Dedicated hardware is probably the way to go for something like this... personally, I'd rather it were that way. Just pipe the audio from our Mac or PC into the VSL hardware, and run MIR on a totally committed machine!
And this notion that chips are going to get exponentially faster is not (currently) accurate -- it HAS been true, over the past 5 years, or so, but I think it will be less and less the case for the next couple of years. Really, the standard "chip" has kind of "hit the wall" as far as raw speed goes... the nuts and bolts of physics are really starting to get in the way now -- heat dissipation, noise, and so on... even quantum effects, I've heard. So really, it's now just a matter of squeezing every last bit they can get out of the basic model -- hence the emphasis on dual-core and hyperthreaded cpus. Until a totally new paradigm comes out, cpu "speeds" are more likely to plateau than anything else...
It is a drag that this will be PC-only, but not hard to understand, given Apple's recent move to Intel.

J.

but more chips are on the way oh yea of little faith...

and there are more ways to get faster than simple clock speed and we're already doing it - multicores, multiprocessors. There will be another leap in technology over the next 3 - 6 years mark my words...! There's more than one way to skin a cat.

2nd, the main reason macs have been traditionally more expensive besides their generally superior hardware design and componentry (note I said TRADITIONALLY as in GENERALLY) which does account for one factor of the expense is the low yeild rates on PPC's which has made them more expensive as they have in honesty tried to keep up with Intel chip makers over the last few years. Now that the processor aspect of the design is cost wise on a level playing field with other hardware companies I think we will see a much more cost competitive Macintosh. I wouldn't expect them to compete with run of the sawdust mill cheap as chips PC's but certainly with the more reliable brand name assemblies.

Personally, I would rather have a Mac running such a system, even if it is slightly more expensive. I mean a few hundred dollars. If it's vastly more expensive that's another story but as i said, the cost difference between macs and PC and the benefits of purchasing MAC for that smaller cost difference is going to improve once the intel chips start shipping. I suppose only time will show if I'm right or wrong on that.

Why not have everything plug into MIR hardware? Because you can update software but not a box (not as easily or cheaply), software is cheaper, scalable to the budget of the user, can't afford a real time system (when it's possible one day) then you can buy the next best thing and render offline, and of course, it works the other way, the same software, with a new hardware/faster system etc will run if not straight out of the box then relatively soon after the hardware release getting potentially massive (relatively) speed increases overnight without the user having to buy new "MIR" box. Try to sell your "old" MIR box not so easy in a sellers market I would bargain, unlike a used PC or MAC which can be put to heaps of different uses when selling second hand a lot easier to shif I would imagine.

The nature of MIR and the fact that until it can render in full quality in real time, no system will be "it" it would be best to stick with software at least, and who knows, what kind of future developments will further increase the processing demands of MIR so even then...

I understand what you are saying, but personally I don't care what OS is used for the box as long as it is convenient and works properly. I agree that the price of a Mac should come down significantly over the next year or so, as it will be a PC [:D] The only difference will be the operating system, but I still think that Apple should make it possible to purchase the OS seperately to run on any PC, but they won't. I guess that this is the only way that they will be able to charge so much for what are standard computer components.

DG

Ahem, a Mac, for now, is NOT a PC. There is a lot more to a Mac than the operating system. And although Intel chips will be inside Macs, I think you will find that Apple and Intel may very well come up with customised chip designs to apples specs especially with the high end machines.
Mac a PC? That's like saying an Astin Martin is a sports car, or a Mazda!

@DG said:

If I buy a piece of standalone gear to run MIR, why would I spend twice as much just to get a Mac based operating system? After all the interface would be the same, the performance (according to you) would be the same, just the price would be much higher.
I would agree that if you like the OS much more on a Mac then some things are more convienient, but in this case I don't really see how.

DG

Well if we're talking software versions it is of course going to be far more effective for me, and other mac users, to use it on the mac. If it is indeed a mixing unit as well as reverb it stands to reason that it would be a plugin component just like the perf-tool. I'm routing for dual versions here, I've no problem with there being a PC version .. I'd just like to have the chance to buy it for mac as well! That's just plain sensible.

And like wise, just like you not wanting to buy a mac, I really don't want to have to spend a shed load more money on a PC, and to buy another sequencer just to run MIR.

And after another morning of HELL with WINDOZE here at work where I just want to reach into the computer and strangle it I'm so dead against MS and I'l NEVER forgive them for the misery the daily yearlly misery that has been caused by that AWFUL company and badly written software. NEVER!!! [8o|] [8o|] [8o|] [8o|]

BTW if you really need a reason not to buy ms and a reason to prove that they really ARE evil (***in my opinion***) check out that video link I posted of the dancing monkey boy and freeze frame it at pretty much any point in the juncture and you will see the face of satan superimposed.

Don't sell your soul, buy apple, buy red hat, don't buy ms (***in my opinion***).

Sorry fairly emotional and heated but I want to throw that stupid computer out the window just now. [8o|]

There is no point getting into a PC/Mac argument when all we are talking about is the OS. Mac an Aston Martin? Perleeze!!!! There is nothing really special about the components that Apple uses, except the price. I'm afraid that I don't like MS very much, but I also don't like Apple either, so I use whatever is more suitable. At least when I buy a PC I am only paying MS the cost of the OS, whereas with a Mac I would be paying Apple the lot, and don't forget that a rather large proportion of that dosh goes to Bill Gates as a major shareholder, so I could argue that buying a Mac was actually supporting the "evil empire", rather than being a brave, lone voice in the wilderness against it [:D]

As I've said before I don't really care what is under the hood of a piece of standalone gear, as long as it is suitable for my purposes. I can just see the reaction from the engineer if I turned up at Air Lyndhurst and threw a hissy fit because the Neve is "PC" based [8-)]

DG

Given the general good humour in the opinions of windoze Vs Mac, and the limitations of DAW's using those OS's, now's the time for an enterprising developer to build a Linux based programme.

Linux Audio Pro. 64 Bit, superb notation, 600 tracks, 90% Ram availability, multi computer compatibility, etc..

The stuff of dreams!


Regards,

Alex.

alex, because you mention it ... anyone knows what happened to the linux sampler project?
christian

Oh who's getting in to a PC Mac debate - not me man, count me out who cares. Just opinions.

Christian,
I've just been to the site, and it seems to be up and running.

www.linuxsampler.org

Regards,

Alex.

@DG said:

As I've said before I don't really care what is under the hood of a piece of standalone gear, as long as it is suitable for my purposes. I can just see the reaction from the engineer if I turned up at Air Lyndhurst and threw a hissy fit because the Neve is "PC" based [8-)]

DG

Heh.. .well Carilion Computers are PC based and Iäd be happy to use one of them .. but they are specialist systems after all. As for the Aston Martin thing ... that car has pretty much all the same components as many other cars .. but it's still better! And anyways, I wasn't trying to start a PC/Mac war. My gripe was picking out that there should be an equal amount of VSL software for both, so that nobody feels left in the rain. [[;)]]

And just to add to what hetoreyn said, I think we can all at last agree that PC's s**k and Macs are the best. [[:|]] FINALLY. javascript:emoticon('[:P]')

And just to add to what mpower88 said, I think we can all at last agree that Mac's s**k and Linux computers are the best. FINALLY.

Clark

Oh you're so immature... [*-)]

sorry guys, you're all wrong. without wanting to offend the amiga community - SGI computers are the best [6]
here and here is why [:P]

...I still don't buy it. The Golden Age of the "chip" as we know it has passed. Dual-core, quad-core... sure, okay. But then the bus is the bottleneck, and the same problems that are cropping up in the cpu are going to crop up (are cropping up) there as well. There are probably numerous alternatives, and there probably have been designs for alternatives for years, but the money is still in making basic chips that kids can plug into their asus mobos and go nutz playing the latest game. We're going to see more parallel(ish) stuff, for sure (dual, quad, etc.), and we're probably going to see more attention put toward writing good code (at last), but I don't think we'll see the sort of speed boosts we saw from aorund '97 to '04. I'm totally willing to be wrong about this, but there is no great indication that things are going to change in a fundamental way any time soon.

And a standalone box doesn't have to be any more or less flexible than a conventional computer. It would probably be based on some brand of linux, with a proprietary GUI, and little or no access to the OS itself. But you've still got software/OS, and firmware/BIOS. That's it. If VSL wanted to update something, it could be as simple as applying a patch -- in fact, it could even be done automatically online for you, without you even thinking about it.

J.

The Buss on the Mac G5 is faster than any PC buss. My PC can't even turn on without generating some stupid registry error. I have to reformat my PC every three months. The other day I turned it on to find that Norton anti-virus ... was behavingly like a virus! :[:P] I mean,.. what the hell man!

My Quad G5 is on order and coming soon and I can't wait. Oh sure given time PC's will be using quad prcessors too, and they may finally have a 64 bit operating sytem like OS X (Yes it is 64 bit, it says so!).

To be honest I'm fairly sure that my PC is the crapest in the universe, and I'm pretty sure that everyone elses PC's run a lot better than mine. Which stands to reason otherwise you wouldn't defend their honor when one of us mac users stamps our feet in frustration over PC things. Still .. it's all funny really. You gotta laugh otherwise you'd cry. [:D]

Wait till crystal-optical chips start coming out, and HD's finally becoming as fast as the processor. At which point the VSL will be some 300 Terra Bytes in size! Who knows!

@hetoreyn said:

My Quad G5 is on order and coming soon and I can't wait.

What you gonna use as a sound card?

yeah, Paul... I was wondering about this too -- with them going PCI-Express only... Everybody's going to have to go USB/Firewire. That could be a bit of a bummer, since most of the decent firewire stuff is over $1000. Anyway, I'm still running my "old" dual 1.8 G5! Which is fine for me. After all, I'm pretty certain the next chunk of money I'm going to blow will be on whatever VSL is cooking up in 4 days! ...mind you, it could be like $10,000 or something, which will relegate it to the realm of dreams... "It's real"??? not for me it aint! [;)]

btw -- I just spent the last week in the UK. My girlfriend has rented us a place in a fancy Mill-conversion in Brighouse. Definitely a not-much-going-on kind of town, but Leeds is only 20 minutes away, and seems like a pretty nice city from the few times I've been there. I also got to check out a couple of shows at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, which was great. I've no idea how a place like Huddersfield managed to build such an impressive festival, with so many big names... kind of a head-scratcher, that. Also, just curious: do you happen to have any ideas on where I can get _reasonably-priced_ acoustic foam in the UK?

cheers,

J.

and as to the general discussion: yes, when the chips go crystal/optical (or IF they do) then we'll see some profound speed boosts again. But the memory bandwidth problems are significant. Even now the bus is being pushed for all it's worth (yes, on the G5, as well as in the PC world), so it will be interesting to see how this plays out over the next few years.