@MS said:

I don't intend to start a Mac vs PC bashing contest here. Those threads will never end. I was just saying that in general, audio software performs better on Windows (7) than on OSX (10.X). There might be exceptions to the rule, and I understand people having preferences of one over the other. We of course try to do our best to support both platforms as good as we can. But the fact remains, OSX is a more troublesome platform to develop for, there are also many more formats, architectures and frameworks that you have to support on OSX.

So, returning to the beginning of the thread, I would still recommend you to run Windows 7 on your slave. It will perform better for your purposes, IE you will be able to run more instruments / more tracks before running into clicks and pops.

MAKE A BENCH MARK ! 

and even so all depends of the programer !

I have been programming for 20 years in Hex, Cobol, Basic, Algol, Postscript, depending on how you write a program, it will go fast or slow

The company I was working for, bought a Postscript program from a Canadian company. It was very slow. I complettly re-wrote it ; It was running 10 time faster, no wait for the user !

I have post on the Core Audio develloper conference :

@DG said:

The DawBench test uses Cubase, Reaper, Pro Tools and Studio One, I think. Whether or not Logic is efficient or not is not really relevant, because Martin's point was about cross-platform applications. Similarly Sonar would be irrelevant to the discussion.

DG

Not that you've shown any benchmarks to back up your claim, but as I pointed out, the tests also use Reaper, Pro Tools and Studio One.

DG

@civilization 3 said:

what claim? that logic performs better than Cubase on a Mac? I know this is true, from using both. I prefer Cubase. I want Cubase to work better. I do not have any bias to confirm. If you're calling me out, and if I cared, I could produce that benchmark. I don't care. I don't expect to 'win' this fight. I am addressing specific claims which I find to be based in poor logic. Including this; is it impossible that these apps are CODED BETTER FOR WINDOWS? This is a matter of REALLY basic logic.

I'm not saying that Logic doesn't perform better, but to quote figures without actually stating where you got them from doesn't really back up that claim. However, 4x better? I don't believe that for one moment. Are you sure that when you did that test you had all of the tracks in your Logic project in Live mode (to eliminate the process buffer)?

Of course it is possible that all cross-platform applications are coded better for Windows. It's also possible that Windows is just a better operating system. No way of knowing, unless you see all of the source code for all existing cross-platform applications. [;)]

There is no fight. Nothing to win. If you were interested solely in performance you wouldn't be using OSX at all. The fact that you are, means that there are other things that are more important to you, such as the way the OS handles for you and the sequencer you choose to use. Nothing wrong with that. For me I don't care what OS or machine that I use, as long as I can get the performance I need. OSX won't do that for me.

DG

It is really disappointing to hear what I suspected long ago... that the VSL programmers are biased towards Windows. That benchmark link really is just so silly, I expect more form VSL. I would bet that none of those programs get as much attention and expertise on the Mac side as they do for the Windows side, and who knows what kind of clunky workarounds they implemented to get that software that was developed on PC to work on Mac OS. Perhaps none, perhaps several, but we don't really know do we?

As for the programming being easier for Windows, well I work much quicker and efficiently in Logic than I do in Cubase. Does that make Logic better?

Of course if you're preference is to develop on Windows and then you have to port to Mac out of necessity it's always going to appear that Windows is superior.

DG, I really get tired of your Mac bashing on this forum. We all know by now you just love Windows so much and seem to hate Macs. You take any opportunity to tell us how much superiour a PC system is. This is just plain bollocks when you factor in the headaches you get from dealing with Windows, and then there's the whole good coding issue.

You are shooting the messenger. I am a long time Mac user and the author of 2 Logic Pro books but I am building a PC slave because East West, for whom I am aa part  time employee, has  told me exactly what VSL is telling you here, that it is very difficult to make the OSX 64 bit version of Play as efficient as the Windows 64 bit version. That is just the reality.

Is a programmer needs help, there is a coreaudio devellopper forum that is manage by Midi's and Core Audio's god

Honestly, some of this stuff really gets old.  One must remember that when Apple went to 64 bits, they pulled the rug out from under all of their third party developers by unexpectedly changing their initial 64 bit o/s specs.  VSL, along with everyone else was absolutely stuck.  There were very real reasons why 3rd party developers were able to be deliver products for the 64 bit Windows o/s, but not for Mac. 

Of course, customers blamed VSL, and others, for not producing immediate products for Apple's new o/s, when it was entirely a result of Apple's behavior.  What makes it more awkward is that Apple was something less than honest with consumers regarding their claims about their 64 bit o/s.  As in this thread, customers still blame VSL (and others) for producing "inferior" products for Mac, when the source of the problem traces to weaknesses within Apple's own o/s design.  Apple, in may ways, is their own worst enemy.  Great platform, has the advantage of being a closed system (theoretically means fewer stability issues), and arguably the more "elegant" solution, but of late a major pain for developers, and in at least some ways not the technological leader they used to be (an absolute reversal from Mac's early days).  As they have morphed into a giant innovative consumer electronics company, their former core business (and the market that kept them afloat for many years) - computers for high-end artistic/creative content developers, has become a very minor portion of their overall business.

Perhaps I simply should have said +1 to Asher's comments.

1. So simply switching to Windows will give me performance benefits? A bootcamp running Mac Pro is indistinguishable from an equivalently powerful PC?

2. I need to use OSX on my master to run DP. Any networking issues I should be aware of when communicating Mac-PC?

@inwinterhesleeps said:

It is really disappointing to hear what I suspected long ago... that the VSL programmers are biased towards Windows. That benchmark link really is just so silly, I expect more form VSL. I would bet that none of those programs get as much attention and expertise on the Mac side as they do for the Windows side, and who knows what kind of clunky workarounds they implemented to get that software that was developed on PC to work on Mac OS. Perhaps none, perhaps several, but we don't really know do we?

I am simply stating reality here - that most (all?) x-platform software performs better on Windows than on Mac. We (and others) use x-platform frameworks to be able to deliver software for both platforms. It is true that some (I believe all?) of these frameworks perform better on Windows than on Mac, which is one of the main reasons software appear snappier on Windows. To completely throw away the code and keep two separate branches of code for Mac and Windows separately, is just not a real solution for a small software company. It would be way too costly, and would take too much time.

Then you have the issue with the constantly changing "rules" for the Mac platform. First, there was PPC and Carbon. Then there was a sudden switch to x86, and Cocoa was added to the palette. Then we were told Carbon would not go to 64-bit. So the story continues...

Most of the specific platform efforts from our side actually go towards solving issues on the Mac platform. A big reason for this is the wide variety of combinations possible on Mac, compared to Windows. On Windows, you have x86 and x64, Win32 gui and VST 2/3 format. (With the very rare occasional Win/RTAS user). On Mac, you have 4 architectures - x86, x64, ppc, ppc64. Add to this AU, RTAS, VST2, VST3 formats, some supporting Carbon views only, some supporting Cocoa views only, some supporting both. Since we are not developing every piece of code on our own - we rely on 3rd party frameworks for a variety of things - we are also relying on these frameworks to implement support for whatever radical change Apple decides to push through at the moment. 

The Apple shift to Cocoa-only for 64-bit operation, was probably the toughest one for most developers. Cocoa comes with some benefits (Carbon is terrible and badly documented), but also a lot of drawbacks. Large Cocoa apps using lots of widgets, which is exactly what audio apps are doing, tend to get slow, simply due to how the Cocoa framework works. I remember Apple recommending to keep Widget count to below 100 with Cocoa apps, something which is just not possible for a modern audio app. You could easily notice the decrease in responsiveness when Logic switched from Carbon to Cocoa, I believe in Logic v8. Somhow everything got "sticky" in mouse/keyboard interaction with the gui.

There are many, many other core technologies that also simply work faster on Windows than on Mac, due to the way the kernel, OS, SDK, compiler tools etc are put together. For certain things there are workarounds to be found, sometimes there are not. We at least are doing everything within our powers to make it better.

Hi All,

It must be tough (for Martin) being in the middle of all this. But returning to the OR, I too am interested in running Bootcamp.

I am (was) a die hard Mac fan, but since Lion am thinking to the future and where Apple is headed.

The original thread was really asking: Is Bootcamp as efficient as a "normal" PC running windows? (The question of whether PC is faster than Mac does seem to have been answered.)

I would like to also ask:

If I intall Windows 7 as a Bootcamp drive, do I need to transfer my VSL library to EXFat drives or NFTS drives, or will the recent HFS+ Windows 7 driver that Bootcamp 3.1 provides, allow library data to be read just as fast, by windows bootcamp, from the HFS+ drives that the library is sitting on at the moment?

It's a big question - or rather it's answer will be big. I want to "try out" windows on bootcamp for Nuendo and VSL, but don't want ot burn any bridges yet. My various SSD drives were quite an investment. I only want to re-format (or buy more of them) if there is a speed necessity.

Another question: I also run (under OSX obviously at the moment) 2 Sonnet SATA E4P Pci eSATA cards. These run a dream on Mac. I believe they run under windows, but don't knowif they will run under Bootcamp.

An finally - will the eLicenser dongles all be happy bunnies too?

Whoops - one more question. Must we install a 64 bit version of Windows 7? And will that allow both 64 and 32 bit instances to work together as they do on the Mac?

Anyone in the know, please feel free to chime in (ideally without any emotional Mac vs PC ramblings).

Thanks

Ben

Ben,

For what it's worth, I use Windows 7 in Bootcamp on my master Mac Pro and get a 7.3 Windows Experience Index rating (of a possible 7.9). This is a very high rating. 

MOH

@benbartlett said:

Hi All,

It must be tough (for Martin) being in the middle of all this. But returning to the OR, I too am interested in running Bootcamp.

I am (was) a die hard Mac fan, but since Lion am thinking to the future and where Apple is headed.

The original thread was really asking: Is Bootcamp as efficient as a "normal" PC running windows? (The question of whether PC is faster than Mac does seem to have been answered.)

I would like to also ask:

If I intall Windows 7 as a Bootcamp drive, do I need to transfer my VSL library to EXFat drives or NFTS drives, or will the recent HFS+ Windows 7 driver that Bootcamp 3.1 provides, allow library data to be read just as fast, by windows bootcamp, from the HFS+ drives that the library is sitting on at the moment?

It's a big question - or rather it's answer will be big. I want to "try out" windows on bootcamp for Nuendo and VSL, but don't want ot burn any bridges yet. My various SSD drives were quite an investment. I only want to re-format (or buy more of them) if there is a speed necessity.

Another question: I also run (under OSX obviously at the moment) 2 Sonnet SATA E4P Pci eSATA cards. These run a dream on Mac. I believe they run under windows, but don't knowif they will run under Bootcamp.

An finally - will the eLicenser dongles all be happy bunnies too?

Whoops - one more question. Must we install a 64 bit version of Windows 7? And will that allow both 64 and 32 bit instances to work together as they do on the Mac?

Ben, the only questions i can answer are these:

1. There is possibly a difference between a Bootcamped Mac Pro and a PC in terms of performance, but it may not matter at all, and in any case performance will be better than you'll get in OSX, so it is a win  win situation.
2. Nuendo will perform much better in Windows than OSX.
3. Use Windows 7 64bit. You can use either Nuendo 32bit or 64bit and also both versions of VE Pro.
4. eLicenser tends to work better on Windows than OSX, whereas iLok tends to be the other way round.

Hopefully others who have experience of using the same drives on both platforms will be able to answer your other questions.

DG

@mohurwitzmusic said:

Ben,

For what it's worth, I use Windows 7 in Bootcamp on my master Mac Pro and get a 7.3 Windows Experience Index rating (of a possible 7.9). This is a very high rating. 

MOH

This is quite normal as in our Mac we use Xeon processors, and those are used on servers in the Win World

@benbartlett said:

Hi All,

It must be tough (for Martin) being in the middle of all this. But returning to the OR, I too am interested in running Bootcamp.

I am (was) a die hard Mac fan, but since Lion am thinking to the future and where Apple is headed.

The original thread was really asking: Is Bootcamp as efficient as a "normal" PC running windows? (The question of whether PC is faster than Mac does seem to have been answered.)

I would like to also ask:

If I intall Windows 7 as a Bootcamp drive, do I need to transfer my VSL library to EXFat drives or NFTS drives, or will the recent HFS+ Windows 7 driver that Bootcamp 3.1 provides, allow library data to be read just as fast, by windows bootcamp, from the HFS+ drives that the library is sitting on at the moment?

It's a big question - or rather it's answer will be big. I want to "try out" windows on bootcamp for Nuendo and VSL, but don't want ot burn any bridges yet. My various SSD drives were quite an investment. I only want to re-format (or buy more of them) if there is a speed necessity.

Another question: I also run (under OSX obviously at the moment) 2 Sonnet SATA E4P Pci eSATA cards. These run a dream on Mac. I believe they run under windows, but don't knowif they will run under Bootcamp.

An finally - will the eLicenser dongles all be happy bunnies too?

Whoops - one more question. Must we install a 64 bit version of Windows 7? And will that allow both 64 and 32 bit instances to work together as they do on the Mac?

Anyone in the know, please feel free to chime in (ideally without any emotional Mac vs PC ramblings).

Thanks

Ben

Ill be also very interested of a benchmark Logic on a master Mac and VSL on a slave Mac used with OSX and with WIN 7

@Another User said:

There are many, many other core technologies that also simply work faster on Windows than on Mac, due to the way the kernel, OS, SDK, compiler tools etc are put together. For certain things there are workarounds to be found, sometimes there are not. We at least are doing everything within our powers to make it better.

I appreciate the hard work in supporting both platforms, however, it seems to me that the points you expressed would simply be the other way around if the VSL team were primarily programming for Mac and then supporting Windows. Coming from a Logic background I think I'd find Cubase a bit awkward and problematic and vice versa.

@Another User said:

I appreciate the hard work in supporting both platforms, however, it seems to me that the points you expressed would simply be the other way around if the VSL team were primarily programming for Mac and then supporting Windows. Coming from a Logic background I think I'd find Cubase a bit awkward and problematic and vice versa.

See, we are developing our code for 3rd-party x-platform frameworks, which in their turn support Windows or OS X. We usually develop on Windows, since the development utilities, compilers etc are faster and better than the offerings on Mac. But the code written is the same, even if we would write it on a Mac. Most companies developing for more than one platform work this way.

For VI Pro, Vienna Imperial and Vienna Suite (plus the connector plugins of VE/VEPro), we have actually developed our own x-platform plugin and gui framework from the ground up.

Thanks for those answers guys! Really useful to know - I am about to order a copy of Windows 7 64 bit. Gulp.

And we are all making progress with our posturing, which is great too. ;)

On the subject of PPC support, I believe I was a user that rather loudly asked for this. Just FYI, I am finally decommissioning my remaining PPC, at least as a VE PRo server. It will remain in the studio to run legacy plugins only, as inserts via an audio card.

However, presumably one could run VE Ensemble (any version) with hardware Midi/Audio I/O, and not worry about being "version compliant" between the other machines? This being a final solution as and when VSL do actually drop PPC support.

Still needing an answer about HFS+ performance under Windows 7....

Best Wishes

Ben

I was never happy about HFS+ performance with MacDrive, so I would recommend you to format your drives as NTFS if you plan to run Windows.

@benbartlett said:

Thanks for those answers guys! Really useful to know - I am about to order a copy of Windows 7 64 bit. Gulp.

And we are all making progress with our posturing, which is great too. 😉

Best Wishes

Ben

There never was any posturing. At least not from "our" side. Only presentation of facts. [;)]

DG