Never produced on a laptop. Mac or Windows?

[amillionwinters]

Hi,

For those who are familiar with producing music on a laptop:

Mac or Windows? And, what kind of system configuration should I aim for? Should I pay out $3000 for a Macbook Pro, or can I get away with something for much less?

Below is some context, if that sort of thing helps:

I have always worked on towers, but now I do most music production "in the box" and I would like to have something smaller and more mobile.

I have always used Macs, so that is what I am used to.

I don't like Apple as a company. I am tired of paying a huge markup for hardware I can get anywhere else for far less.

With that said, I do like Mac OS X. I dabble with programming and I have become quite accustomed to using Terminal on a daily basis, and I would miss having it.

I have never done any music production on a laptop. I am not quite sure about what kind of system configuration I should aim for.

I use Ableton Live 9 and Propellerheads' Reason 8 exclusively at this point.

I never record more than two tracks at a time, if I do any recording at all. I use a few vst/au instruments and effects (mostly u-he stuff) as well as Live's and Reason's built in instruments.

I have a Presonus FireStudio Project for recording, which is mostly to track guitar and bass through a ToneLab or Line6 POD. There is a possibility I will track drums again, but I no longer own any drum mics, so it will not be any time soon.

I also have a random assortment of midi devices (radium49, korg pad controller, etc).

And, if it helps, I don't produce music professionally. It is just something that I have to do because I always have, and I will go insane if I don't.

What I currently work on is an early 2007 Mac Pro.

Thanks for any suggestions or information you can provide!

[Notron User]

if you are not a fan of specific software (logic, numerology, etc.) you can go windows and save on hardware costs. With live and reason, it won't matter.

I say this as a late 2012 mac mini owner (with a 30" 2560*1600 screen)

[UltraJv]

Its good to think about screen size, Laptops are a compromise, you might not feel comfortable doing it all on a smaller screen. Its also worth checking that you will have enough USB ports to do what you want on the laptop.

[softska]

For desktop I rather build my own, but for laptop I like Apple's. The hardware/drivers work out of the box with less headache comparatively (until you try to upgrade OSX anyhow). But as you mentioned, you do pay a quite hefty tax for Apple for maintenance especially past the 3yr of Apple care. Non-retina models can save quite a chunk from the $3k you're thinking of.

[2ZrgE]

Hi,

For those who are familiar with producing music on a laptop:

Mac or Windows? And, what kind of system configuration should I aim for? Should I pay out $3000 for a Macbook Pro, or can I get away with something for much less?

Below is some context, if that sort of thing helps:

I have always worked on towers, but now I do most music production "in the box" and I would like to have something smaller and more mobile.

I have always used Macs, so that is what I am used to.

I don't like Apple as a company. I am tired of paying a huge markup for hardware I can get anywhere else for far less.

With that said, I do like Mac OS X. I dabble with programming and I have become quite accustomed to using Terminal on a daily basis, and I would miss having it.

I have never done any music production on a laptop. I am not quite sure about what kind of system configuration I should aim for.

I use Ableton Live 9 and Propellerheads' Reason 8 exclusively at this point.

I never record more than two tracks at a time, if I do any recording at all. I use a few vst/au instruments and effects (mostly u-he stuff) as well as Live's and Reason's built in instruments.

I have a Presonus FireStudio Project for recording, which is mostly to track guitar and bass through a ToneLab or Line6 POD. There is a possibility I will track drums again, but I no longer own any drum mics, so it will not be any time soon.

I also have a random assortment of midi devices (radium49, korg pad controller, etc).

And, if it helps, I don't produce music professionally. It is just something that I have to do because I always have, and I will go insane if I don't.

What I currently work on is an early 2007 Mac Pro.

Thanks for any suggestions or information you can provide!

$3,000 bucks for a Macbook? That's insane. I bought a consumer Win laptop for around 450 dollars four years ago, and it has not hampered my muscial output yet...I love the ability to carry around my 'studio' whereever I go, so I haven't bought a desktop PC for production (yet). At home I connect whatever I need through USB hubs (audio interface, at least three diffrent midi controllers, keyboard, mouse, screen, around 6-7 hard disks....) - works for me without problems...