Mac vs. PC for Show Control

[Gahrgoyle]

I'm about to buy a new computer for controlling light and sound for our theater. The question is "Mac or PC?". I'm very much a PC guy, but there is the whole battle with the latency issue, which requires the computer to be totally dedicated to this one and only purpose. I'm wondering if it's the same with Macs. I keep hearing how they are "designed for multimedia" and do not have latency issues. Can anyone verify this?

Many show control programs like MagicQ, ShowXpress and Showmagic have a timeline or sequence feature that allows Audio, DMX and video to all be cued simultaneously. Are Macs better at handling all of this at once because they are optimized to do so, or do they have to be optimized like PCs?

 

[Aman121]

Here we go:
Many people prefer Macs, I personally prefer PC. IT depends on what programs you want to run really. Latency isint strictly governed by whether you have a mac or PC, any show computer shouldnt have all of your torrented movies on it, in fact it shouldn't even be networked if your only going to be loading data via flash drive or CD.
If your going PC I would buy as opposed to building one yourself for a professional environment. When something goes wrong, its your fault as the builder! If you do buy a PC< make sure that there issint a bunch of crap software loaded onto it; this will hurt performance dramatically. Best buy as a retailer and lenovo as a manufacturer are notorious for doing this. You may want to buy a copy of windows and do a fresh instal just to be sure.
If your going mac, well any mac should work. Just dont put any more junk onto it. Id get one with decent storage capacity and chipset, but it doesn't have to be a monster. Same goes for a PC.
Now the question of desktop vs laptop is raised. Laptops are portable, but can be stolen or misplaced. Desktops (or all in ones like the imac) cant be stolen as easily but take up space. And if you go desktop id recommend getting a UPS in case of a power blip. Laptops will be covered though.
I cant attest to much to your software questions, there are many on here who can provide better answers but I hope this is a start.

 

[zmb]

If you do buy a PC< make sure that there issint a bunch of crap software loaded onto it; this will hurt performance dramatically. Best buy as a retailer and lenovo as a manufacturer are notorious for doing this. You may want to buy a copy of windows and do a fresh instal just to be sure.
If your going mac, well any mac should work. Just dont put any more junk onto it.

All new systems will include a system recovery disk and the key, do a fresh install off of that and don't buy another copy of Windows. And watch when installing essential freeware like a PDF reader or Flash to uncheck any boxes that will install a toolbar or anything else that could be clutter.

 

[cpf]

Mac vs. PC for Showcontrol

There's really no inherent advantage of one over another. Pick the platform that runs the way you do, and supports the programs you need/like. I personally chose Mac because of QLab and its simplicity, but before that, and still today, I do the exact same things on a windows machine.

 

[ruinexplorer]

Re: Mac vs. PC for Showcontrol

The biggest issue with pre-built machines is that many of them offset the cost by putting "trial version" software on them. This is much of the reasons that you will lose performance in the computer. Higher end, more costly machines perform better due to avoiding the cost offset (that's why the price difference does not always reflect the upgrades in hardware). That being said, I agree that the number one mistake people have with show computers is using them for other purposes. Personally, I don't let mine ever connect to the internet unless I specifically need something (like software update). If you can afford something like a Boxx computer, then I'd go PC all the way. Either way, if you have a show computer, dedicate it to that and pull off unnecessary software and optimize it during start-up (so it basically only has what you need running in the background).

 

[Gahrgoyle]

Re: Mac vs. PC for Showcontrol

That's pretty much what I've done so far with the old laptop that we're using right now. I've stripped it down as much as possible. I've even going through a list of tweaks that a lot of recording engineers suggest to remove as much latency as possible--it's a real killer when recording. It definitely works better, but is not where it could be yet. There's a few more tweaks that I need to implement, but their a little more involved than what I've done so far.

Thankfully I have a buddy that owns a computer shop. I can have him custom build a dedicated machine for me, but I just wanted to be sure that I was on the right path before I have him start. I'll have to educate him on exactly what the system is supposed to do so that he builds with that in mind.
Thanks for the input guys, this is good stuff.

 

[LampyTom]

Hi there,

Something else I would consider when building a show control system would be to also have a RAID array in there.

If it were me, I'd get an SSD for Windows and programs. Then, get 2 x larger (perhaps 7200RPM 1TB drives) in a RAID1 array so they mirror each other; that way if one should fail the machine won't completely die.

I'd also make sure you get Windows 7 on it - stay away from Windows 8!


Cheers,


Tom

 

[Gahrgoyle]

So, latest greatest in my comparison of Mac vs PC: I met with a music teacher that teaches sound engineering about this topic. He used PCs for years and says that he basically went through hell with them because of all the latency issues. Every PC he brought in he had to strip down to bare bones and make them completely dedicated machines--as suggested by some of you in this thread. He switched to Mac and said that it was like night and day. Out of the box his machine ran everything flawlessly. He spent time trying to make it glitch by running all of his recording software, Playing an HD video, opening an excel spreadsheet, and surfing the net simultaneously. It didn't so much as hiccup. The downside to the mac is that they don't support touchscreen monitors very well. I guess Apple thinks the iPad is enough. If anyone has a different view on the touchscreen for macs please let me know!

On the other front, my friend that owns a computer store says that a ram disk program on a PC is the way to go. The ram disk sections off a portion of ram and dedicates it specifically to whatever you decide. Apparently this is the fastest way for the machine to access data therefore minimizes the latency. The issue with this is power bumps because the memory is volatile, so if anyone tries this make sure you're using a laptop or have a UPS. Apparently with the ram disk you don't have to strip down and dedicate your machine, but you have to have PLENTY of ram and of course the UPS for a desk top . . . plus the ram disk program.

As for me, I'm still kicking this all around in my head. I like the "out of the box" functionality of the mac, but I also really want a 22" multi-touch touchscreen monitor for accessing multiple sliders and controls quickly. We don't have enough money to buy a PC wing like MagicQ sells. Anyway, more food for thought.

 

[aldenf]

Gahrgoyle,

Trust me when I say that there is little difference between Mac and Windows hardware and OS. If you're a QLab guy, go with Mac. If not, go with Windows (you may save a lot of money). I designed a show for a "cirque" company in QLab on my workstation, exported the show and imported it on a MacMini running QLab at the theater. The MacMini belonged to one of the performers and was her everyday desktop. It was atrocious. QLab kept crashing and the system was very unstable. I grabbed a spare hard drive, swapped it in the MacMini, did a clean install of the OS and QLab; perfection.

Moral of the story: Regardless of Mac or PC, show control computers must be kept single-purpose, un-networked (meaning internet) machines to ensure ongoing reliability. Keep a separate content creation workstation to create shows. Show control computers are entirely there for control and playback. Don't think of it as a "computer". Think of it as a machine that only does show control and playback.

Skip the ramdisk. All current professional level playback software pre-caches cues into system memory, essentially creating it's own ramdisk. Go with 4 GB of RAM and you'll be fine. I have 10 yo machines running WinXP, SFX Pro and 512 MB of ram that will run extremely complex shows with multiple simultaneous sounds.

Latency issues tend to be much more of a problem on workstations with multiple, competing software installed, or machines accessed by people who do stupid things to it, like install games. I have never had unsolvable latency or stability issues with any of my PC based DAWs in almost 20 years of doing this. The simple solution is to change the way we think. If you have a "mission critical" purpose, like show control/playback, multi-track audio recording, etc, we need limited purpose "computer appliances" not general purpose computers.

A lot of what you call "latency issues" often depends on how well the software addresses the hardware. If you have a well written piece of software that is designed to control DMX lighting, sound playback and video playback simultaneously, I can't imagine a difference between Mac or PC. However, I can't think of a single pro (or amateur for that matter) who wants separate lighting, audio and video control software running simultaneously on one machine whether Mac or PC. I personally would throw a fit! The software would have to play exceedingly well together, addressing hardware resources without starving said resources from each other.

We've gotten to the point with technology that computer hardware is rarely an issue. A $400 PC (minus audio/dmx interfaces) would be a fine show control system, providing the software is solid.

Just my two-cents.

Good luck,

~Alden

 

[len]

Many of the dmx programs are PC only. There's some that will run on a Mac, but not all. And before you go the Windows on a Mac route, I'd make **** sure I could return the computer and/or the software before I invested any money. Just because they say it will work, doesn't mean it will.

And make sure you understand the OS limits of the software. Some pc programs won't work on Win7, let alone Win8.

 

[themuzicman]

Many of the dmx programs are PC only. There's some that will run on a Mac, but not all. And before you go the Windows on a Mac route, I'd make **** sure I could return the computer and/or the software before I invested any money. Just because they say it will work, doesn't mean it will.

And make sure you understand the OS limits of the software. Some pc programs won't work on Win7, let alone Win8.

Mac Mini's are really your safest bet as far as show-control computers go in terms of flexibility meets price and power. Run bootcamp or fusion for your PC based programs, which supports Windows 7 and 8, or use Mac OS for your mac needs.

 

[amcsx4]

Mac Mini's are really your safest bet as far as show-control computers go in terms of flexibility meets price and power. Run bootcamp or fusion for your PC based programs, which supports Windows 7 and 8, or use Mac OS for your mac needs.

This is the final straw for me every time I have this conversation. With a Mac you can legally have both operating systems and thus the benefits of any app available for the two. A PC can run OSX, but not legally.

 

[aldenf]

This is the final straw for me every time I have this conversation. With a Mac you can legally have both operating systems and thus the benefits of any app available for the two. A PC can run OSX, but not legally.

mcsx4 makes a valid point...

I hesitate discussing this, Gahrgoyle, but you have another option. I generally don't like admitting to breaking the law in an open forum...

I keep one workstation. I really don't have room for more. It is a self-built, 4-core/8 thread Intel machine with high-end nVidia graphics. Not including audio interfaces or OSes, I have approximately a grand into it. I utilize an Antec Easy SATA dock in one of the 5 1/4" drive bays. It's wired to drive 0 (boot drive) input on the motherboard. It docks 3 1/2" drives or 2 1/2" drives in 3 1/2" adapters. This allows me to boot into multiple machines using the same hardware. I use 300 GB Intel SSDs but you can use whatever drives you want. I have four boot drives: DAW, Photo/Video Editing, General/Gaming & OSX. Yes, a Hackintosch. It's 100% stable and runs like a dream... Do a basic install and activations of Win7 (forget Win8 for our purposes) on one hard drive, updating all hardware drivers and installing basic software you want across all machines (system utilities, Word, Excel, etc.). Using Acronis (or similar software), create an image of the entire hard drive from an off-line boot. Restore this image to as many hard drives as you have use for, installing all the software appropriate for each machine. This gives you your multiple Windows workstations. This allows you to keep a machine solely for control/playback while allowing you to use the expensive hardware for other purposes simply for the cost of the $20 SATA dock and additional hard drives.

As for installing OSX on the machine... This is where you have to do your homework. It can be an ordeal. It has gotten easier over the past few years, however. There are several forums on the interweb that will help walk you through the process. The most important aspects is choosing your individual components carefully. They must all play nicely with OSX. Then it's just the matter of a custom boot loader. This $1000 machine, plus the cost of OSX (yes I purchased a full copy), runs circles around Apple's $2500 MacPro, and has better quality/more reliable hardware of my choosing.

This is the option I decided worked best for me. However, I have been building computers since high school, in the 80's. You have to be willing to geek out a bit or pay someone to do it for you.

~Alden

 

[museav]

This is the final straw for me every time I have this conversation. With a Mac you can legally have both operating systems and thus the benefits of any app available for the two. A PC can run OSX, but not legally.

And you could mix a Broadway show or skit in a cafetorium on a Cadac mixer, but does that make it always the best option?

My view is that the critical points are pretty simple and have already been noted. Select the software that best fits your needs first and let that help drive the hardware selection. And think about whether what you want/need is a computer or a device that happens to be computer based.

The latter point can sometimes also be relevant for academic, corporate, worship, etc. applications where computer purchases and administration may have to be standardized and handled through an internal IT group. In some cases, a purchase of something like "a microprocessor based content player with hard drive and monitor" may fly 'under the radar' and allow it to be configured for the purpose and/or prevent it having to be loaded with all the standard software, be remotely updated during the middle of a show, etc.