Recording music - upgrade MacBook Pro or buy new laptop?

sofuzuxiko · 22 Oct 2018 at 13:11

Hi all,

I'm looking to record music on my laptop (not EDM, just guitar, vox, etc.). At the moment I have:

MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012)
2.5 GHz Intel Core i5
16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3

Option one is I put a Samsung 860 Pro 512GB SSD in the MacBook, download Logic Pro X, and start recording...

Option two is I buy a more up-to-date laptop (heard good things about Dell XPS) - it'll perform better and (hopefully) last longer.

What do you think? Thanks in advance for any pointers!

X x X · 22 Oct 2018 at 19:16

Keep the mac and put a ssd into it...
Watch it fly..
I done that a few months ago and the mac dont lagg one bit..even playing 4k video at 2x speed and even 4k 60 at 2x speed i think toooo

ShortWarning · 23 Oct 2018 at 10:01

Depending on the size of your sessions/how many plugins you're using, that i5 may hold you back.

Probably best to give it a go and see before dropping a lot on a new laptop though.

DoogzR · 23 Oct 2018 at 10:39

+1 for upgrade with SSD

I use an i7 MacBook Pro (2011) and installed a replacement SATA SSD which made a world of difference for all things. Inexpensive upgrade and benefits all round.

I record guitar using Reaper DAW (free, fully functioning trial available) and EzMix/EZDrummer plugins and often end up with a dozen tracks running without issue. As mentioned above, all depends on size of session, no of plugins, etc. SSD helps with latency on getting those wav forms recorded / played back.

X x X · 24 Oct 2018 at 14:40

Ram should be the biggest factor and ye..cpu clock speed...
The ssd speed is just opening apps and booting the beast..

From there? Its all cache and processing
So ram/cpu

Haaaawever me running 8gb ram & a fury x which has 4gb... ye i get some stutter buttttt.. i have multiple ssds where i got caches split between them sooo

U gonna have to do some tweeking on that....
Go to a mac forum

sofuzuxiko · 25 Oct 2018 at 11:34

Thanks for your feedback! I'll buy an SSD and see how I go...

X x X · 25 Oct 2018 at 13:02

Wat ssd u gonna get..dont worry about benchmarks.. they have fake inflated numbers from their ddr3/ddr4l ram caches....
They mostly the same speed... go for higher durability n warrenty