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  3. iMac as a VE Pro slave machine?

  • iMac as a VE Pro slave machine?

    W
    W

    Hello,

    I'm wondering about the feasibility of using a new iMac as a sample slave, specifically to host Kontakt-based libraries in VE Pro.

    I currently use a 5-year-old G5 as my main slave machine (dual 2.3 GHz with 8GB RAM). I use it primarily to host strings & winds from EWQLSO Platinum in Kontakt (72 parts/channels loaded). Samples are spread out across SATA drives in an external chassis, and it works great except that I can't do any offline bouncing.

    So, I was thinking about grabbing a new iMac and replacing the G5, which would allow me to put all this stuff in VE Pro. This would give me the benefits of offline bouncing on my main machine as well as easier project recall, etc.

    The only down side I can see is that I'd have to use external FW800 drives for samples if I went with an iMac. I would think that would be fine given what I'm asking of this slave machine - but then again, with the increase in CPU over a G5, I might be tempted to ask more of it.  I am meticulous about spreading libraries out over dedicated drives (i.e. strings on 1, winds on 2, brass on 3, etc.).

    So I guess my question is more about sample streaming performance on an iMac using Firewire 800 drives.

    Any thoughts/experiences appreciated!

    Thanks,

    Jim
  • F
    F

    Great question.  I'd like to know the answer to it as well.