laptop wanted: good for use with audio interface to record multi-track guitar

chaucer

Like the title says really ...

I'm very out of touch with the latest specs and what is a good price.

I want a laptop that is good to run as a 2nd computer in the house for general use.

I want to be able to connect some sort of usb device (either an audio interface such as E-MU 0202 or maybe a usb mic) to record guitar (either from a line-out of my amp if using an audio interface or through the mic in front of my amp).

My recording software will be either audacity or reaper.

I also want to sync the audio with video so it might be good if the laptop has a decent video editing software (Ihave moviemaker on my PC).

Any finished vids will be transferred to external HDD for storage so the size of the laptop HDD does not need to be enormous for storage long term.

Budget is the key ... I am not fussed about having the best graphics and won't be gaming ... so I'm hoping that the price can be kept pretty low ... basically as low as is reasonable to get what I want.

Many thanks in advance.

bingo_bango

I'd have thought that pretty much any laptop would fit the bill for what you want, but you say in the thread title that you want multi - track recording, and in the post you say you use Audacity which is stereo tracks only.

Which is it? If you use something more powerful like Reason then I would suggest a multi core processor as there lots of associated concurrent threads running with something like it. Audacity will run on just about everything.

£$&*"($£&(

bingo_bango wrote: »

in the thread title that you want multi - track recording, and in the post you say you use Audacity which is stereo tracks only.

Which is it?

Audacity will do multitrack recording.

Reaper though it a more sensible option.

A decent processor, 3gb of RAM and preferably a speedy hard disk (7200 rpm) will be best but most importantly you should tweak it for recording. You need to make sure priority is given to background processes and turn off various things. Best advice can be found in the stickies in the Sound on Sound PC forum and some of their articles.

chaucer

Thank you

bingo_bango wrote: »

... you say in the thread title that you want multi - track recording....

by that I mean to record one track, then record over it again and build up mutli-tracks ... if audacity can't cope then I'll use reaper or similar

bingo_bango wrote: »

...pretty much any laptop would fit the bill ....

so no special spec to look for?

in that case ... I really do want the price to be as low as is reasonable so would love some suggestions ...

new or refurb would be ok

chaucer

Thanks

grahawk wrote: »

... but most importantly you should tweak it for recording. You need to make sure priority is given to background processes and turn off various things.

can you be a little more specific as to what things please?

grahawk wrote: »

Best advice can be found in the stickies in the Sound on Sound PC forum and some of their articles.

thanks - I've not visited there so will have a look

bingo_bango

grahawk wrote: »

Audacity will do multitrack recording.

Reaper though it a more sensible option.

A decent processor, 3gb of RAM and preferably a speedy hard disk (7200 rpm) will be best but most importantly you should tweak it for recording. You need to make sure priority is given to background processes and turn off various things. Best advice can be found in the stickies in the Sound on Sound PC forum and some of their articles.

News to me! Mind you, I haven't actually used it for anything other than stereo tracks (and that was a while ago) so that may explain why.

£$&*"($£&(

chaucer wrote: »

can you be a little more specific as to what things please?

It's things like anti vius, the internet connection, indexing, screen savers hardware polling (?) where things in Windows keep checking for drives and other things. All this sort of thing can interfere. I have forgotten the exact things but you'll find info on Sound on Sound.

Tweakheadz is also a good source of info.

http://tweakheadz.com/index.html

The background processes thing made the biggest difference for me.

chaucer

bumping with a supplementary question

would a netbook be any good for my needs?

and if so should I look for xp or win7?

I really want to spend on a budget as I still need to buy an audio interface etc and netbooks seem to cost less than laptops

Donnie

So what is your budget?

BLT_2

chaucer wrote: »

bumping with a supplementary question

would a netbook be any good for my needs?

and if so should I look for xp or win7?

I really want to spend on a budget as I still need to buy an audio interface etc and netbooks seem to cost less than laptops

Netbooks are cheaper for a reason, their capabilities are far lower than the larger version. If I were to require a laptop for video editing I would avoid a netbook.

Leopard

I love my little netbook. But, for what you want to achieve, using a netbook would be like trying to lap the Isle of Man TT course on a child's tricycle.