Do I need a new a Mac?

[TJFord]

Hello friends.

I am not an expert in computers so I do need your advice if ye be so kind

I have been dedicated to music production from the last three years. The things are going great, but I starting to have annoying problemas with Logic Pro.

I use a Macbook Pro 13.3 Core I7 2.8 Ghz 8gb Ram. I'm using Logic Pro with about 500 plugins and 40 virtual instruments. I used four audio tracks, but now I'm using 40 audio tracks with audio and virtual instruments, and Logic is crashing everytime.

The problem is that a lot of plugins were installed in a music production school and I will have to lose them all. Because there is no way to make a backup of them, true?

So, what kind of hardware would I need to buy to run Logic without annoying crashes? My maximum budget would be like 2500-2700 dollars.

Some people is telling me to buy Windows pc with that budget, but I really want to keep using Logic Pro.

Thank you.

 

[Destroysall]

Why not upgrade your RAM to 16gb. That should help plenty and could solve your issue with Logic crashing. Another thing that might also help would be to upgrade your storage. I don't know if you installed an SSD or not, but that could considerably help as well.

 

[t434]

Just upgrade the RAM

Sidenote - Just curious, if you mind me asking, what music production school do you go to?

 

[barkmonster]

First thing first. RAM will help with the number of software synths and plugins. It will do absolutely nothing to help with the number of audio tracks you're recording. You need to be recording to a separate drive. Get an external drive with either an SSD or 7200rpm HDD and make sure it's either Firewire 800 or USB 3.0 (USB 2.0 or below is useless because of it's CPU overhead, simplex operation and tendency to always cause CPU spikes and errors). There's no credible source who'd ever recommend using the system drive (no matter how fast that drive happens to be) for multitrack recording.

You could also try increasing the audio buffer settings. It'll increase latency but adds more breathing room for plugin processing.

 

[ChrisA]

..
I use a Macbook Pro 13.3 Core I7 2.8 Ghz 8gb Ram. I'm using Logic Pro with about 500 plugins and 40 virtual instruments. ...

Seems to me like you need a more RAM.

Are all of those plug-ins up to date and latest version? There is your problem you have to test the specific combination of plug-ins to verify they work. With 40 of them running at once there is a good chance of it not working.

What you are seeing is likely NOT logic crashing but a plug-in crashing and taking Logic with it

It will take you a long time but you need to figure out which ones you can and can't load at the same time.

Next, Are you actually running all 40 virtual instruments at once? You can freeze some of the tracks and reduce that number be a LOT. This would help

The next thing you an do is buy a solid state disk. Swap it out for the macbook's hard drive. It will improve the over all performance of the computer noticeably. In fact you do NOT need to record to an external disk if the internal one is an SSD. (But of course you still need a few external HDs for off-line storage and backup. But the internal SSD is a huge upgrade. Get the best/biggest one you can afford

Going to 16GB RAM should be a done right away. Compared to the cost of those plug-ins the cost of the RAM is trivial, Heck even a large SSD is cheap compared to the software you have. Just go to the OWC web site and order it now.


I doubt the hardware is the problem, is the combination of plug-ins you have. The RAM can help as can a faster SSD but you are gong to have to work differently