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  3. SSD and Mac Mini

  • SSD and Mac Mini

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    My slave computer running my VSL libraries is a Mac Mini with 16GB of RAM.  I am planning to put an internal SSD drive in it, maybe a Crucial M550 512GB to start with.  I have read that I can expect to load maybe 10 times as many samples into my template as with the regular external hard drive which I am using now.  What settings do I need to adjust to make this happen once the drive is installed?  Is it just the buffer size that needs adjusting or will it just automatically allow me to load more samples/patches?  Apologies if this has been answered before but I'm hoping that spending $250 or so on an internal SSD will significantly increase the number of instances and instruments that I can have loaded at any one time.

    Thank you,  Andy
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC
    last edited
    last edited

    @andygrainger said:

    My slave computer running my VSL libraries is a Mac Mini with 16GB of RAM.  I am planning to put an internal SSD drive in it, maybe a Crucial M550 512GB to start with.  I have read that I can expect to load maybe 10 times as many samples into my template as with the regular external hard drive which I am using now.  What settings do I need to adjust to make this happen once the drive is installed?  Is it just the buffer size that needs adjusting or will it just automatically allow me to load more samples/patches?  Apologies if this has been answered before but I'm hoping that spending $250 or so on an internal SSD will significantly increase the number of instances and instruments that I can have loaded at any one time.

    Thank you,  Andy

    Is your Mac Mini with a Sata II or Sata III interface ? if it is a SATA II you will not be able to get all the speed of your Sata III SSD

    You set this in Directory Manager.

    You may need that some instruments will require a larger buffer

    I have set mine to the minimum buffer size, except Trumpet C

    you have to try until you get no click and pops

    MacBook Pro M3 MAX 128 GB 8TB - 2 x 48" screen --- Logic Pro --- Mir Pro 3D --- Most of the VI libs, a few Synch... libs --- Quite a few Kontakt libs --- CS80 fanatic
  • A
    A

    Thank you Cyril,

    My Mac Mini is a late 2012 model and from what I can gather it does have a Sata III interface.  (Nowhere can I seem to find a definitive answer to this however, not even in the Apple specs. The concensus seems to agree that it will be Sata III)  I wonder if anyone has a preference between the Crucial MX100 or an M550 SSD?  They claim the M550 is even faster tham the MX100 but the read and write speeds are the same.  Can't wait to experience the increase in performance now that SSD's are becoming more affordable.

    I will indeed experiment with the preload sizes in the directory manager once I'm up and running.

    Best,   Andy
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC

    The Master running thr DAW does not need to have very fast disk access. A SATA III SSD will do the job even if it is plugged on a SATA II bus

    It is the computer that will contains all your samples that need to have very fast disk access 

    MacBook Pro M3 MAX 128 GB 8TB - 2 x 48" screen --- Logic Pro --- Mir Pro 3D --- Most of the VI libs, a few Synch... libs --- Quite a few Kontakt libs --- CS80 fanatic