PC for music editing and HTPC

[prism]

Hey all,

I have a co-worker that wants to build a PC with the following requirements, and keep it all below $2k with Windows 7 Home Premium, but no peripherals/monitor. He mainly wants to use it for editing music and as a powerful (and future-proof) HTPC. He's willing to spend up to this to use the best and most reliable parts. I don't know if a dedicated GPU would make any difference for this, but he does want a fast CPU. Any and all help and advice is appreciated!:

Intel Core I7
Min 16G RAM
260G SS HD
2TB HDD (7200RPM+)
Recordable DVR
Minimum of two 3.0 USB ports (prefer 4- 2 front, 2 rear)
Mid-High end sound card
Sexy tower
Sufficient power supply
Possibly Liquid-cooled?

 

[mfenn]

No such thing as future proof. Also, a big powerful editing PC does not mix well with HTPC. I'd get two computers:
- Precision from the Dell Outlet with 3 year warranty to serve as an editing PC
- One of the ASRock Core HT boxes as a quiet yet capable HTPC

 

[pauldun170]

I3-2100 (stock cooling)
8gb Ram
high end sound card of choice
basic z68 board with usb3
350-400 watt psu
Spend the rest on a storage and whatever case "looks like a big fancy expensive case". Gold plate it an have diamonds embedded in it.

Your co-worker reminds of a friend of mine who always goes out and buys the latest top ends stuff.
He doesn't game on it
He doesn't do much besides use Microsoft word and internet explorer.

His current rig is a 2700K with 2 120gb SSDs, a $250 Asus board and a raven case (I forget the video card).
Yup...it starts up word like nobody's business.

If your friend wants to dump top end stuff in...let him.
Just shake your head while doing it.

 

[DSF]

I assume he has a nice speaker setup for his home theater? If not, a high end sound card isn't going to do much.

 

[nsafreak]

I assume he has a nice speaker setup for his home theater? If not, a high end sound card isn't going to do much.

For that matter why does he even care about the sound card? If he has decent speakers I sure as heck wouldn't use the sound card to amplify them so unless he's using a dedicated 5 channel amp or multiple stereo amps and feeding the analog out from the sound card to them I'd just take the digital out that's available via most PCs as onboard sound & feed that to his receiver/decoder.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

Also, watercooling is expensive and will not make your system quiet fyi

also, HTPC & a workstation? no....just no

just get a dell...

 

[prism]

I know, I know... . I should've clarified that he will be recording his own music onto the computer and wants to edit it. He was informed (possibly misinformed?) that by recording his music (while playing) onto the SSD, it will record the music without any hiccups that an HDD would. Anyone know if this is true?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

[mfenn]

Any HDD will be able to handle the relatively low bitrates involved in audio recording without problems. Even 24-bit 96KHz PCM is only 288KB/s per channel.

 

[oynaz]

I assume that your friend wants to use his computer as a full-blown DAW (Cubase, Pro Tools, etc) ? If not, and he just wants to plug in a mic and record, any computer (or better, a handheld recorder) will do.

A DAW build:
i5 or an 8-core AMD if you can have it cheaply
A good case, and a good air-based cooler. Liquid cooling is noisy - quiet is important here.
8 gb RAM is plenty, and can be easily expanded
A 7200 rpm disk will handle 50+ tracks - no need to use an SSD as recording media
Firewire, either on the mobo or as a card, if needed by his audio interface.
A low-end Nvidia or AMD video card will enable 3 monitors if he needs it.
A backup solution. If he has access to a fast internet connection, Crashplan or similar is a good choice. If not, I would get a NAS as well for backup.

The audio interface deserves its own topic.

 

[prism]

I assume that your friend wants to use his computer as a full-blown DAW (Cubase, Pro Tools, etc) ? If not, and he just wants to plug in a mic and record, any computer (or better, a handheld recorder) will do.

A DAW build:
i5 or an 8-core AMD if you can have it cheaply
A good case, and a good air-based cooler. Liquid cooling is noisy - quiet is important here.
8 gb RAM is plenty, and can be easily expanded
A 7200 rpm disk will handle 50+ tracks - no need to use an SSD as recording media
Firewire, either on the mobo or as a card, if needed by his audio interface.
A low-end Nvidia or AMD video card will enable 3 monitors if he needs it.
A backup solution. If he has access to a fast internet connection, Crashplan or similar is a good choice. If not, I would get a NAS as well for backup.

The audio interface deserves its own topic.

He is using pro tools for sure, dunno about the others...what do you mean by the 7200 being able to handle 50+ tracks? He said the pro tools manual recommends a 10k+ rpm hard drive (?). I don't know anything about music mixing/editing terminology . I know he wants USB 3.0 inputs for the equipment he's plugging into it.

 

[oynaz]

I have never heard of anyone using 10K rpm drives outside pro studios, but on the PC, Pro Tools have suffered from atrociously poor programming in past versions, so there might be something to it. Supposedly the new versions are better, so he might want to spend some money on an upgrade as well.

I use 50+ tracks in Cubase 5 on an old 7200 rpm drive without issues.

 

[richaron]

For a DAW box, i have found the amount ram & hdd/ssd speeds is more important than cpu. In fact i believe a nice monitor is more important than the fastest cpu; i would rather be able to see more tracks on screen than save a couple of seconds processing. 8g ram is probably enough but $2k is heaps...

If he's serious he needs a decent audio interface & headphones. A large portion of the budget; easily being couple of $hundred each.

Edit: usb 3.0 is good for large data transfers over external drives, just keep an eye out on prospective motherboard specs. You can always add a card if needs be, but it's not going to help with peripherals.

 

[Topweasel]

Is it really an HTPC if it is a big honking tower with large fans sitting next to the entertainment system?

Really he seems to be asking for two different products. You can build a pretty decent $700-$900 full ATX Silverstone case set top system. Though for most HTPC functionality a micro ATX or Mini ITX would be a better way to go. I have been looking at an A6 or A8 Mini ITX system for about $500. That would mean $1500 towards a pretty beefy 2500k or 2600k system for the audio work.

 

[mfenn]

Is it really an HTPC if it is a big honking tower with large fans sitting next to the entertainment system?

Really he seems to be asking for two different products. You can build a pretty decent $700-$900 full ATX Silverstone case set top system. Though for most HTPC functionality a micro ATX or Mini ITX would be a better way to go. I have been looking at an A6 or A8 Mini ITX system for about $500. That would mean $1500 towards a pretty beefy 2500k or 2600k system for the audio work.

:thumbsup: :thumbsup: My thoughts exactly.

 

[richaron]

Is it really an HTPC if it is a big honking tower with large fans sitting next to the entertainment system?

Really he seems to be asking for two different products. You can build a pretty decent $700-$900 full ATX Silverstone case set top system. Though for most HTPC functionality a micro ATX or Mini ITX would be a better way to go. I have been looking at an A6 or A8 Mini ITX system for about $500. That would mean $1500 towards a pretty beefy 2500k or 2600k system for the audio work.

I have been known string a 15 foot hdmi cable to my big honking tower and call it a HTPC

In my case i initially wanted a single box & it was logistically possible. Plus i had a much more important waste of money on my mind: I did actually spend $600+ on an interface/phones.

Point is, a $2k audio computer deserves half that budget on interface/phones and display. OP says he doesn't need peripherals or monitor, but that's like saying "I'm building a $2k gaming computer, but I don't want to spend money on a GPU".

Of course he may already have this equipment, in which case i'll shut up and you should listen to those dudes up there ^

 

[prism]

Alright guys, with your help I've convinced him that he can get by with an i3 or i5 and 8 gigs of ram . Can you all just give me some advice on which processor, as there are so many to choose from, as well as a mobo with hopefully four USB 3.0 inputs. Also, does an i7 use the same socket as an i3?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

[mfenn]

Sandy Bridge i3, i5, and i7 2xxx series all use the Socket 1155 platform, so you're good there. On his budget, you can easily get a quad-core (i5) if you want.

For example:
i5 2400 $190
P8Z68-V LE $133 - two USB 3.0 on the back and header for two on the front panel

A dual-core like the i3 2100 would save you $80 right now.