UPDATE: Not enough wallop: Processing power for making music

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  • andy_kandy_k Frets: 818
     I guess we all have different needs, but I have come to accept there are limitations with whatever platform we work with.
    my point with the 2 options i use, is that they both work ok for me.
    The more recent macs, with their soldered in ram and fairly small SSD drives, make it hard to avoid filling up with bloat, with each update of Logic for example, the library of sounds that you need to download is enormous.
    When I go back onto a PC, I realise how much I hate Windows, but I wanted a cheap option to take out and record live rehearsals etc, without risking my main macbook pro, and the Ilok that is needed for pro-tools and Slate, so  use an Asus zenbook, which has 4 gig of soldered ram, but is an I7 and running from a fairly small ssd, so the compromise forced me to look into Reaper, and I honestly prefer it to both Logic and Pro-tools.
    All 3 Daws are amazing, and can all do pretty much the same things, and at first they all seem ridiculously complex, Logic is ace for creating ideas, and Midi is one of it's strengths, Pro-tools is the industry standard, so chances are you will have to learn it, but it is expensive and to some extent it is a bit behind the times with its locked in way of working, Reaper seems to be able to do everything the others do, with a tiny footprint on your computer, and if theres anything you need to know-there is a massive community who are willing to help.
    A Mac is a big investment, and will get a lot of use, so will eventually break, so it is a good idea to have a plan B ready to go with. If I was you, I would hold off buying just for now, and look into getting more out of your current machine, when the new macs come out-the price of the second hand Mac dustbins will fall, and that is a serious bit of kit for music creation.
    It is the librarys of content that will soon fill up any hard drive, so it is worth having an external SSD which you can store these things on, and maybe even be able to run from.
    good luck
    Andy k
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  • andy_k said:
    If I was you, I would hold off buying just for now, and look into getting more out of your current machine, 
    I definitely agree with not buying new stuff just for the sake of it. My concern is that I'm not sure how to 'get more' out of my current machine. Again this morning, GB was saying it was 'overloaded' with only one track. Having done everything people suggest in this thread and still having trouble, I wonder what I should do. 


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    Telecaster American Deluxe, Cornell Romany amp, without the talent to use them properly
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  • Winny_PoohWinny_Pooh Frets: 7735
    edited September 2018
    Get a trial of Reaper
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  • Although it’s an older Mac a couple of things come to mind.

    check all the stuff that is running in activity monitor.
    There could be a few things hogging memory simply need closing down completely. Chrome is one that comes to mind.

    also check how much memory you actually have available once GarageBand is loaded.

    Also check the CPU load which tasks are stealing ticks. some o.der stuff can be badly written or if GB is killing the processor when running then time for an upgrade. If you are constrained on memory you can shutdown or kill stuff.

    If from looking at activity monitor it’s memory or drive a cheap mid life kicker is switch out the old slow hard drive for an SSD. also look at upgrading the memory to the max.

    I still have an old Pre unibody MacBook Pro early 2008 that has max memory and an early SSD. It still works fine for loads of tasks.
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  • octatonicoctatonic Frets: 33725
    Get a trail of Reaper
    Trail of Reaper sounds like a bitchin’ metal band.
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  • Although it’s an older Mac a couple of things come to mind.

    check all the stuff that is running in activity monitor.
    There could be a few things hogging memory simply need closing down completely. Chrome is one that comes to mind.


    I've used Activity Monitor and got these readings. Does this reveal anything?






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    Telecaster American Deluxe, Cornell Romany amp, without the talent to use them properly
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  • octatonicoctatonic Frets: 33725
    You have a lot of other little applications and resource hogs- the cumulative effect of which will slow down your CPU.
    I would get rid of Backup and Sync, Cloud App, MagicPrefs, Dropbox and anything else that is using the CPU or memory whistle recording.

    In particular, Backup and Sync from Google is a known resource hog and in this instance it is nearly taking 20% of your CPU.
    Get rid of it, or at least disable it when doing music.

    The MBA has a limited amount of power- if you want to run all those small apps and helpers then you will need a faster computer if you want to do audio.
    Or simply disable the various little apps and helpers.
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  • octatonic said:
    You have a lot of other little applications and resource hogs- the cumulative effect of which will slow down your CPU.
    I would get rid of Backup and Sync, Cloud App, MagicPrefs, Dropbox and anything else that is using the CPU or memory whistle recording.

    In particular, Backup and Sync from Google is a known resource hog and in this instance it is nearly taking 20% of your CPU.
    Get rid of it, or at least disable it when doing music.

    The MBA has a limited amount of power- if you want to run all those small apps and helpers then you will need a faster computer if you want to do audio.
    Or simply disable the various little apps and helpers.
    Thanks @octatonic Have done a clean install and got rid of a lot of those apps completely. I need Dropbox and Backup and Sync for work, but if I just quit them during music, that will help?


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    Telecaster American Deluxe, Cornell Romany amp, without the talent to use them properly
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  • andy_kandy_k Frets: 818
    I'd recommend you try Reaper, at least see how it runs on your fresh system. There is a resource tab which you can have open while it is running which shows how much resources EACH track and EACH plugin is using in real time, that will at least give you an idea of how far away from a new system you are, it does everything you need, and may well use a lot less resources than Garageband or Logic. it costs nothing to try it out for as long as you like anyway.
    good luck.
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  • Yep, have downloaded so will give it a go, cheers for all the advice folks!


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    Telecaster American Deluxe, Cornell Romany amp, without the talent to use them properly
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  • ijontyijonty Frets: 32
    I felt I should come back here to say: blimey, Reaper's good, isn't it? Thanks to all who told me to try it!


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    Telecaster American Deluxe, Cornell Romany amp, without the talent to use them properly
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  • FunkfingersFunkfingers Frets: 14324
    All of the boring model specification information is readily available by clicking on the Apple symbol at the top left of the monitor screen. First option on the menu, About This Mac.

    Based on the incomplete information in the opening post, I reckon that the offending MacBook Air is a Mid-2012 example. The iLife software bundled with a Mac of that date would have included Garageband 6. Its system requirements appear to be;
    • Mac OS X 10.7.5 or later. (El Capitan is OS 10.11)
    • Hardware: Mac system with Intel® Core 2 Duo processor. 2 GB of RAM (required for Mac OS X 10.7) 1.5 GB of available hard disk space. Internet connection required for LiveUpdate.



    The current revision is Garageband 10. Its system requirements are;
    • Mac computer with an Intel Core 2 Duo, Core i3, Core i5, Core i7, or Xeon processor.
    • Mac OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) or later.
    • 2GB of RAM (as defined by the Mac OS X Mavericks minimum requirements)
    • 1280 x 800 screen resolution.
    The OP's MBA should be able to support GB10. More than 4GB of RAM would help but the machine can probably get by as is. 



    There remains the question of the audio in/out interface device and its settings within Garageband. 

    Be seeing you.
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  • andy_kandy_k Frets: 818
    I think , now the OP has experienced Reaper, there will be no more hardware related problems.
    It has become apparent to me that Apples model of forcing an upgrade path has reached the point where it is self defeating. Eg, by making Garageband  and Logic so similar, they force casual users to have to use bloated software, and thus the need for more power-more storage.
    The experience of downloading Reapers 16 Mb install, which extracts to around 70 Mb, and then seeing that it can do everything that Logic can do ( allowing for Logics included synths and samples ), made the decision of where to spend my recording and mixing time, I'd rather not be OS dependant on my music software either.
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