Hello everyone. I am an IT professional that is assisting a music composition friend with a system build. Thing is, I'm not sure how best to optimize the system for music composition. The requirements I've been given so far: Thunderbolt port, lots of CPU, lots of memory, future expandability. The system needs to stay under $1200.

This is what I've come up with so far:

• Intel Core i5-4670K Haswell 3.4GHz LGA 1150 Quad Core ($100 less than an i7) - $240
• ASUS Z87-EXPERT LGA 1150 Intel Z87 (1x Thunderbolt v1.0) - $230
• G.SKILL Trident X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) (lowest CAS latency) - $164
• SAMSUNG 840 EVO MZ-7TE250BW 2.5" 250GB SATA 6Gb/s MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) (OS and programs) - $140
• Seagate Hybrid Drive ST2000DX001 2TB MLC/8GB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s NCQ 3.5" Desktop SSHD (data storage) - $120
• ASUS DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS Black SATA 24X DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM - $20
• RAIDMAX Blackstone series RX-700AC 700W Continuous Power ATX12V V2.3 / EPS12V V2.91 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply - $70
• PC tower case - $50
• Video Card - Going with onboard for now. Plan on upgrading later with additional funds - $0
• Sound Card - ???
• Windows 7 x64 OEM - $100

Current Total - $1134
Any thoughts on this build? I'd appreciate any feedback you might have.

Some questions I have:
Is having ECC memory important for music composition?
Any recommendations on a sound card? Is onboard sound sufficient for the short term?

Funds are limited at this point. So I'm trying to leave the system open for expansion. That would include: doubling memory to 32 GB, adding video card, adding sound card (if needed), adding audio capture card (if needed).

 

What about keyboard, mouse, and display?
Your an it guy no inside deals you can use for win 7.
Drop the price on that motherboard and go for a cheaper one by $70
Between the both above options you can save about $120

Is having ECC memory important for music composition? NO
Any recommendations on a sound card? Is onboard sound sufficient for the short term? Short term will do

That's all I got at the moment !! Hope it helps

 

That is decent enough specs for sure, i would ask him what his requirements are with regards to his music composition as the onboard soundcard might not fit his requirements. If he is gonna use something like a firewire interface such as the focusrite range etc then the onboard sound really dont matter.

 

if you are building a pc for your friend he must already know that onboard sound cards sucks for recording music.

 

The specs on that build are just right for music production and then some.

 

If he wants to make a lot of scoring/cinematic composition using several loud samples libraries with Kontakt, he needs a lot of RAM, i own 16 gb and i would really appreciate to get 32 or even 64 gb to don't be forced to bounce my tracks.

 

Thank you!

Keyboard, mouse, monitor, and speakers are not part of the $1200 budget. Unfortunately all the current MS deals I can find are for Windows 8, not 7. Not sure if he will be using Firewire, I'll ask.

Yes, $230 is about twice as much as would I normally spend on a motherboard. However, he has stated that Thunderbolt is a requirement. That is the second cheapest Thunderbolt motherboard I can find. The cheapest is ASRock and I'm not sure I'm comfortable with the brand name.

I'd like to make it 32 GB as well, but money would have to be freed up elsewhere. I could save about $40 on the memory by going with a higher CAS. From 8 timings to 9. If memory speed isn't critical, then the extra space would be worth it. If the memory speed is really important, then the 32 GB upgrade will have to wait until he earns some additional cash.

When I said "I'm an IT professional" I didn't mean for that to sound like "I know everything." I was trying to convey that I have a technical background and am comfortable talking hardware specifics.

Thanks again for the help!

 

Go i7 if you can .. you can never have enough CPU .. especially in the future

 

You save $100 by using an EXPENSIVE i5 "K" series that is designed for overclocking????

Simply get a NON "k" series i7 as recommended above by Zenarcist.. That was also my 1st thought.

CPU is very important for music and the overclocking ability of the "k" series is not really a strong point of a music computer. It is not a tinkerers box... just something we want to work when turned on.


ADVICE from a Microsoft Certified Trainer - Get current model non-K i7 for near the same price as a "k" series i5


NOTE:
1. Motherboard may have features that remain unused for a music computer. Lower priced motherboard ...
2. Having a PCI slot helps for adding older budget "pro" soundcards such as a Delta 1010LT that sell for the same price as gamers soundblaster series soundcards...

 

I just put together a system last month which after a few tweaks has been working flawlessly:

ASUS Z87-A $140
i7 3.4 4770 CPU $295
Crucial 128GB SS drive $75
Kingston 16gb 1600 RAM $160
750w Seasonic power supply (second-hand) $75
Second-hand full size ATX case, unknown brand - $40
Stock Intel CPU fan
Zalman 120mm case fan $17
SATA CD/DVD drive $40

I already had two Seagate 7200 500gb SATA drives, and also bought a USB 3.0 1T external drive. I'm also using a Lynx AES-61 PCI card. The reasons I chose this particular MB was because it had two PCI slots, and had received several positive reviews as a DAW platform on gearsluz.com.

I paid a guy $200 for putting it together, including the cost of installing Win7 Pro (64 bit). All total I spent around $1100 USD.

 

You need to clear the sound card requirement. If he needs to do serious recording using mics or instruments he will need a semi pro sound card ~ 100$ min. Lower latency on memory - of course. Cpu is good and you don't need the K version - i7 has the same specifications except hyperthreading and I cannot find info on how many cores (physical/logical) can audio rec software use; it used to be only 4 (physical/logical?!). I would go with asrock, if it is considerably cheaper, for they are cheaper only because they don't use unnecessary options that other motherboards are filled with. You don't need a hybrid hd, you already have an sdd for system. The psu is to much for this conf. : it could only make more noise, and that is a question of importance if the mic recordings are going to take place in the same room. Since this is audiosex related to audioz, maybe you should consider daz instead of microsoft? What about other softwares; they can cost more than the computer?!
Also ssd is not a requirement; you could literally put two smaller hds in raid0 and get far more space for less money, and the speed? - like I said it is not a requirement for rec, it simply speeds up the boot time of large softwares; for the recording process all that is recommended by both software and hardware manufacturers is having a separate hd for samples and projects. I will check this later so feel free to ask anything in particular...
Never ECC! Only non-ECC because Error Correction something is for servers only and slows down comp terribly!
Motherboard:- if your option was ASRock Z87 Extreme6/ac Intel Z87 go for it and get a better quieter inside-padded case for low noise;
we are talking about recording music...
Onboard audio; in both mb the same realtek; good for reproduction, probably even latency, but recording is not just signal-to-noise ratio and resolution; what about phantom power?- basically you have not listed what this guy has already and what he needs in the end and that is a problem...

 

You're serious man? Don't head this guy to the wrong road. If you can't make top notch music with 16GB then it should be something wrong with you, not with your configuration. You think the "to don't be forced to bounce my tracks" have something to do with the ram amount exclusively?? 32GB is usually enough for a video-editing professional, while you still recommend this guy even 64gb for music production?? How big are your projects with your actual 16gb? 100 fully loaded vsti instrument tracks?? Don't tell me you wander through your big number of your tracks. Do you want to break a guiness book's record with the number of your instrument tracks in a musical project?


Kildrak, 32GB is future proof for a music scoring professional/cinematic stuff with heavy loads of vstis, but that doesn't mean you won't be able to work with 16gb. Even 16GB is more than enough if you produce intelligent music, which is not a mess made by thousands of useless tracks, or creating a instrument track for every single note of your arrangements. There's still alot of professionals out there who didn't upgraded their 16gb amount yet, so don't try to rush about it, 16gb is more than just fine!

 

The fact about ram is it depends on cpu; what cpu could process 64 gb of information?! Probably not even i7 extreme! 4 core cpu is enough for 16 gb; take away 1 gb for integrated video card and 3 gb for the system and cache and you're left with 12 gb; to name the actual possible instruments: cubase alone: 300 mb, basic kontakt symphonic orchestra: 1-2 gb, superior drummer and addictive drums for comparison: 1gb, two trilian bass guitars for comparison: 2 gb, two large pianos for comparison or stereo: 1 gb; bunch of plugins, let's say 20x100mb each(!) :2gb. I already can't think of anything else and this is only 8 gb! Now you could increase preload buffer size in kontakt, but you HAVE a separate hd for samples so you don't need that! ...
The fact is this is all better safe than sorry logic, psychological. In reality you do need a good comp.; music production is no joke; but not extreme; extreme is for loser gamers and children who dream of second lives because they don't have a first life. For music; rather find a beautiful girl worthy of writing songs to and learn to play an instrument; not everyone should be a world star like most dream; playing gigs, meeting people, hanging about..........................

 

Sorry if i said wrong things or exaggerate things.i didn't want this and i didn't want to lead him on a wrong path.

Of course i don't use so much tracks like you asked and my aim is not to break a stupid guiness book. The fact is : using several patches of Spitfire Sable libraries (let's say 4 or 6) + 1 Voxos Choirs + Percussions + 2 or 3 8Dio patches of synths/fxs, my 16 gb of ram are full.
Yes, i'm may be stupid and could work in a more clever way but i really appreciate to be able to modify notes and so on.. during the longer time i can and when i spent a certain amount of loud Kontakt libraries patches (often 8 or ten),i'm forced to bounce at least some of them.

Samples libraries in Kontakt are not VSTI - my life if full of doubts but i'm quite sure of this. So it doesn't use resources the same way.
I mean, when you don't own a large SSD or fast hard drive to stock your samples libraries, then you'll be limited to the speed of reading/transfer a certain amount of samples. Thus, you can use Kontakt Memory Server which uses RAM in order to avoid "cracks" when reading too much samples at the same time.

It depends on the samples libraries you're using : while Adagio strings series and Spitfire Sable are quite heavy, Heavyocity Damage or Best Service Ethno Instruments are liter

You can always work with what you got even if you don't got a lot but you'll not work with the same comfort which could be sometimes,redhibitory.

Sorry if i said bullshit, again, it was not my goal, it will make a lesson i'll remember : "give help if you're absolutely sure of what you say"

Ps: Yes, 64 gb is may be extreme, i admit, but 32 would help me so i think it could for him too. I remember this video template for orchestral stuff whichs uses around 30 Gb http://youtu.be/SA5ba4BBiu8

Peace

 

It's ok man, i got it now.

P.S. How do you know in that orchestral layering session video, that project to use around 30GB, because i don't see the VST Performance meter.

 

The author tells us in the comments sections and when i look to his massive layering template, i'm not really amazed *yes*

 

Alright. After a long discussion he's decided to drop the Thunderbolt requirement. That frees up about $100 on the motherboard. Hooray!

Change i5 4670 to non-K version, save $20
Remove Thunderbolt from motherboard, save $100
Change hard drive to non-hybrid, save $20
Current total: $994

He's going to try 16 GB memory for now. The system will be fully capable of being upgraded to 32 GB if it is deemed helpful at a later date.

Thank you, savadious. That is an incredibly useful bit of wisdom there. Especially since I had originally picked a motherboard without legacy PCI slots.

Thank you, Lord Koos for sharing your PC specs. It's very helpful to know we are in the same ballpark for system specs.

He's unsure of his recording requirements for right now. So we may leave it to onboard sound for now until he has a better idea of what he wants.

 

Pesonally I wouldn't trust onboard GFx processor... especially if they arent using a DAW that can disable "fancy" graphics like Reaper can... those moving knobs and flashing lights can tax the GPU if its not up to snuff... even something with 1GB DDR3 would most probably do the trick... I'd go for slightly less memory like 3x 4GB and a GFx processor that allows for dual screens; because everyone inevitably moves to dual screens when they have the option...

 

The onboard graphics is the next target. Found a fanless GPU for $80.

Zotac ZT-60207-20L GeForce GT 640 Graphic Card - 900 MHz Core - 2 GB GDDR3 SDRAM - PCI Express 3.0 x16

Yes that may be overkill for an audio workstation, but he's also a bit of a gamer. And he'll be making game music on occasion, so it's needed for "research purposes."

As others have brought up, fan noise is a concern. I found a low noise CPU cooler for $23.

ARCTIC COOLING UCACO-FI11001-CSA01 92mm CPU Cooler

So that leaves the power supply fan and the case fan. The case I'm considering has a 140 MM fan (the larger, the quieter) so that should help with noise. Not sure there is much I can do about the power supply fan. I do have one chosen with the larger diameter bottom mounted fan. The case I'm considering:

NZXT Source 210 Elite White Steel with painted interior ATX Mid Tower Computer Case w/ Black Front Trim - $50

 

Not sure where your reply went, drdark2, but wanted to thank you for the case advice. And yes, that NZXT thing is pretty ugly. I sent it to him as a joke and he said he liked it.

I found this case and it includes a quality 500W power supply. Its supposed to be a bit quieter than the usual case.
Antec Sonata III 500 Black 0.8mm cold rolled steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 500W Power Supply

I tried to sell him on the Corsair Obsidian, but he felt it was too expensive (same price as the Sontata 3, but no PSU included).