Pulled the trigger on a Windows machine for audio!

Well, Apple came to the forefront not because of any realistic performance difference. One was almost perfect "coolness" marketing at a time when people had more money to blow on things that seemed cool and trendy. Up until then, it was a beige box or nothing. Two, was that their marketing used a lot of hatred towards windows to it's advantage.  Three was the ultra simplistic approach to it's users, essentially forbidding them from doing any harm to their systems, which only added to their aura of being "stable".

Their "supercomputer" marketing in the 90's was based on a flaw in the calculations of a single filter in a benchmark test which gave them a 200-500% increased score, which was later found to be false, but by then they had already enjoyed around 6 months of marketing as a "PC killer", although all their other benchmarks were around 25% slower in pretty much every category.

Also, I'm never going to let it go that Apple has always colluded with companies to be exclusively Apple. Look at the original ProTools, which had developed a complete PC version but was soon killed at the request of Apple in their typical "Apple or nothing" fashion. Also, Apple typically enters into schools through the guise of offering the schools impossibly cheap Macs so that the schools lock themselves into Apple products. Once the contract is signed, any attempt at teaching anything but Apple and Apple approved software, results in Apple taking back all hardware and software, leaving the school with nothing. This strong-arm mafia shit is great for Apple and their friends as it locks young minds into thinking that there is only ONE player in the professional market, and that's what they'll purchase once they leave school, but it's horrible for the audio community because it only allows companies like Avid to sell completely overpriced devices under the guise of superiority.  The fanboys eat that shit up because it makes them feel like winners after they've been fleeced for all their hard earned dollars.  They spent a lot, that must mean they are gonna get a lot!  Right?

And the rest is history.

Oh I remember the times. I was working in IT during those years while going to school. There were definitely a few Apple fanboys, even back then, and we used to get into some real doozie arguments and spent lots of time doing overclocking and benchmarks on PCs and Macs while we should have been working.

I haven't benchmarked anything in a decade. I'd use Win 7 forever if I had my choice. The problem with bugs is that they come from many places, usually user error or cheapest bidder driver development.

So first, for audio I'd run an I7 with the fastest speed I could get and still having good amounts of L1 and L2 cache. I'd run a medium amount of low latency system RAM. Primary drive which runs the programs and a secondary drive that handles the separate disk caching needs to be SSD these days. (Drive caching is the most likely place for bottlenecks these days). Data drives can be normal fast access SATA or SAS drives, likely in RAID-0 running on the motherboard's chipset. Video doesn't need anything super crazy, but a good amount of video RAM and a wide RAM bandwidth are good for lots of colors and shapes.

The windows OS needs to be cut down to size. On XP I got the system ram usage down to around 50MB total, not counting the actual DAW and software mixer. It was mentioned that newer Windows versions just need more ram and the services don't need to be disabled, but I disagree with that. With the 50+ services that run natively on a fresh install of windows 7, 40 of those don't actually need to run at all. While ram is cheap, system caching of these services means that disk access is going to be much higher as fragmentation is higher and the system needs to update active services, even when they aren't being used. Shutting them down allows fewer IRQs and a whole lot less memory usage.

All in all, if we were comparing, I'd say between what's available for PC hardware and the tweaks that can happen in windows, I'd say I'd beat pretty much every competitor with around 800$-1000$ worth of PC running win 7.

This is a bit revisionist history. IME.

The truth is actually less dramatic and conspiracy theorist. You have to examine what computers were used for in "music production". Until the mid 90s, that was MIDI. ONLY. Other than Atari, which folded pretty early, MacOS was the only OS that was accurrate AND had good software selection--thus it was used for MIDI. In the early to mid 90s, came ProTools TDM systems--NuBus was the first I remember. Where we're the DOS Nubus machines? Right--it was Mac only. Until maybe the mid 2000s, native computing simply wasn't even CLOSE to usable for any multitracking and mixing, so if you used a computer for anything north of a little demo thing, it was a TDM system--still Mac Only.

Now, the trendy Apple thing you refer to is actually when they started to let the music community down. OSX's midi over USB was fucking horrible--windows was worse still, but there was another paradigm shift around 2k---the virtual instrument. ASIO under windows and on a professional level, GSIF under Windows KILLED OSX for this purpose alone. And since virtual instruments are directly tied to MIDI...and looping audio....replacement of Akai samplers and such my Gigastudio and Acid....Windows made their way into the professional music studio for the FIRST TIME.

Apple, while using Motolora G4 era chips (similar timeframe-trying to go as best in order)...wasted Intel's for audio. WASTED. Apps like Logic and DP that exploited the AltiVec engine were REAL WORLD (benchmarks are mostly meaningless, IME, for anyone trying to use a system to accomplish a job)...killed and made native processing possible for SMALL studios.

The two things that changed the landscape the most? The iPod. Apple buying Logic(Emagic). They did it because Emagic made far and away the most efficient and powerful Windows music software. They had two reasons to buy it--to stop that on the Windows side AND because Motorola was starting to deliver slower and slower chips--they needed to prove they could still keep up via software optimization, which is what made Emagic work well on inferior Wintel machines. But, this pissed of MOTU and Avid/Digi....and gave Steinberg the in they always wanted. As the SECOND BEST DAW on Windows, they suddenly had a HUGE influx of users who were Wintel Logic users who refused to switch platforms to keep using Logic. They COMPLETELY reworte their app from the ground up using the Nuendo audio engine....and catered to all the ex Logic users--and in short time, was not only the best on Windows, but as the chips changed--the best....native software DAW. The iPod was just when Apple started going for broad consumer based and using the iPods and later iPhones to sell computers TOO....

So, Apple had to ditch Motorola to A)get faster chips as by the time of the G5s, the tables had turned and intel was whooping ass...and B)to get more markup in their newly higher selling consumer computer line.

Apple further angrier the 800lbs gorilla (Avid) by partnering with Apogee to make the Symphony/Logic combo direct competition for TDM rigs. It never REALLY equalled the performance, but their claims it did were enough to get more people to go the native route --which Avid has always sucked balls at.

Which now we're fairly caught up....Steinberg makes the most efficient and flexible native DAW that's cross platform....it will run better on a Mac RUNNING Win7 now...Microsoft has stayed out of the audio business, allowing ASIO and VST to continue to mature on the Windows platform...MOTU has leased DP for Windows now....LogicX has some crazy system requirements--pointing out the business model--they made LogicX to "inspire" Logic users to buy new hardware...which of course only they make. Their new "free OS updates" is more for that--what do you do when you have a mature platform that most people don't need to move on from? Update the system to make it run slower on old hardware. Welcome to how they sell new iPhones. It's no longer an app that can be run on whatever Mac, but a NEW Mac.

Obviously, virtual instruments got to be a pretty big thing, and as someone who has both right now, I can PROMISE you Wintel KILLS Mac still for this purpose. Guess what works great? Logic's built in still like they were 15 years ago instruments. Of course, you also know how little I value virtual instruments north of making demos.

I love my Apples. As consumer devices, Particularly ones I don't have to support (Meaning ones MsPop and Pop's Mom use)....for Internet appliances, they KILL Windows. KILL. Same with sync'ing and dealing within things, which KILL Android and such....KILL.

But. I use Windows in the studio because it's simply better right now for audio. And for virtual instruments. It's hasn't ALWAYS been (except VIs)....but, it is now, and I could give a shit what used to be. Which is the other part about why som many professional engineers use Macs--look, I just showed how for nearly 25 years is was a superior solution--mostly because of the original no multitasking OS that made midi better....then Digi's hardware enabling audio production where native simply couldn't..to the AltiVec engine era--point is, people get used to tools and use them. Whether thats an old preamp....or an old computer OS. They will continue to use them until they have no other choice. I'd give it 5 years before apple pulls the plug on computers all together for mobile computing. Ironically, that MAY BE when I switch back since that will be the next recorder for me--a iSurfaceLike all solid state dock able unit. It remains to be seen how long this old C2Q lasts. But, it's doing fine at 88.2 and 96khz....but, if it can hold out, I'll take the silent tablet to replace it, since the processing is getting close. We just need true multitouch in the DAWs to get mature.

Anyway, it pains me to see so much silly fanboy stuff on eith side. It simply doesn't matter. Pick your tools and get to work. The above is the explanation is true...and from someone who has no love for either in a studio context. The are too many people on ever side of the "debate" that seem to be invested on some personal level. Pick your tools. Get to work. I've got some 88.2 mixes going right now at about 50% load on my antique Win7 machine. It also shit the bed a few days ago and I lost a few hours of productivity getting it back "right". During this recording process, I wanted a sampled piano....and couldn't use my MAcBook because the latency was truly annoying using CoreAudio....previously, I couldn't get through a single session in Logic 9 wiout a crash (doing ALL VI work)...suffice to say--I've got horror stories on both sides...and would LOVE to not have a consumer computer in my studio at all. But, that's only possible with a LOT of money now....or working on some l48khz antique.

A word about the services on Win7/8 again...
I reduced disk access to minimum on my actual main machine with a very simple trick...
My 100$ (consumer!) mainboard came with a system software that allows to cache temporary system data on a RAM disk that is automatically configured on system start. Simple thing, and ran as intended out of the box. But comparing with a "normal" Win7 pc i do not really experience huge gains in everyday performance at all....
Built a year ago, my machine achieves 13.7k on the geekbench 3 for a 1k Euros in new parts, i could have built it cheaper, but i wanted ultra-silent quality parts, since i plan to use it for a long time, and got a slightly overdosed graphics card. I used a consumer i7 cpu where i could have cut cost using a similar xeon, that utilizes 4 cores with hyperthreading, reflecting 8 thread cores to the OS, which is one point, why it cannot compete to hexacore and up workstation mainboards in multithreading benchmarks. Now, a year later, one can buy similar computers for the same price without building yourself.
The single core speed which is important, and cheap RAM increase with 64bt computers and OSes and the overall performance with SSD is great with win 7 up and the price/performance/usability ratio for audio works nowadays is not only better than ever before - it is easily affordable. For most people things work right out of the box, which makes it possible to actually work with DAWs on a professional level for everyone. The vast increase of bedroom studios, that are only limited by skills and not by their inferior systems, in the last years reflects that it is actually doable without beeing a computer geek.
I consider this a good thing. There is no need beeing snobby about computers anymore.
We can concentrate on skills and audio again.
Price does matter depending on your choice of OS and therefore hardware choices if you decide to go the apple route, but with the arrival of usable, mature and well perfoming native DAW software and the overall trend to mix ITB, audio and music skills become the main limiting factor of what you can achieve in professional level audio production.
I am very fascinated by this and very happy about every minute i don't have to worry about bottlenecks, driver problems, performance etc.pp. anymore...
BTW, i am not a fanboy, i would prefer working on a stable linux system of my choice...but i can not find a DAW that fits my needs. May change with Mixbus 3....

Well formatcyes,
i am not too enthusiastic about Ubuntu, in my perception it moves away from what i want from a linux, too many distro-specific specialties, same thing that made me move away from SUSE long ago...probably due to the raving attention it got over the last years...
Last system i checked out a bit deeper was mandriva, which i enjoy pretty much.
Main advantage i see in using linux is that i am able to tailor it to my needs or pick a distro that is optimal for my needs. Not beeing bound to a specific distro once chosen and the absence of the proprietary boundaries is what makes linux interesting for me.
Just a while ago, Ubuntu broke compatibility of quite some things in a version update - which makes it not my choice for the future anymore...
Well, whoever wants to jump the train to linux right now, reaper would be a possibility - fully functional DAW with a good keyset of plugins, fast, reliable, cheap and small fingerprint.

When you consider that both Apple and M$ are moving hell-bent in the direction of battery-powered web browsers, our ability to hitch a ride on mass produced general purpose desktop technology may be drawing to a close. The next generation of pro DAWs may well look more like a recording console than any kind of computer. My best friend in high-school told me back in the 1960s that the line between hardware and software has always been completely arbitrary and dictated by economics. Professional media production is a tiny niche. While auto-focus point and shoot cameras are stupid cheap, meeting costly deadlines with expensive talent still requires the flexibility of high-end solutions.

Any artist who isn't recording every single gig on their iPad is out of their mind. I just mastered my first album that was recorded using Auria and I've got to say it sounded better than most of what I get sent for mastering. It was recorded live and only the simplest signal processing was even possible. Back to basics!

call me crazy, but i went ahead and Hackadoodle updated my firmware to 5,1 via the link addogg put up, and i purchased 2- intel xeon x5650 6 core CPU's for $200! My Mac pro geekbenched at 16,700 or so, i'm expected to hit between 25- 27,000 with the 4 extra cores  For 2 hundy, i HAD to do it!!!

this is the 2009 nahalem Mac pro firmware, mac would not allow us to upgrade from 4,1(this firmware only lets you run 2-quad core cpu's and 1066 buss ram speed)
The below pics are my Mac pro before and after

this is the Current Mac pro firmware(5,1 lets you run 2-6 core cpu's and 1333 bus ram speed...wheeeeehaaaa!!!)