.

With regard to lifespan, I want at least ten, if not more years use. Of course the computer world is a fast developing one and in essence everything you buy today is obsolete tomorrow. I work with my limitations, such as bouncing down tracks but at the same time wishing I didn't need to commit myself to something fixed. I have to say I would like the luxury of running all the plugins I want. I still consider that my seven year old music pc with all my Pulsar cards as state of the art, but I really want more power.

By the way, I don't notice any boost in performance with my added RAM. I have now 3 GB of RAM compared to 1.5 before. My default startup project in Ableton was at 23% and now it is still 23%. Does that seem right?

Thanks

yes. ram wasn't the problem to begin with...

as to the difference in performance between sata and pata, for practical purposes on your machine, there's likely to be virtually no difference....

Atomic Marshmallow wrote:though any associated sample libraries with a program I keep in the C Drive too-dunno if that is good or bad thing to do

It is probably much slower at starting windows now than it was at the beginingwhen there was few data on it.
It is not necessary to partition, but it is good to know that if you partition your disk, the first partition will have faster access to data, because the disk are circular, and the edge require less mechanical movement than the center (less turns)... or the contrary. This might be different with recent "lateral writing" drives (i don't remember the name exactly, it's the new satas from WD), eventhough i partitionned mine.

Atomic Marshmallow wrote: By the way, I don't notice any boost in performance with my added RAM. I have now 3 GB of RAM compared to 1.5 before. My default startup project in Ableton was at 23% and now it is still 23%. Does that seem right?
Thanks

i do not know, it is probably 23% of what Ableton can use as maximum ram (2GB?), while the rest, not seen by ableton or other 32bits application, will be used by windows. What is relevant is how much ram is seen by windows (in system properties). at least that what i have with Cubase.... hopefully, the next relevant upgrade for using ram is going windows7 / 64 bits so these limits can be a thing of the past....


10 years ? why not.... the lifespan of my old atari was longer than that and has even been resold 2nd hand (or 10th hand to freaks who want to make music only with gear of the pre-x86 era.... But it was an exceptional atari1024 with huge ram amounts (4 Megas )

garyb wrote:yes. ram wasn't the problem to begin with...

What do you mean garyb?


I take back what I said in my previous post. Despite my Ableton startup project reading the same value of 23% before and after adding RAM, I have noticed significant CPU headroom in playing about now. Cubase 5 is a real CPU hog. Even on an empty project my CPU load is 10% compared to Ableton's 2%. Anyone know why?

By the way, my thumbs still feel a bit sensitive after installing the RAM modules. My point being that short of using a hammer, I really had to push hard down on those things. The amount of pressure was excessive in my opinion. Puts me off adding more RAM. Is it just as difficult to add more RAM into a laptop?

i mean that the additional ram was probably unecessary. if you have lowered your cpu usage, though, then it was a good upgrade.

a laptop is earier, but more of a hassle. actually, it takes a fair amount of pressure to install ram on a desktop, but not usually like you are describing. perhaps the missing standoffs are making things harder..