16 Jan
2006
16 Jan
'06
7:20 a.m.
Hallo,
Ferdinand Vesely hat gesagt: // Ferdinand Vesely wrote:
I'm not quite shure, if this belongs here, or to
the LAU list, but I am
subscribed here, so this is why I post it here.
I think, this is more a topic for LAU, so you may want to subscribe
there, too.
First, let me explain: I'm in an urgent need for a
notebook, as I am
a university student (from Slovakia) working as a part time PHP
programmer and playing in a (prog)rock band. I don't have much money
I can spend on that book and I need it now, so I am considering
buying a refurbished IBM ThinkPad 600X (PIII/450MHz, 128 or 256 MB
RAM, 12 GB HDD). I'm not very demanding, but I would be very glad,
if I could use it for performing music on stage. In the beginning
maybe only playing a bit with PD and playing samples and loops. I
had an idea (this is why I'm writing) to buy later a better desktop
PC (with a good audio interface; maybe with a rack-mount case) which
would be running some audio apps (Jack, softsynths, sequencer, ...)
and could be controlled on stage via MIDI and/or from the notebook
using VNC (or NX) or MIDI. Or do you have any suggestion, what could
work better with lower latencies? Or is this idea foolish as a
whole?
Generally a standard PC will of course give you "more bang for the
buck". Laptops are more expensive and cannot be upgraded as easily.
Still on stage you see people perform with laptops almost exclusively
because they are much easier to transport and set up on stage.
You will be able to do a lot with a 450MHz CPU already. Playing
samples and loops is not very demanding CPU-wise. You may want to make
sure to have at least 256MB RAM, though. I don't think, VNC is a good
idea for remote control of audio applications. VNC has a certain lag
which makes controlling graphical audio applications difficult, at
least in my opinion. I would rather build a GUI on the local machine
with Pd and control the other side through Midi or better yet through
networking/OSC. This way you don't generate that much load on your
network and gain a consistent latency.
Ciao
--
Frank Barknecht _ ______footils.org_ __goto10.org__