Help With Creating a New Portable Studio?

Getting Stuff Done How do I .... ?
#1

Hi Guys,

I’m thinking of making the switch to linux and was wondering if you could help me out. Maybe this isn’t the right thing to do, but it’s worth a shot.

Right now my studio set up is:
MacBook 2.4 GHZ core 2 duo,
2 gigs ram,
external harddrive via firewire 7200 RPM,
Apogee Ensemble + DigiMax D8
Apogee Duet for the road
Logic Pro 8

I’ve been using this set up now professionally for quite some time.
Its been fairly sturdy but recently I have been running into crazy bugs that
have slowed my workflow to a halt.
Missing files, moved regions, tempo inaccuracies, bizarre crashes.
Recently I’ve been using quite a bit of MIDI and find Logic’s MIDI handling to
be cumbersome and slow.
All this has made me want to find another solution.

My needs are fairly simple.
-I need a portable set up so a laptop is a must. What would you recommend?
(I ran Ubuntu on my MacBook but didn’t like how the macbook handled it versus PC’s I’ve tried with Ubuntu on them. Plus I want to be free of apple’s expensive upgrades and overall philosophies)
-Comparable I/0 to both the Apogee Ensemble and the Duet in AD/DA quality.
(I don’t think from what I searched that Apogee gear is compatible with Linux,
Also, should I stick with Firewire based I/0’s?)
-MIDI instruments such as 808, 909, and other drums plus Synths and Others.

  • I use Melodyne for pitch correction.
    -Plug ins that recreate the LA-2A, 1176, L2 and Neve 33609

Basically I’m asking you guys to build a dream portable studio that will be easy to
maintain, operate and upgrade.

Thanks for any of your insight.
I truly appreciate it.

-TheAwesomeKing

#2

Thanks for your honest answer.
I guess what you’re saying is hold off for now?

Thats sort of frustrating for me because as time goes on I seem to
be slowing down more and more.

Well, I hope this project develops fast and strong.

I will get a laptop though to run Ubuntu on and keep up to date on Ardour
progress.

What laptop would best serve my needs?
Should I hold off until the nVidea ION platform comes out?

Thanks.
-TheAwesomeKing

#3

Thanks for your honest answer.
I guess what you’re saying is hold off for now?

Thats sort of frustrating for me because as time goes on I seem to
be slowing down more and more.

Well, I hope this project develops fast and strong.

I will get a laptop though to run Ubuntu on and keep up to date on Ardour
progress.

What laptop would best serve my needs?
Should I hold off until the nVidea ION platform comes out?

Thanks.
-TheAwesomeKing

#4

Logic8 and the Apogee Ensemble under OSX should be a great system. Have you tried a wipe and re-install of everything?

There are some Linux supported cards with ADAT, so you could try the Apogee Ensemble as a stand alone ‘dumb’ 8ch ad/da via it’s ADAT ports.

#5

but if you anyway want to go to pc´s-… not a bad thing is a thinkpad with a multifaceII pcmcia card (or digiface)(or the new standard I forgot the name) and if you don´t like the rme ADconverter buy some external ones from apogee and put them via adat… there are other solutions, maybe better ones… but this would work…

#6

Hello!

You described a studio which many of us need. However, linux seem to be not yet ready for all this. Ardour is the most promising DAW, however, there is no support for Melodyne and soft synth VSTi yet. Hardware is another hard question. Firewire support is yet not wide enough, MOTU soundcards will never be supported, USB soundcards are very limited in number of channels.

However, right now it seems that linux audio is developing very fast. Calf plug-ins, better VST support seem serious milestones in linux audio progress. I seriously hope that progress will lead to a snowball effect, and soon ardour will be able to replace commercial DAWs!

That’s my point of view.
Oleg.

#7

TheAwesomeKing,

If you are moving to Linux in order to try out Ardour, why not just run Ardour on your Macbook? Ardour has no MIDI sequencing features at this moment, but it can run AU plugins. The nicest part is that it will use your existing Apogee I/O.

If you really want to run Linux, then you’ll find there are tons of great apps which you can mix-and-match to create a professional studio. For example you might use Ardour for audio recording, Rosegarden for MIDI sequencing, LinuxSampler for sampled instruments, and Jamin for mastering. All of these apps can be interconnected (MIDI, Audio and timecode) via JACK. This is tremendously useful for certain kinds of production. But be warned, it is very different than running a “monolithic” program such as Logic. You may find that you like it more, or maybe not.

-Ben