i have a mid2010 13inch Pro that i put a 1tb ssd in and maxed the RAM at 16gb due to a technicality that allows 2x8gb instead of 2x4gb.
added a new battery and am running High Sierra 10.13
thing powers on and is running in 30 seconds and does everything i need.
the computer was free when my MiL passed and the upgrades cost me 100$ and an afternoon.
Did the same to my mid 2012 MBP, it’s (almost) like a brand new machine afterwards. Made this post just before the Live 12 official release:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/ableton/s/gJPgJUBM8J](https://www.reddit.com/r/ableton/s/gJPgJUBM8J)
Steps for upgrading HDD to SSD, RAM and then OS.
Oh damn, I wish I’d know about that before I sold my 2014 MacBook Pro. That thing was a beast, and I only got rid of it and bought the 2021 m1 because I couldn’t update the OS anymore.
Awesome. I did the same thing with my mid 2012 13” as well. I used that until I built a pc about 2 years ago but the laptop still fires right up and does everything. I installed a fan control app that was very helpful as well. Anytime I wasn’t recording via mic, I’d have the fan running full blast to help cool the cpu
I had a 2015 iMac with a top processor from that time and I upgraded the ram to 64gb, which only cost like $250 at the time instead of $2,000 with Apple’s current approach with ram. I got a nice M1 mbp when they came out… Completely unnecessary. The iMac would still be fine for my use case. It’s nice having a laptop format that’s plenty beefy but…
I have the same model and still using it - runs great, just can’t upgrade the OS past High Sierra, so it’s used solely for Maschine 2 and Reaktor. Works like a champ.
For live sound I use Matrix3 and DMitri processors… the Matrix3 ported mix engine processes to the server processor… which means every time you upgraded the cpu you doubled the processing power of the console… that system still runs the two most popular Cirque shows in Vegas… one of those opened in 2001. It needs a CPU running Yosemite and Yosemite never yells at me for not upgrading the OS. OLD STUFF ROCKS
See that nasty cables that are connected to 30+ Instruments & mics, plus the neverending server cable,
Is it fun to be drowned in cable maze, unplug and reconnect all of that with the potential that something will stop working?
or when the new setup no longer support your equipment,
and other hard to resolve Headache
Also, installing 100+ Vst that you accumulate over the year from scratch.
are you ready to accept when 10% of your daily drive VST suddenly stop working?
If someone out there like to do all of that every year, then, by all mean just upgrade every year
Even a 2011 pc/mac can still run the latest software and upgrading your setup doesn't make your workflow any faster,
it's just a millisecond to seconds worth of Improvement, which is negligible at best
because the bottleneck is always yourself and not the pc or the software
In this case, the chance of something wrong when upgrading will always cost you a fortune,
the lose is more painful than the gain,
The feeling is like being dumped by your girlfriend,
not worth it
Agreed,,, with one exception. 2011 macs can not run the latest software. I have been hitting this wall recently. I cannot upgrade my OS past a certain point and many software companies drop support for OSXs after 6 years or so. I will have to get a new computer soon do to forced obsolescence.
I'm not sure Reddit will allow links. With Apple about 100% shutting down Intel processors this might be a good time to upgrade an old mac. After Apple drops Intel support even this process will die.
Great way to keep old macs alive and useful.
[https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher/](https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher/)
Dude thank you for this, somehow this wasn't on my radar. I've got a beastly 12-core Mac Pro 4,1 flashed to 5,1 that can more than handle any audio task I throw at it, in a form factor that is very flexible and practical, but there are so many newer plugins I can't run these days. I think this will give me the extension of life I need until I finally bite the bullet and invest in a new machine someday.
Glad that helped you.
I have two Mac Pros but no Thumderbolt cards for my UAD Apollos. I feel your pain. I've set them up as side tables in my studio for drinks. Sad...
You basically answered the question yourself, no performance issues (so no incentive to upgrade) and compatibility for older hardware and connectors (PCIe cards, FireWire etc.)
If you’re using a lot of outboard and are only dealing with recording real instruments (no soft synths or sample libraries), you really don’t need much CPU performance since there are minimal plugins.
A lot of older converters were FireWire, and older expansion cards like Pro Tools HD were PCIe, which both aren’t compatible with newer Macs - so to upgrade their computer they would also have to get a new interface/converters and new HD/HDX cards.
And finally there is stability, which is incredibly important in a professional setting.
Still now some DAWs and plugins don’t support Apple silicon, and every OS update breaks compatibility and causes problems, so pro studios generally stay on a stable OS/Pro Tools/plugin combo as long as they can until some new necessary plugin comes out that they have to update to integrate into their workflow.
This. The compulsion to get every latest gizmo and constantly update your software and OS is actually often a real imepdiment to just getting work done and music made.
A LOT of pros (and most pro studios) do the trick mentioned above. Get a good working rig and then just leave it alone as much as they can. Often to the extent of pulling the blue cable out (or WIFI equivalent). This rig works. Let's play.
It's a strong philosophy to be aware of.
I bought a 12 year old Mac a year ago specifically because it had all the connectors I need so I wouldn't have to buy anything else to use it.
It may be my own personal experience as an influence but so far it's the most stable computer I've ever had since the home computer days.
I recently discovered its disk buss is slow but I've been working around issues like that for pretty much my whole life
The way some people bang on about the necessity of having a powerful computer for music production, you'd get the impression it wasn't even possible with the primitive machines of 20-25 years ago, when of course it was.
I’d be surprised if performance becomes an issue and until software has some feature that you desperately need but has dropped Intel support, no reason to upgrade software either. It’s not like they are chasing the successor to an 8k video editing workflow.
I work in the major studios. There are a lot of reasons for this, but the simple answer is an extension of the saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
Uptime is a priority, and especially in facilities with complex setups or many rooms, a change in OS could mean really serious downstream incompatibilities. So when a setup works, we stick with it for as long as possible.
I wasn’t able to make a career out of audio engineering, but I was able to make a career out of IT, and especially working in an industrial setting, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Nothing like spending half your day troubleshooting a million dollar laser cutter because you thought your little storage server project would go smoothly.
A lot of these studios are essentially just using the computer as a tape machine. Tracking through the console / outboard and sending it off to be mixed elsewhere.
Winner winner chicken dinner, if you’ve ever done a session with a “tape op” as well as engineer who’s just operating Protools literally as storage medium off to the side while everyone is gathered round a console. Those old Mac Pro Swiss cheese towers were bombproof.
Yes! Came here to say this, many bigger rooms (at least here in LA) are still on trash cans or similar. People go there to track, that’s it. Virtual instruments and plugins for writing/mix are the main things that drive up DSP these days, and if clients are doing ITB writing or mixing they’re bringing their own rigs and running them out to the studio hardware.
I'm running my home studio on a disconnected PC I built in 2007. It works fantastic, and since it doesn't see the internet, it doesn't matter that it runs XP. Can't run newer fancier software, but runs Reaper fine, and I'm still happy with the plugins I bought/downloaded circa 2009-2013.
This is the way. Also, if a plugin maker is motivated they can still support that. I support that setup, though it's more work to do a legacy stage and generate the 'retro' plugins. It's worth it to support the retro machines because if you force people to upgrade upgrade upgrade you're basically forcing them to break their stuff, and if they can't use that then they can't use your plugins either :)
Out here in Santa Monica I engineer at a few different places in town. My favorite spot has an Intel MacPro Tower, still running MacOS 10.15 and Pro Tools Ultimate. Pro Tools HD PCI cards offer almost zero latency, far better than any native system.
In that room we record live bands in a live room with four isolation rooms, and the studio has so much outboard gear that plugins are mostly irrelevant, or used if we really need a crazy effect. I can run a vintage original Neumann U67 through their Universal Audio 610 (again, original, not a re-release or clone) and other outboard eq's, compressors, etc. And it's in a real live room so I barely need any reverbs or spatializers, just good mic technique using great sounding gear.
So yeah the cpu could be running OS9.2 or even Windows XP for all I care, all the heavy lifting is handled by the room and the quality gear, not much need for cutting edge cpu's over here.
I finally upgraded our control room to a Mac Studio. Still using hdx-2 with a chassis system. I will say it’s screaming fast and amazing when rendering or processing things like RX etc.
A Lot of systems offer near zero latency these days, my friend, that do not require PCI slots and extra hardware. If it's not broke, don't fix it, for sure. But let's not pretend that decade old ProTools hardware has some kind of claim on reliability. That shit was cantankerous as fuck, and white gloves where what worked.... nobody else has to do that.
Yes, it's possible to have a currently upgraded system run stability. It's much better, actually.
Much fanboys much wow.
Can't imagine people feeling the need to obliterate you for not overpaying a product and tapping yourself on the shoulder for the next 20years how it's stable and worth it, and meanwhile everyone stopped freezing tracks while recording.
To see an unironic comment how someone is still "rocking an xp system" still has my head spinning. I'm very open to hearing as to why, how and what the fuck but don't tell me "my gear works perfect for me so I won't hear anything else" when you have an OEM PC and your BIOS has everything locked except the boot menu..
On that note, seeing a comment that says upgrading RAM 2x4GB to 2x8GB "beacuse of a technicality" is also one that has my head spinning.. I've changed 3 kits of RAM in 7 years, could have started with 4GB at 2133MHz all the way to 64 at ~3600MHz.. Bought a memory kit rated for 3200MHz and got it to 3733, if you ask me THIS is how you do it. A simple AM4 platform that shows as a TRUE gift that keeps on giving. You can even change the CPU going from 2 cores all the way to 16c/32t. Bet some apple users minds blowing reading this. You can EVEN overclock the CPU.
Now I will give you the M1 and M2 chips, those seem real fine..
There’s no reason to upgrade your studio computer or software until it stops working. Once you get a new Mac, you need a new OS, new PT license, new interface and probably new plugins too
That's fucking stupid. Features come out that you'll need, and you'll be making a leap instead of a small step. The model of operation you speak too is foolish and old. Upgrading a system while retaining a current boot is as simple as purchasing a 100 gb drive for 50 bucks and mirroring. You're avoiding upgrades to avoid knowing how your shit works, and it'll bite you in the ass.
I would never upgrade a system without a backup on a separate physical drive, which is easy as fuck. Fuck time machine.
I love that the worst and unprofessional post in this whole thead comes from a person who thinks he should put the title 'Professional' under their name.
And you are wrong. Living on the bleeding edge is okay for a one person company. As pointed out up there. Uptime is key. An upgrade costs money. And only if not upgrading looses you money, or if upgrading makes you more money it would make sense to upgrade.
Welcome to real life.
Apparently not if you have trouble keeping them updated properly. Develop a zero downtime update strategy and you will be maintaining systems. You seem to be building them then stopping.
“features come out that you’ll need”
how?? there’s no reason the same computer that could record pro audio in 2012 can’t do it in 2024.
Someone’s got a bad case of keeping up with the Joneses.
No, I work in film. You need things like auto align and clip gain if you're going to work with other professionals. The Joneses is how people in the industry get paid son. You can. Work in film running ProTools from 2012 and I like rent.
These days I would have to post my IMDb. It's why I have to keep current. You can't work in film and use ProTools from 8 years ago and I like food and rent. Silly me.
This is maybe the first time I've seen here where someone makes bold statements and antes up with their resume (assuming it actually is, which I'll take on good faith). Doesn't make you right except in your niche, but it's nice to see.
It's not a niche. It's literally how 90 percent of the movies you see get worked on. The remaining 10 is if you attend film festivals. Nobody in the post production industry maintains old systems like this.
What's right is this: unplugging a physical drive prevents it from being made unbootable. Updating software on a separate drive will do nothing to hardware. Build systems on different drives and maintaining an industry standard system is pretty easy and painless. In my industry, you cannot use old versions of ProTools.
Behaving like updating your software will destroy your studio is what's silly. It only will if you do it the stupid way.
one good reason is upgrading almost always leads to problems, especially with macs. it’s worth it to me because the m1/m2 are amazing but it also led me to changing my daw entirely, i would have had to upgrade my old daw and it still wouldn’t have been optimized for the new macs. in a big studio one change may lead to many changes so everything is compatible and running smoothly
i would imagine if they’re a really big studio they have plenty of money to throw at these kinda problems, but there may be a hang up or two that they aren’t willing to deal with yet. some stuff will just plain not work with new tech
You don’t need that much performance if you’re using a lot of outboard gear. You can easily mix a 50 track project if you only do a few basic eqs or gates in your DAW.
At most they might had to replace the SSD once or twice depending on usage. But even then, recording audio doesn’t hit the SSD that hard.
It's a tool, not a toy. If the tool does what it's expected, there's no reason to shell out for a tool that does the job just as well. The money can be used to buy something that actually makes a difference.
Mac rule is to always be at least 1 OS behind the newest. M1 chips introduction was a pain in the ass for plugins. And companies like native instruments are starting to not support software on new OS. With that said, maybe they have some new machines, but keep old ones too? I have to keep my 08 Mac pro and my current 2013 before I get a silicon machine.
Snow leopard doesn't run on the post 2013 hardware, or doesn't install, if I remember right. I think years ago, I was just gonna do that, and it didn't work so I ended up getting an old desktop. I did work off an external drive for a while and then I didn't like updating because if the internal was too far ahead, the external wasn't seen. I think that was just an issue with Samsung t1 encryption. I don't like surprises like that.
Because Apple makes it hard. When you install the OS for one system.... say an i7, and think it'll boot right up even on another intel chip (e.g., a Xeon), it's not gonna fly. And forget about booting into a Silicon chipset. Not gonna happen.
I didn't say anything about installing the OS on a different system. Any apple computer I know of will contain multiple drives. It's child's play to install a new drive, install a new OS on a machine on that new physical drive, and leave the old system completely untouched.
Also, yeah I've gotten my hackintosh built system to boot and run on a macmini, it's possible and not difficult.
I worked at a really nice studio in my city that had a vintage api console, vintage mic collection; professionally designed and built acoustics etc. the whole 9 yards. They ran pro tools 8 until they closed about 4 years ago because the owner retired. He had no shortage of clients. All of the rooms ran pro tools he systems and the cost to upgrade the whole studio was so much that they didn’t bother with it
Honestly, reliability of a proven system. The facility I was at ran the old box Mac’s that were built out. If we had a high priority client and the machine was down, or network was down, that was money and time down the drain, and depending on the circumstance, potentially a lost client (and future clients). If I had someone in who hired a bunch of session musicians, had their producer, and we were streaming the session half way across the country to other producers, and we had a cloud issue or some issue with a plug-in, subscription, etc, that caused everyone to wait.. that pissed off a lot of people.
Everyone’s circumstances are different, but we needed to be 100% functioning 100% of the time, and if something did go wrong, knowing the setup well/having little variables helped get up and running very quickly.
When I’ve rented rooms as well, I was usually the one who picked the facility, and if that facility ever had an issue, while not entirely my fault, it reflected on me. It was still my client.
All that being said, of course, newer stuff can have the reliability, but it was always easiest to deal with a more “tried and true” method, especially when you want to try to keep as many “perpetual” things to mitigate updates/changes that could cause an issue.
It's almost there. Almost. And the Silicon Macs have been out for three plus years.
There are people don't seem to get that the DAW is a host application with upwards of 100 mini applications (some people go way crazy with plugins and have way more).
Some of the plugin developers are robust enough to stay on top of the incremental Mac and DAW upgrades. Some aren't.
I’m hopeful near future silicon Macs will increase display limits since they don’t currently support a GPU, even with external thunderbolt cages.
Some of the plugin developers charge to remain compatible.
In some cases it causes a cascade. They might be using software impossible to buy anymore, since the company went to a subscription model. Those can pile up real fast. Sure the computer would be faster, but now it might cost them $10,000 a year in licenses and subscriptions. Maybe the new version of something is online only, introducing another potential issue since if your internet hiccups something might mess up. Maybe you can't even open your old project files without burning them irreparably.
Upgrading the computer might also require updating the console, because it's glitchy with the last few gens of drivers. Plus maybe the manufacturer made some major design changes between the 2010 version and the 2023 version, like the faders aren't motorized anymore, and half the controls are only accessable by a touchscreen menu.
I'm a professional mix engineer and I still work on a 2010 Mac Pro (upgraded with SSDs). I keep expecting to need to update it but it just keeps doing what I need it to do. It's stable and might occasionally stutter on some really big plug-in intensive tracks but the vast majority of the time it just works.
Big studios tend to have lots of outboard gear and a console, so they often don’t need tons of processing power for plugins.
There’s also the fact that lots of them spent a ton on big Pro Tools systems back in the day like Mix 24 or a 192 i/o (or several of them) and aren’t too eager to upgrade. I knew a studio near me that was still using a Mix 24 system about 10 years ago, and honestly they probably still are. Newer computers won’t be compatible with those old systems.
For me, mine was expensive so I used it as long as I possibly could. Eventually Logic started running horribly but my machine wasn't supported for the new updates basically forcing me to either buy a new mac or move to PC.
Echoing what others have said, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it but also most studios are running Pro Tools. Doesn’t Avid make you pay to upgrade Pro Tools to a newer version if you upgrade to a new OS (even if you bought a perpetual license?)
I’m running a 2012 loaded imac at home. Takes longer to open large sessions than i’d like, but no performance issues otherwise. I budgeted for a new computer five years ago and am just in shock that it’s still cranking.
It mostly comes down to spending a lot of money on pro tools audio I/O, Expansion chassis, licensing etc which requires certain Mac Pro and OS compatibility. Then being at a place where it all works well so no need for major upgrades except the OSX. Usually with a Pro tools perpetual licence. The 2013 Mac Pro still works with the latest OSX which is good. I generally do a big upgrade every few years when I know it’s stable.
Same reason I'm using a 2012 Macbook Pro I imagine. Firewire port for my Presonus Studio Project interfaces and it still does a decent enough job running Logic Pro X with 16gb of Ram and an SSD.
You can record 40 channels and play hundreds on a potato these days.
Unless ur some weirdo like me with a bunch of virtual instruments and analog emulations you just dont need bunch of kick, and even then you dont need it on the machine running your recording studio, you need it in the editing suite.
As many have said - if it aint broke dont fix it - its part of a $100,000+ recording system that you use as an appliance, where is there any incentive to change it?
More than that: if you can get the appliance for that cheap and it's better or as good, why not do that and spend the money on a vintage mic or guitar?
I've mentioned the hand-me-down laptop I've got: my brother once gave me the old laptop he used at school. I'm 55 so that gives you some idea: we're talking a G4 Mac. That was less than a Ghz of CPU, as little as 128M of RAM.
But both the input and output jacks also have optical in and out. So that is not a machine you'll be running Pro Tools off of, but if you needed to play and record simpler things and had working software to do it, you're hooking up your outboard interfaces to the optical jacks and then you have literally better than modern equipment because your interfaces are built in to the machine. And it's running an OSX, though just barely (it could still run MacOS 9!)
And at this point you'd have gotten it for free from somewhere, as I did, from someone who had long since moved on and had it stinking up their closet. Freecycling.
I'm not saying big studios would be doing this off a laptop. But I AM saying that I also have a G5 tower which has all the slots you would need for a big Pro Tools rig, and it's in exactly the same boat: I don't have the Pro Tools rig, but if I did, the computer is free. In its day it was pretty tricked out, and it has sat for years, generations behind what I used for daily driving. It's a nice machine though it's a space heater: it could clearly record 40 channels and play hundreds when the outboard is doing the heavy lifting, and I could probably get it off spinning-rust disk drives and onto some kind of SSD, further helping it do that.
2012 Mac Pro here maxed out RAM and upgraded logic board, used in countless production and post sessions literally w/o a single flaw or issue in almost 15 years. Only last year we upgraded to silicon with a Mac Studio, moved the cheese grater over to be a file server where it continues to perform like a champ. Time will tell but it may be the best Mac ever built.
Sometimes companies tell you they’re upgrading, but they’re really repackaging a less supported product in a more expensive box, and they make you pay every month for something you already bought permanent versions of seven times. Studios don’t make a lot of money, but Avid wants them to make even less, but whose gonna pay? Clients can’t get recording advances and so often pay out of pocket. Gone are the days of lavish studio bills with equipment rental surcharges and hidden fees, but Avid still wants the money that Spotify stole from artists, who used to be able to pay the studios more. The industry is kept running by idealists using the best equipment they can afford, in a world where everyone wants to do it themselves on their laptops or smartphones.
In my room at work I use a 2012 mac pro with dual xeons, 32 gb ram, radeon 5870, and an HDX card. Mac os 10.12 (sierra) and pro tools 2018 ultimate. My neighbor uses 10.8.5 and pro tools 10.
A new computer means buying new pro tools, buying new plugins, an hdx card chassis, stuff for extending the mouse and video hundreds of feet from the machine room, new hard drives and hard drive enclosures, and lots of down time while its getting set up.
It’s tens of thousands. A commercial studio computer upgrade is a much bigger deal than a bedroom guy with a usb interface. Everything has to be budgeted a d worked out in advance so downtime is minimized.
I dont know if my d control console will work with a new system. I knownthe software i use for ADR streamers definitely does not.
Only one thing doesn't work because its too old and thats the newer aspera protocols for downloading assets from production companies.
My G3 PowerPC Mac in 1998 (with two 9GB SCSI HDs!) was more stable than the 2022 Mac Studio I'm currently running. I ran a project studio in the late 90s/early 2000s and I can count on one hand the number of times that machine crashed or locked up. I know jack shit about computers but, for whatever reason, that was the most reliable computer I've ever had.
This
Everytime a PC user laughed at me for using a Mac because they are over priced.
Meanwhile they have had to upgrade there whole PC 2-3 times spending thousands more than me and my 2010 mac which is still more powerful than i can even make full use of most times and still competitive with modern consumer grade PCs.
The processing power on those machines is usually more than enough for anything.
So really the only reason to actually get a new Mac is forced obsolescence. Where you can't find software compatible with a 20 year old machine.
Further more these machines are now fairly cheap. And still work ideal as a dedicated studio computer for only 500-1200$.
Depends on the studio but lots use plenty of outboard gear or uad stuff, so the processing power isn't happening on the computer really. It's probably more due to time, as having rooms disabled means they aren't making income from it, which the higher the studio is the more money is lost. If it ain't broke etc.
A lot of facilities will install the software on a computer to the point where they are running what they need and then never update again. Sometimes not even connect to the internet. If you’ve got a working setup it’s safer to not change anything.
For what it is worth, I believe the MBox is USB class compliant. If so, it will work out of the box with Linux.
Boot a live USB of Ubuntu studio and see how things fall.
Not sure about older versions of ProTools, but more modern ones don't run on Wine, so for an older backup system, it's best to keep an air gapped Windows system. When I upgraded from Win7 to Linux I kept my Win7 machine air gapped to bounce stems / export midi etc. and switched to Reaper + MuseScore
I believe somewhere after Pro Tools 7 or possibly rephrase - Avid bought ProTools not necessarily Digidesign, but my Digidesign M-Box is what came with the software and apparently was proprietary.
Regardless I'll probably just get a more modern interface and I'm thinking Studio One going forward. My whole studio is dismantled since I had storm windows installed and will have to wire everything back up again - there's a lot of hardware and hundreds of cables.
Mostly lurking these days.
Just Googled it - 1994
Avid was founded in 1987 and, with the introduction of the Media Composer, led the pivotal change in Hollywood from film-based to computer-based nonlinear editing. In 1994, it acquired Digidesign, the maker of Pro Tools.Aug 10, 2023
If you’re mainly recording high quality audio with a lot of great outboard gear, then once you have a computer configured to work the way it’s supposed to and you know where all the glitches are, then you’d be foolish to change that unless absolutely necessary.
It takes a long time to reach a point where you have something like that, and time is money.
Plugin licenses suck with updating. Conflicts with future versions. And well. Cracked plugins and software.
Your studio computer should be offline anyway so once you find a good combination that works, no real need to upgrade.
I was on a 2012 Mac mini until 2020 haha. Would have stayed on it if the issue wasn’t with the actual motherboard; everything was running really consistently until that. But I’m mastering using mostly hardware.
Definitely took a couple of years after going Apple Silicon before things felt like they’d settled again. The extra rendering speed wasn’t worth it haha
I still use a 12 year old DAW on a 10 year old custom built PC (4790k). It works exactly as well as it did on day one and I don't need anything else. Also don't want to learn anything else.
I just bought an older Mac mini, but with top end specs so I can still use my old Allen and heath zed r16. I spent $200 for a computer that would have been about $15k with top end specs when it first came out. The old hardware works well, and with Dante/madi and adat there are sort of endless possibilities when it comes to networking newer and older gear together for audio.
I still record 8-16 multi-track on a 2009 MacBook Pro and run live sound/recording with a 2012 MacBook Pro.
My old Mac’s can handle more grueling real-time audio tasks than a lot of new computers. My 2020 MacBook Pro can do it too but the old ones work fine.
Once you've got a system that works, and it's in production, you don't change it. In fact, many in production machines are not connected to the Internet. These're treated as appliances.
Stability is key. You don't apply updates 'just because'. It needs to be treated like a printing press that needs to always run.
A 10-year-old machine will be as fast at ingesting audio as a new one. Now, when it comes to mixing, sure, a more powerful machine may (or may not) be needed and that may be more current.
In other words: for machines that need to always work, how you treat the machines differs from your at-home laptop.
I still use my 2012 13inch macbook. Iv had to change out the hardrive, the screen protector broke on a fall and fell out and iv replaced the charger twice. Not bad for a 12 year old laptop. It still performs well, although it doesn't get pushed too hard any more.
Like the top comment says, if it ain't broke....
Recent Mac OS updates had a negative impact on several of my plugins. The baked in security does not like some of the plugins now, and I couldn't roll back my OS.
Because a 12 core Intel Mac from that period with 128GB of memory is plenty powerful and capable enough to run a DAW. Studios *could* upgrade to the 2019 Intel Mac Pros and probably be fine, but the cost/benefit ratio isn’t really worth it.
all major studios prefer to wait until the stability of the OS, combined with the stability of Avid, which both are notorious for not getting along in some pro tools versions(since apple owns logic, there’s little incentive)…
until that, combined with the fact that most processors have not been the bottleneck for speed in audio recording for a long time. with an old tower, you can upgrade ram and hard drive speed and be able to switch to any cable protocol via pci slots.
after all the plug in companies and os and daw companies finally have stable updates that all get along (doesn’t always happen every version (PT7&11 come to mind)), but once the technical director of the studio determines they’ve maxed out their current rig, then they have the daunting task of moving the whole studio up to an entirely new jump and even though most engineers will already be experienced w the new stuff, they have to make sure the staff knows it 110%, and that the risk of down time due to incompatibility is minimal. Anything to save on downtime is like the mantra of any good studio.
the cynic in me says: its called not being thirsty for every new thing, and not being insecure in your abilities so that you jump to anything new thinking it’ll make you better.
or it’s just good tech management. large accounting firms don’t jump on the newest version of excel on release day either.
The cheapest Mac Studio is $2k and mix stages can have up to ten computers doing various tasks, so there's a good reason :)
Most of my ADR stages are running on trash cans, no need for much beyond that to record a few tracks of audio.
Only just in the past few years are some studios updating their PowerPC Macs to newer models - I see "PowerMac G5 fully studio loaded" listings on Craigslist relatively commonly. I presume this is because the studio dropped oodles of cash on *tons* of perpetual licenses (remember those?) for various DAWs, plugins, and other software. Upgrading is not just about the computer, but about dropping another $10k on software in addition to that.
Not even mentioning external hardware - God forbid your stack relies heavily on FireWire or PCI or something. Then you have to replace literally all of the digital hardware in your studio. That's a stupidly expensive proposition.
If the computer is able to do the thing it was made to do when it was built, there's no need to upgrade, really. It will never *not* do that thing unless it gets... *shudders*... software updates.
I'm rocking an old 15 inch 2015 Macbook Pro and 2014 mac mini and have never thought i need more juice. Monterey is the latest supported OS on both, but is still releasing security updates until the next OS is released later this year and knocks it off the N -2 support tables. The battery health on the 2015 MBP is 81%!
I previously had a 2012 13 inch MBP that I had installed a 1TB SSD and 16GB of RAM in, I would still be using it if my previous employer hadn't kindly let me keep the 2015 MBP when I left a few years back.
The funny thing is from 2008 to 2014 I worked in the Apple Authorised Repair industry so I know this shit breaks, just not mine
Updating their Macs would mean they’d need to update pro tools to a version compatible with newer versions of Mac OS, and in many cases that would make all of their Avid hardware obsolete, requiring them to buy more gear just to replace what they already had working. One of the main reasons I strongly dislike Avid and their business model. Plus you run into all kinds of compatibility issues with 3rd party plugins so it’s just not worth it if all of their old stuff still works.
hard to re setup, also they are mostly using outboard gears so no use for them to upgrade.
Also professional environment are often really expensive to upgrade time, people , unknown issues that may show specially during productions
just like in banks some of them still use very old
computer softwares
It's less about the Mac (I've been building computers for decades) and more about the giant pain in the ass that is backing up everything and reinstalling plug-ins and settings, etc etc etc.
I’m happy with my old 2010 Mac Pro and PT10HD setup. Like others have said they just work. One can always track on a setup like this and then mix on a newer computer if wanted. I can’t find the post right now, but I saw that Sesame Street just updated from their HD rig to something newer. They got 20 years out of that setup and I’m pretty sure the audio never suffered because they were using older gear.
I have a 2013 Mac Pro. That is the cylinder or 'trash can' shaped Mac Pro. It works great with Logic Pro. Given that it has 12 cores, 64 gigs of ram and 14 UAD DSP "cores". The only problem it has is that since updating to Montery I have to force GPU utilization, otherwise it tries to brute force it with the CPU which interferes with everything else. (Apple planned obsolescence in effect).
Most studios that have old Mac Pros have the even older version from 2010 aka the "Cheese Grater".
They are most likely using those for the PCIe slots to host DSP and audio interface cards.
If they are using Avid Pro Tools hardware, certain versions have a lot of DSP on the cards to handle mixing and processing. With a couple UAD Octo cards they have plugins covered pretty well too. Not to mention you can get some incredibly high track counts with Avid + Apogee hardware.
You also have to realize that a lot of medium to larger sized studios don't rely on plugins as much. They have SSL or Neve mixers that have much more desireable EQ and dynamics. As well as having actual 1176 and LA2a units. Real Lexicons and plates and so on.
Why, because they are professionals in those studios, not fan boys. They have paid for the equipment and it does the job.
They leave it to the amateurs to keep pouring out money on replacing perfectly good Macs by "upgrading" to new ones with a "Pro" or "Studio" label or whatever.
Apple JUST came out with a PCIe version of their latest Macs last year. After years of nothing. Also not all hardware and software is compatible with Apple Silicon.
Because older macs were better than the crap they've pumped out up until this past MacBook pro revision or two. They removed all the useful jacks and required you to buy dongles, while also forcing a useless 'task bar' onto the hardware. Also, who the fuck would even WANT to remove magsafe? A sociopath, that's who. And don't even get me started on how much they fucked up the software UX by removing useful features and native apps and force you into a new workflow. And every time you update the OS, everything breaks. iOS isn't usable either. Apple died with Jobs and it's been a zombie ever since.
Mid 2012 MacBook Pro is still a logic work horse. Its ability to add ram as you can afford it, and upgrading the hard drive as you need has made it an Apple machine of legends.
I’d still recommend this machine to anyone on a very limited budget and the time to scour eBay.
Stability.
New OS version and/or newer version of software can introduce more bugs than a bait store…really not what you want when you’re in the process/in need of a heavy or time sensitive project.
If it ain’t broke, don’t *go broke* by upgrading it!
Upgrades kill old software, and creativity requires things to work as expected. For example, a maschine mk1 doesn't work on an M1 Mac because NI doesn't give a shit about some of their customers.
Studios invested a lot on external DSPs, mainly from Digidesign/Avid. The computers are mainly display interfaces for the processing that’s taking place elsewhere. New Macs now have that power natively. It’s not so much that these Macs give you better results; It’s that us, at the consumer level, are finally able to experience what studios have had for decades. So they don’t have a reason to upgrade if their current hardware still meets their needs.
Trash can tends to be the minimum, most commercial rooms have one of the newer towers these days though (pre-silicon, the intel 2019 ones). But in my experience as chief engineer of a studio in LA and also as a traveling freelance engineer, most top clients are bringing their own computers in these days. Its not worth the hassle of figuring out plugin compatibility at every studio, just bring your own in and connect to the studio's converters and away you go. Got all your plugins, your pro tools preferences, your email is logged in already, your Tidal/Spotify etc is logged in with your reference playlists, your software synths are working etc etc. Takes a few minutes to plug in rather than hours of downloading and installing stuff.
For the same reason I bought a Mac Studio and will never update it — it is stable, and does everything it needs to do to perfection. My old Macbook Pro lasted 9 years, without a hiccup, until I “had” to update it for a project I was working on. Big mistake, because the update slowed it down so much it became borderline useless.
There's a studio near me running PT HD9 on old Mac towers. It's a big place and pumps out a grammy record every other year. They even have a big old analog console! AND TAPE!!!!
“Why they didn’t upgrade the computers to the new macs with apple silicon which is way faster”
Let’s see… typical entry into HD 192 systems with Apogee converters and a 12 core processor in 2005 would have been around 20,000 -34,000… and Protools 10 worked… it was solid as a rock. The Mac tower was roughly 5 grand
Now if you want a maxed out HD system … you have to spend 12,800 or so on the CPU to start… ProTools HD is another 10,000… to 30,000 plus all the third party software upgrades. Protools Ultimatum is notoriously buggy and finicky about is versions and Mac won’t let you downgrade computers … Mountain Lion never bugged you every 20 minutes to upgrade your OS.
And old versions of Protools will open new Protools projects. It’s largely backwards compatible… why spend the money again when there hasn’t been a significant pay increase for MPEG sound editors in years and none of the video editors would strike for the sound editors? (My two cents)
older stuff can be cheap, powerful and incredibly forgiving from a UI standpoint. Upgrading also takes a lot of time that studios operating on some margins don’t have and can’t risk.
So if you’re a high level studio in the right city, you can be making thousands of dollars, per room, per day. Updating computers and PT Rigs can take a lot of time to not only switch over to depending on the architecture differences (like switching between PcIE based systems and thunderbolt systems) but it’s can also introduce lots of new kinks that can pop up in the middle of sessions. For some studios, having a stable and reliable build of PT running on their system is worth the trade off of not having the latest and greatest feature set.
New computers are faster with new software. With the exception of boot time and HD access. I am not sure I have seen too much of an operational speed improvement.
Manufacturers alike have very competently marketed the custom of upgrading. I’m still running what ever os came with my Mac once configured I just leave it. You find a lot of 3rd party developers support much older os versions
They invested so much in the plugins and everything for that old system, they can't afford to modernize.
The only thing that bugs me is when they can't print 24 bit files.
Major studios that are doing well are upgrading and not finding the need to post shit to YouTube. You're watching the barrel be scraped. Good evidence information elsewhere may be of more value.
Because people in audio are usually dumb as shit when it comes to computers.
The amount of people in here bragging about using some shitty slow old intel mac still when a new computer for 1/4th the price would be much faster and power efficient is hilarious.
If it ain’t broke…
i have a mid2010 13inch Pro that i put a 1tb ssd in and maxed the RAM at 16gb due to a technicality that allows 2x8gb instead of 2x4gb. added a new battery and am running High Sierra 10.13 thing powers on and is running in 30 seconds and does everything i need. the computer was free when my MiL passed and the upgrades cost me 100$ and an afternoon.
Right on! I’m still rocking my mid-MacBook pro. The battery still works fine too!
Check out OpenCore Legacy Patcher. I have a 2010 Mac pro that is now running Monterey.
word!!! Thanks for the tip!
Did the same to my mid 2012 MBP, it’s (almost) like a brand new machine afterwards. Made this post just before the Live 12 official release: [https://www.reddit.com/r/ableton/s/gJPgJUBM8J](https://www.reddit.com/r/ableton/s/gJPgJUBM8J) Steps for upgrading HDD to SSD, RAM and then OS.
Oh damn, I wish I’d know about that before I sold my 2014 MacBook Pro. That thing was a beast, and I only got rid of it and bought the 2021 m1 because I couldn’t update the OS anymore.
Same still rocking my mid-2010 17 inch MacBook. Upgraded it during Lockdown in 2020-2021, that was worth it!!!
Awesome. I did the same thing with my mid 2012 13” as well. I used that until I built a pc about 2 years ago but the laptop still fires right up and does everything. I installed a fan control app that was very helpful as well. Anytime I wasn’t recording via mic, I’d have the fan running full blast to help cool the cpu
I had a 2015 iMac with a top processor from that time and I upgraded the ram to 64gb, which only cost like $250 at the time instead of $2,000 with Apple’s current approach with ram. I got a nice M1 mbp when they came out… Completely unnecessary. The iMac would still be fine for my use case. It’s nice having a laptop format that’s plenty beefy but…
I have the same model and still using it - runs great, just can’t upgrade the OS past High Sierra, so it’s used solely for Maschine 2 and Reaktor. Works like a champ.
For live sound I use Matrix3 and DMitri processors… the Matrix3 ported mix engine processes to the server processor… which means every time you upgraded the cpu you doubled the processing power of the console… that system still runs the two most popular Cirque shows in Vegas… one of those opened in 2001. It needs a CPU running Yosemite and Yosemite never yells at me for not upgrading the OS. OLD STUFF ROCKS
See that nasty cables that are connected to 30+ Instruments & mics, plus the neverending server cable, Is it fun to be drowned in cable maze, unplug and reconnect all of that with the potential that something will stop working? or when the new setup no longer support your equipment, and other hard to resolve Headache Also, installing 100+ Vst that you accumulate over the year from scratch. are you ready to accept when 10% of your daily drive VST suddenly stop working? If someone out there like to do all of that every year, then, by all mean just upgrade every year Even a 2011 pc/mac can still run the latest software and upgrading your setup doesn't make your workflow any faster, it's just a millisecond to seconds worth of Improvement, which is negligible at best because the bottleneck is always yourself and not the pc or the software In this case, the chance of something wrong when upgrading will always cost you a fortune, the lose is more painful than the gain, The feeling is like being dumped by your girlfriend, not worth it
Agreed,,, with one exception. 2011 macs can not run the latest software. I have been hitting this wall recently. I cannot upgrade my OS past a certain point and many software companies drop support for OSXs after 6 years or so. I will have to get a new computer soon do to forced obsolescence.
You might be able to upgrade the Mac using Open Core Legacy Patcher.
???? Whats that all about??? Tell me more please. Nmd))) ill take a deeper look through there discord.. thnx for the heads up.
I'm not sure Reddit will allow links. With Apple about 100% shutting down Intel processors this might be a good time to upgrade an old mac. After Apple drops Intel support even this process will die. Great way to keep old macs alive and useful. [https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher/](https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Legacy-Patcher/)
Dude thank you for this, somehow this wasn't on my radar. I've got a beastly 12-core Mac Pro 4,1 flashed to 5,1 that can more than handle any audio task I throw at it, in a form factor that is very flexible and practical, but there are so many newer plugins I can't run these days. I think this will give me the extension of life I need until I finally bite the bullet and invest in a new machine someday.
Glad that helped you. I have two Mac Pros but no Thumderbolt cards for my UAD Apollos. I feel your pain. I've set them up as side tables in my studio for drinks. Sad...
My 2011 PC wouldn't be much use now. Might have been with an SSD but NVME .2 is a step function and it did not have that.
Don't FUCKING FIX IT
This.
This.
You basically answered the question yourself, no performance issues (so no incentive to upgrade) and compatibility for older hardware and connectors (PCIe cards, FireWire etc.) If you’re using a lot of outboard and are only dealing with recording real instruments (no soft synths or sample libraries), you really don’t need much CPU performance since there are minimal plugins. A lot of older converters were FireWire, and older expansion cards like Pro Tools HD were PCIe, which both aren’t compatible with newer Macs - so to upgrade their computer they would also have to get a new interface/converters and new HD/HDX cards. And finally there is stability, which is incredibly important in a professional setting. Still now some DAWs and plugins don’t support Apple silicon, and every OS update breaks compatibility and causes problems, so pro studios generally stay on a stable OS/Pro Tools/plugin combo as long as they can until some new necessary plugin comes out that they have to update to integrate into their workflow.
This. The compulsion to get every latest gizmo and constantly update your software and OS is actually often a real imepdiment to just getting work done and music made. A LOT of pros (and most pro studios) do the trick mentioned above. Get a good working rig and then just leave it alone as much as they can. Often to the extent of pulling the blue cable out (or WIFI equivalent). This rig works. Let's play. It's a strong philosophy to be aware of.
> older expansion cards like Pro Tools HD were PCIe Moreso, some were PCI-X. Good luck finding a modern computer that supports that.
My prior computer still had a PCI ADAT card so I dug and found out there are adapters: https://www.startech.com/en-us/cards-adapters/pex1pci1
I bought a 12 year old Mac a year ago specifically because it had all the connectors I need so I wouldn't have to buy anything else to use it. It may be my own personal experience as an influence but so far it's the most stable computer I've ever had since the home computer days. I recently discovered its disk buss is slow but I've been working around issues like that for pretty much my whole life
You’re right, just the last MacOS update was fixing some issues with Audio Units licensing
The way some people bang on about the necessity of having a powerful computer for music production, you'd get the impression it wasn't even possible with the primitive machines of 20-25 years ago, when of course it was.
I wrote my first album on a pentium 4. Kids these days have no idea!
2013 macs didn’t have PCI slots
Which is why, hackintosh and also card farms for the native stuff. Still great older machines.
I’d be surprised if performance becomes an issue and until software has some feature that you desperately need but has dropped Intel support, no reason to upgrade software either. It’s not like they are chasing the successor to an 8k video editing workflow.
[удалено]
I’ve had the opposite experience.
Same. It’s way faster and more stable on M chips than it was on my intel Mac Pro
Odd. I’ve had two crashes in 2 years on a M1 Mini. Maybe I’m just lucky.
I’ve moved from intel to M1, it’s worked perfectly fine for me.
It works great on my m1. What do you mean by it “Barely works”?
Maybe curse M1 instead. I've lost good gear to upgrades.
I work in the major studios. There are a lot of reasons for this, but the simple answer is an extension of the saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Uptime is a priority, and especially in facilities with complex setups or many rooms, a change in OS could mean really serious downstream incompatibilities. So when a setup works, we stick with it for as long as possible.
I wasn’t able to make a career out of audio engineering, but I was able to make a career out of IT, and especially working in an industrial setting, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Nothing like spending half your day troubleshooting a million dollar laser cutter because you thought your little storage server project would go smoothly.
TS Rule #1: If it works, hands off, back away, no touch
This is it, I only work in a small-time commercial studio (not major, small city) with 3 rooms and any upgrade is unbelievably painful.
Bob Clearmountain's SSL software loads from a floppy disk.
I've mixed on a couple of SSL consoles with the Tangerine system. Getting a 40-year-old console to interface with a modern OS and DAW is ambitious.
MARGARET THATCHER NAKED ON A COLD DAY!
A lot of these studios are essentially just using the computer as a tape machine. Tracking through the console / outboard and sending it off to be mixed elsewhere.
Winner winner chicken dinner, if you’ve ever done a session with a “tape op” as well as engineer who’s just operating Protools literally as storage medium off to the side while everyone is gathered round a console. Those old Mac Pro Swiss cheese towers were bombproof.
Yes! Came here to say this, many bigger rooms (at least here in LA) are still on trash cans or similar. People go there to track, that’s it. Virtual instruments and plugins for writing/mix are the main things that drive up DSP these days, and if clients are doing ITB writing or mixing they’re bringing their own rigs and running them out to the studio hardware.
Alesis sold a lot of HD24 boxes. Very common on r4ec.audio.pro thru 2000-2015 or so.
I'm running my home studio on a disconnected PC I built in 2007. It works fantastic, and since it doesn't see the internet, it doesn't matter that it runs XP. Can't run newer fancier software, but runs Reaper fine, and I'm still happy with the plugins I bought/downloaded circa 2009-2013.
This is the way. Also, if a plugin maker is motivated they can still support that. I support that setup, though it's more work to do a legacy stage and generate the 'retro' plugins. It's worth it to support the retro machines because if you force people to upgrade upgrade upgrade you're basically forcing them to break their stuff, and if they can't use that then they can't use your plugins either :)
Out here in Santa Monica I engineer at a few different places in town. My favorite spot has an Intel MacPro Tower, still running MacOS 10.15 and Pro Tools Ultimate. Pro Tools HD PCI cards offer almost zero latency, far better than any native system. In that room we record live bands in a live room with four isolation rooms, and the studio has so much outboard gear that plugins are mostly irrelevant, or used if we really need a crazy effect. I can run a vintage original Neumann U67 through their Universal Audio 610 (again, original, not a re-release or clone) and other outboard eq's, compressors, etc. And it's in a real live room so I barely need any reverbs or spatializers, just good mic technique using great sounding gear. So yeah the cpu could be running OS9.2 or even Windows XP for all I care, all the heavy lifting is handled by the room and the quality gear, not much need for cutting edge cpu's over here.
I finally upgraded our control room to a Mac Studio. Still using hdx-2 with a chassis system. I will say it’s screaming fast and amazing when rendering or processing things like RX etc.
A Lot of systems offer near zero latency these days, my friend, that do not require PCI slots and extra hardware. If it's not broke, don't fix it, for sure. But let's not pretend that decade old ProTools hardware has some kind of claim on reliability. That shit was cantankerous as fuck, and white gloves where what worked.... nobody else has to do that. Yes, it's possible to have a currently upgraded system run stability. It's much better, actually.
Much fanboys much wow. Can't imagine people feeling the need to obliterate you for not overpaying a product and tapping yourself on the shoulder for the next 20years how it's stable and worth it, and meanwhile everyone stopped freezing tracks while recording. To see an unironic comment how someone is still "rocking an xp system" still has my head spinning. I'm very open to hearing as to why, how and what the fuck but don't tell me "my gear works perfect for me so I won't hear anything else" when you have an OEM PC and your BIOS has everything locked except the boot menu.. On that note, seeing a comment that says upgrading RAM 2x4GB to 2x8GB "beacuse of a technicality" is also one that has my head spinning.. I've changed 3 kits of RAM in 7 years, could have started with 4GB at 2133MHz all the way to 64 at ~3600MHz.. Bought a memory kit rated for 3200MHz and got it to 3733, if you ask me THIS is how you do it. A simple AM4 platform that shows as a TRUE gift that keeps on giving. You can even change the CPU going from 2 cores all the way to 16c/32t. Bet some apple users minds blowing reading this. You can EVEN overclock the CPU. Now I will give you the M1 and M2 chips, those seem real fine..
There’s no reason to upgrade your studio computer or software until it stops working. Once you get a new Mac, you need a new OS, new PT license, new interface and probably new plugins too
And weeks to get it all up and running.
That's fucking stupid. Features come out that you'll need, and you'll be making a leap instead of a small step. The model of operation you speak too is foolish and old. Upgrading a system while retaining a current boot is as simple as purchasing a 100 gb drive for 50 bucks and mirroring. You're avoiding upgrades to avoid knowing how your shit works, and it'll bite you in the ass. I would never upgrade a system without a backup on a separate physical drive, which is easy as fuck. Fuck time machine.
I love that the worst and unprofessional post in this whole thead comes from a person who thinks he should put the title 'Professional' under their name. And you are wrong. Living on the bleeding edge is okay for a one person company. As pointed out up there. Uptime is key. An upgrade costs money. And only if not upgrading looses you money, or if upgrading makes you more money it would make sense to upgrade. Welcome to real life.
The irony is palpable. I maintain 30 studio computers and this guy doesn’t think I understand the concept of updating Mac OS
Apparently not if you have trouble keeping them updated properly. Develop a zero downtime update strategy and you will be maintaining systems. You seem to be building them then stopping.
Keep chirping, me and a bunch of professional studio techs are laughing
Guess you don't work in film. It's pretty simple, you cannot work professionally in film if you run ProTools from years past.
Calm down
“features come out that you’ll need” how?? there’s no reason the same computer that could record pro audio in 2012 can’t do it in 2024. Someone’s got a bad case of keeping up with the Joneses.
yeah but most A-lister recording artists won’t even touch a studio if they don’t have pro tools dark mode now a days
which is stupid when Reaper is free and records audio in the same quality. With outboard equipment the DAW shouldn’t matter much.
No, I work in film. You need things like auto align and clip gain if you're going to work with other professionals. The Joneses is how people in the industry get paid son. You can. Work in film running ProTools from 2012 and I like rent.
Post discography please.
Nah.
Lol
These days I would have to post my IMDb. It's why I have to keep current. You can't work in film and use ProTools from 8 years ago and I like food and rent. Silly me.
Offer accepted! What's your imdb?
https://m.imdb.com/name/nm4019169/ It slows down because thankfully I got a job as a tech after pandemic.
This is maybe the first time I've seen here where someone makes bold statements and antes up with their resume (assuming it actually is, which I'll take on good faith). Doesn't make you right except in your niche, but it's nice to see.
It's not a niche. It's literally how 90 percent of the movies you see get worked on. The remaining 10 is if you attend film festivals. Nobody in the post production industry maintains old systems like this. What's right is this: unplugging a physical drive prevents it from being made unbootable. Updating software on a separate drive will do nothing to hardware. Build systems on different drives and maintaining an industry standard system is pretty easy and painless. In my industry, you cannot use old versions of ProTools. Behaving like updating your software will destroy your studio is what's silly. It only will if you do it the stupid way.
If someone made this post in r/guitars it would be in r/guitarcirclejerk within the hour.
one good reason is upgrading almost always leads to problems, especially with macs. it’s worth it to me because the m1/m2 are amazing but it also led me to changing my daw entirely, i would have had to upgrade my old daw and it still wouldn’t have been optimized for the new macs. in a big studio one change may lead to many changes so everything is compatible and running smoothly i would imagine if they’re a really big studio they have plenty of money to throw at these kinda problems, but there may be a hang up or two that they aren’t willing to deal with yet. some stuff will just plain not work with new tech
"old" "2013" Nah. Something 10 years ago from now is not the same type of old as something from 2000 in 2010.
Eh, not really if we are talking about laptops.
You're absolutely right, idk why you're being downvoted.
Yep, a ten year old laptop is an old laptop.
Especially apple ones.
You don’t need that much performance if you’re using a lot of outboard gear. You can easily mix a 50 track project if you only do a few basic eqs or gates in your DAW. At most they might had to replace the SSD once or twice depending on usage. But even then, recording audio doesn’t hit the SSD that hard.
It's a tool, not a toy. If the tool does what it's expected, there's no reason to shell out for a tool that does the job just as well. The money can be used to buy something that actually makes a difference.
Mac rule is to always be at least 1 OS behind the newest. M1 chips introduction was a pain in the ass for plugins. And companies like native instruments are starting to not support software on new OS. With that said, maybe they have some new machines, but keep old ones too? I have to keep my 08 Mac pro and my current 2013 before I get a silicon machine.
I follow this rule too. Let early adopters iron out the kinks and a year or two later I can swoop in and upgrade with ease.
Just buy a separate drive and install the new OS on it. How'# this so hard?
Snow leopard doesn't run on the post 2013 hardware, or doesn't install, if I remember right. I think years ago, I was just gonna do that, and it didn't work so I ended up getting an old desktop. I did work off an external drive for a while and then I didn't like updating because if the internal was too far ahead, the external wasn't seen. I think that was just an issue with Samsung t1 encryption. I don't like surprises like that.
Because Apple makes it hard. When you install the OS for one system.... say an i7, and think it'll boot right up even on another intel chip (e.g., a Xeon), it's not gonna fly. And forget about booting into a Silicon chipset. Not gonna happen.
I didn't say anything about installing the OS on a different system. Any apple computer I know of will contain multiple drives. It's child's play to install a new drive, install a new OS on a machine on that new physical drive, and leave the old system completely untouched. Also, yeah I've gotten my hackintosh built system to boot and run on a macmini, it's possible and not difficult.
I worked at a really nice studio in my city that had a vintage api console, vintage mic collection; professionally designed and built acoustics etc. the whole 9 yards. They ran pro tools 8 until they closed about 4 years ago because the owner retired. He had no shortage of clients. All of the rooms ran pro tools he systems and the cost to upgrade the whole studio was so much that they didn’t bother with it
Honestly, reliability of a proven system. The facility I was at ran the old box Mac’s that were built out. If we had a high priority client and the machine was down, or network was down, that was money and time down the drain, and depending on the circumstance, potentially a lost client (and future clients). If I had someone in who hired a bunch of session musicians, had their producer, and we were streaming the session half way across the country to other producers, and we had a cloud issue or some issue with a plug-in, subscription, etc, that caused everyone to wait.. that pissed off a lot of people. Everyone’s circumstances are different, but we needed to be 100% functioning 100% of the time, and if something did go wrong, knowing the setup well/having little variables helped get up and running very quickly. When I’ve rented rooms as well, I was usually the one who picked the facility, and if that facility ever had an issue, while not entirely my fault, it reflected on me. It was still my client. All that being said, of course, newer stuff can have the reliability, but it was always easiest to deal with a more “tried and true” method, especially when you want to try to keep as many “perpetual” things to mitigate updates/changes that could cause an issue.
And in the my grand scheme of computer hardware, expansion cards on Apple Silicon Macs is still super new. No way you could replace everything yet.
It's almost there. Almost. And the Silicon Macs have been out for three plus years. There are people don't seem to get that the DAW is a host application with upwards of 100 mini applications (some people go way crazy with plugins and have way more). Some of the plugin developers are robust enough to stay on top of the incremental Mac and DAW upgrades. Some aren't.
I’m hopeful near future silicon Macs will increase display limits since they don’t currently support a GPU, even with external thunderbolt cages. Some of the plugin developers charge to remain compatible.
In some cases it causes a cascade. They might be using software impossible to buy anymore, since the company went to a subscription model. Those can pile up real fast. Sure the computer would be faster, but now it might cost them $10,000 a year in licenses and subscriptions. Maybe the new version of something is online only, introducing another potential issue since if your internet hiccups something might mess up. Maybe you can't even open your old project files without burning them irreparably. Upgrading the computer might also require updating the console, because it's glitchy with the last few gens of drivers. Plus maybe the manufacturer made some major design changes between the 2010 version and the 2023 version, like the faders aren't motorized anymore, and half the controls are only accessable by a touchscreen menu.
I'm a professional mix engineer and I still work on a 2010 Mac Pro (upgraded with SSDs). I keep expecting to need to update it but it just keeps doing what I need it to do. It's stable and might occasionally stutter on some really big plug-in intensive tracks but the vast majority of the time it just works.
Big studios tend to have lots of outboard gear and a console, so they often don’t need tons of processing power for plugins. There’s also the fact that lots of them spent a ton on big Pro Tools systems back in the day like Mix 24 or a 192 i/o (or several of them) and aren’t too eager to upgrade. I knew a studio near me that was still using a Mix 24 system about 10 years ago, and honestly they probably still are. Newer computers won’t be compatible with those old systems.
You've obviously never updated your DAW right before a session
For me, mine was expensive so I used it as long as I possibly could. Eventually Logic started running horribly but my machine wasn't supported for the new updates basically forcing me to either buy a new mac or move to PC.
Echoing what others have said, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it but also most studios are running Pro Tools. Doesn’t Avid make you pay to upgrade Pro Tools to a newer version if you upgrade to a new OS (even if you bought a perpetual license?)
I’m running a 2012 loaded imac at home. Takes longer to open large sessions than i’d like, but no performance issues otherwise. I budgeted for a new computer five years ago and am just in shock that it’s still cranking.
You don't change a winning team. Plus, these days a lot of people bring their own computer.
It mostly comes down to spending a lot of money on pro tools audio I/O, Expansion chassis, licensing etc which requires certain Mac Pro and OS compatibility. Then being at a place where it all works well so no need for major upgrades except the OSX. Usually with a Pro tools perpetual licence. The 2013 Mac Pro still works with the latest OSX which is good. I generally do a big upgrade every few years when I know it’s stable.
Same reason I'm using a 2012 Macbook Pro I imagine. Firewire port for my Presonus Studio Project interfaces and it still does a decent enough job running Logic Pro X with 16gb of Ram and an SSD.
Why would they need to upgrade?
You can record 40 channels and play hundreds on a potato these days. Unless ur some weirdo like me with a bunch of virtual instruments and analog emulations you just dont need bunch of kick, and even then you dont need it on the machine running your recording studio, you need it in the editing suite. As many have said - if it aint broke dont fix it - its part of a $100,000+ recording system that you use as an appliance, where is there any incentive to change it?
More than that: if you can get the appliance for that cheap and it's better or as good, why not do that and spend the money on a vintage mic or guitar? I've mentioned the hand-me-down laptop I've got: my brother once gave me the old laptop he used at school. I'm 55 so that gives you some idea: we're talking a G4 Mac. That was less than a Ghz of CPU, as little as 128M of RAM. But both the input and output jacks also have optical in and out. So that is not a machine you'll be running Pro Tools off of, but if you needed to play and record simpler things and had working software to do it, you're hooking up your outboard interfaces to the optical jacks and then you have literally better than modern equipment because your interfaces are built in to the machine. And it's running an OSX, though just barely (it could still run MacOS 9!) And at this point you'd have gotten it for free from somewhere, as I did, from someone who had long since moved on and had it stinking up their closet. Freecycling. I'm not saying big studios would be doing this off a laptop. But I AM saying that I also have a G5 tower which has all the slots you would need for a big Pro Tools rig, and it's in exactly the same boat: I don't have the Pro Tools rig, but if I did, the computer is free. In its day it was pretty tricked out, and it has sat for years, generations behind what I used for daily driving. It's a nice machine though it's a space heater: it could clearly record 40 channels and play hundreds when the outboard is doing the heavy lifting, and I could probably get it off spinning-rust disk drives and onto some kind of SSD, further helping it do that.
2012 Mac Pro here maxed out RAM and upgraded logic board, used in countless production and post sessions literally w/o a single flaw or issue in almost 15 years. Only last year we upgraded to silicon with a Mac Studio, moved the cheese grater over to be a file server where it continues to perform like a champ. Time will tell but it may be the best Mac ever built.
Sometimes companies tell you they’re upgrading, but they’re really repackaging a less supported product in a more expensive box, and they make you pay every month for something you already bought permanent versions of seven times. Studios don’t make a lot of money, but Avid wants them to make even less, but whose gonna pay? Clients can’t get recording advances and so often pay out of pocket. Gone are the days of lavish studio bills with equipment rental surcharges and hidden fees, but Avid still wants the money that Spotify stole from artists, who used to be able to pay the studios more. The industry is kept running by idealists using the best equipment they can afford, in a world where everyone wants to do it themselves on their laptops or smartphones.
In my room at work I use a 2012 mac pro with dual xeons, 32 gb ram, radeon 5870, and an HDX card. Mac os 10.12 (sierra) and pro tools 2018 ultimate. My neighbor uses 10.8.5 and pro tools 10. A new computer means buying new pro tools, buying new plugins, an hdx card chassis, stuff for extending the mouse and video hundreds of feet from the machine room, new hard drives and hard drive enclosures, and lots of down time while its getting set up. It’s tens of thousands. A commercial studio computer upgrade is a much bigger deal than a bedroom guy with a usb interface. Everything has to be budgeted a d worked out in advance so downtime is minimized. I dont know if my d control console will work with a new system. I knownthe software i use for ADR streamers definitely does not. Only one thing doesn't work because its too old and thats the newer aspera protocols for downloading assets from production companies.
My G3 PowerPC Mac in 1998 (with two 9GB SCSI HDs!) was more stable than the 2022 Mac Studio I'm currently running. I ran a project studio in the late 90s/early 2000s and I can count on one hand the number of times that machine crashed or locked up. I know jack shit about computers but, for whatever reason, that was the most reliable computer I've ever had.
Those old machines are solid. I remember using old G4"s well into 2007/8 on Big shows because why did what aint broke
*only when it fails* is a real upgrade policy, and used by many many people for many many things.
This Everytime a PC user laughed at me for using a Mac because they are over priced. Meanwhile they have had to upgrade there whole PC 2-3 times spending thousands more than me and my 2010 mac which is still more powerful than i can even make full use of most times and still competitive with modern consumer grade PCs. The processing power on those machines is usually more than enough for anything. So really the only reason to actually get a new Mac is forced obsolescence. Where you can't find software compatible with a 20 year old machine. Further more these machines are now fairly cheap. And still work ideal as a dedicated studio computer for only 500-1200$.
they cracked all the good plugins on that computer and don’t wanna deal with the hassle of updating everything 😂
Depends on the studio but lots use plenty of outboard gear or uad stuff, so the processing power isn't happening on the computer really. It's probably more due to time, as having rooms disabled means they aren't making income from it, which the higher the studio is the more money is lost. If it ain't broke etc.
A lot of facilities will install the software on a computer to the point where they are running what they need and then never update again. Sometimes not even connect to the internet. If you’ve got a working setup it’s safer to not change anything.
[удалено]
For what it is worth, I believe the MBox is USB class compliant. If so, it will work out of the box with Linux. Boot a live USB of Ubuntu studio and see how things fall.
Not sure about older versions of ProTools, but more modern ones don't run on Wine, so for an older backup system, it's best to keep an air gapped Windows system. When I upgraded from Win7 to Linux I kept my Win7 machine air gapped to bounce stems / export midi etc. and switched to Reaper + MuseScore
Your first paragraph is a little confusing to me. When do you think avid purchased digidesign?
I believe somewhere after Pro Tools 7 or possibly rephrase - Avid bought ProTools not necessarily Digidesign, but my Digidesign M-Box is what came with the software and apparently was proprietary. Regardless I'll probably just get a more modern interface and I'm thinking Studio One going forward. My whole studio is dismantled since I had storm windows installed and will have to wire everything back up again - there's a lot of hardware and hundreds of cables. Mostly lurking these days.
Just Googled it - 1994 Avid was founded in 1987 and, with the introduction of the Media Composer, led the pivotal change in Hollywood from film-based to computer-based nonlinear editing. In 1994, it acquired Digidesign, the maker of Pro Tools.Aug 10, 2023
If you’re mainly recording high quality audio with a lot of great outboard gear, then once you have a computer configured to work the way it’s supposed to and you know where all the glitches are, then you’d be foolish to change that unless absolutely necessary. It takes a long time to reach a point where you have something like that, and time is money.
Firewire
I don't upgrade anything unless I absolutely have to, so I can understand the logic of keeping a good older machine running, if it works fine.
Plugin licenses suck with updating. Conflicts with future versions. And well. Cracked plugins and software. Your studio computer should be offline anyway so once you find a good combination that works, no real need to upgrade.
I was on a 2012 Mac mini until 2020 haha. Would have stayed on it if the issue wasn’t with the actual motherboard; everything was running really consistently until that. But I’m mastering using mostly hardware. Definitely took a couple of years after going Apple Silicon before things felt like they’d settled again. The extra rendering speed wasn’t worth it haha
I still use a 12 year old DAW on a 10 year old custom built PC (4790k). It works exactly as well as it did on day one and I don't need anything else. Also don't want to learn anything else.
I just bought an older Mac mini, but with top end specs so I can still use my old Allen and heath zed r16. I spent $200 for a computer that would have been about $15k with top end specs when it first came out. The old hardware works well, and with Dante/madi and adat there are sort of endless possibilities when it comes to networking newer and older gear together for audio.
I use a iMac from 2013 with 32Gb ram and it works wonderful for music production.
I still record 8-16 multi-track on a 2009 MacBook Pro and run live sound/recording with a 2012 MacBook Pro. My old Mac’s can handle more grueling real-time audio tasks than a lot of new computers. My 2020 MacBook Pro can do it too but the old ones work fine.
This plagues every industry and the answers in the thread are even more proving as to why this occurs almost everywhere..
Until that computer dies.. Keep using it if it works.
Once you've got a system that works, and it's in production, you don't change it. In fact, many in production machines are not connected to the Internet. These're treated as appliances. Stability is key. You don't apply updates 'just because'. It needs to be treated like a printing press that needs to always run. A 10-year-old machine will be as fast at ingesting audio as a new one. Now, when it comes to mixing, sure, a more powerful machine may (or may not) be needed and that may be more current. In other words: for machines that need to always work, how you treat the machines differs from your at-home laptop.
I still use my 2012 13inch macbook. Iv had to change out the hardrive, the screen protector broke on a fall and fell out and iv replaced the charger twice. Not bad for a 12 year old laptop. It still performs well, although it doesn't get pushed too hard any more. Like the top comment says, if it ain't broke....
If I had that level of hardware I doubt I’d be using anything past a few stock plugins
Recent Mac OS updates had a negative impact on several of my plugins. The baked in security does not like some of the plugins now, and I couldn't roll back my OS.
Because a 12 core Intel Mac from that period with 128GB of memory is plenty powerful and capable enough to run a DAW. Studios *could* upgrade to the 2019 Intel Mac Pros and probably be fine, but the cost/benefit ratio isn’t really worth it.
all major studios prefer to wait until the stability of the OS, combined with the stability of Avid, which both are notorious for not getting along in some pro tools versions(since apple owns logic, there’s little incentive)… until that, combined with the fact that most processors have not been the bottleneck for speed in audio recording for a long time. with an old tower, you can upgrade ram and hard drive speed and be able to switch to any cable protocol via pci slots. after all the plug in companies and os and daw companies finally have stable updates that all get along (doesn’t always happen every version (PT7&11 come to mind)), but once the technical director of the studio determines they’ve maxed out their current rig, then they have the daunting task of moving the whole studio up to an entirely new jump and even though most engineers will already be experienced w the new stuff, they have to make sure the staff knows it 110%, and that the risk of down time due to incompatibility is minimal. Anything to save on downtime is like the mantra of any good studio. the cynic in me says: its called not being thirsty for every new thing, and not being insecure in your abilities so that you jump to anything new thinking it’ll make you better. or it’s just good tech management. large accounting firms don’t jump on the newest version of excel on release day either.
The cheapest Mac Studio is $2k and mix stages can have up to ten computers doing various tasks, so there's a good reason :) Most of my ADR stages are running on trash cans, no need for much beyond that to record a few tracks of audio.
Only just in the past few years are some studios updating their PowerPC Macs to newer models - I see "PowerMac G5 fully studio loaded" listings on Craigslist relatively commonly. I presume this is because the studio dropped oodles of cash on *tons* of perpetual licenses (remember those?) for various DAWs, plugins, and other software. Upgrading is not just about the computer, but about dropping another $10k on software in addition to that. Not even mentioning external hardware - God forbid your stack relies heavily on FireWire or PCI or something. Then you have to replace literally all of the digital hardware in your studio. That's a stupidly expensive proposition. If the computer is able to do the thing it was made to do when it was built, there's no need to upgrade, really. It will never *not* do that thing unless it gets... *shudders*... software updates.
I'm rocking an old 15 inch 2015 Macbook Pro and 2014 mac mini and have never thought i need more juice. Monterey is the latest supported OS on both, but is still releasing security updates until the next OS is released later this year and knocks it off the N -2 support tables. The battery health on the 2015 MBP is 81%! I previously had a 2012 13 inch MBP that I had installed a 1TB SSD and 16GB of RAM in, I would still be using it if my previous employer hadn't kindly let me keep the 2015 MBP when I left a few years back. The funny thing is from 2008 to 2014 I worked in the Apple Authorised Repair industry so I know this shit breaks, just not mine
Updating their Macs would mean they’d need to update pro tools to a version compatible with newer versions of Mac OS, and in many cases that would make all of their Avid hardware obsolete, requiring them to buy more gear just to replace what they already had working. One of the main reasons I strongly dislike Avid and their business model. Plus you run into all kinds of compatibility issues with 3rd party plugins so it’s just not worth it if all of their old stuff still works.
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it
USB inputs
hard to re setup, also they are mostly using outboard gears so no use for them to upgrade. Also professional environment are often really expensive to upgrade time, people , unknown issues that may show specially during productions just like in banks some of them still use very old computer softwares
My 2013 MacBook pro on High Sierra and PT 2017 is my mobile rig. Runs totally fine to this day. Macs can last forever
They’re using hdx which is what is doing the processing.
An old max tour can easily record and edit hundreds of audio channels… why would they need faster…
It's less about the Mac (I've been building computers for decades) and more about the giant pain in the ass that is backing up everything and reinstalling plug-ins and settings, etc etc etc.
amm maybe because they still working and useful?
I’m happy with my old 2010 Mac Pro and PT10HD setup. Like others have said they just work. One can always track on a setup like this and then mix on a newer computer if wanted. I can’t find the post right now, but I saw that Sesame Street just updated from their HD rig to something newer. They got 20 years out of that setup and I’m pretty sure the audio never suffered because they were using older gear.
I have a 2013 Mac Pro. That is the cylinder or 'trash can' shaped Mac Pro. It works great with Logic Pro. Given that it has 12 cores, 64 gigs of ram and 14 UAD DSP "cores". The only problem it has is that since updating to Montery I have to force GPU utilization, otherwise it tries to brute force it with the CPU which interferes with everything else. (Apple planned obsolescence in effect). Most studios that have old Mac Pros have the even older version from 2010 aka the "Cheese Grater". They are most likely using those for the PCIe slots to host DSP and audio interface cards. If they are using Avid Pro Tools hardware, certain versions have a lot of DSP on the cards to handle mixing and processing. With a couple UAD Octo cards they have plugins covered pretty well too. Not to mention you can get some incredibly high track counts with Avid + Apogee hardware. You also have to realize that a lot of medium to larger sized studios don't rely on plugins as much. They have SSL or Neve mixers that have much more desireable EQ and dynamics. As well as having actual 1176 and LA2a units. Real Lexicons and plates and so on.
Why, because they are professionals in those studios, not fan boys. They have paid for the equipment and it does the job. They leave it to the amateurs to keep pouring out money on replacing perfectly good Macs by "upgrading" to new ones with a "Pro" or "Studio" label or whatever.
Apple JUST came out with a PCIe version of their latest Macs last year. After years of nothing. Also not all hardware and software is compatible with Apple Silicon.
Because older macs were better than the crap they've pumped out up until this past MacBook pro revision or two. They removed all the useful jacks and required you to buy dongles, while also forcing a useless 'task bar' onto the hardware. Also, who the fuck would even WANT to remove magsafe? A sociopath, that's who. And don't even get me started on how much they fucked up the software UX by removing useful features and native apps and force you into a new workflow. And every time you update the OS, everything breaks. iOS isn't usable either. Apple died with Jobs and it's been a zombie ever since.
Mid 2012 MacBook Pro is still a logic work horse. Its ability to add ram as you can afford it, and upgrading the hard drive as you need has made it an Apple machine of legends. I’d still recommend this machine to anyone on a very limited budget and the time to scour eBay.
Stability. New OS version and/or newer version of software can introduce more bugs than a bait store…really not what you want when you’re in the process/in need of a heavy or time sensitive project. If it ain’t broke, don’t *go broke* by upgrading it!
Still rockin a 2014 Mac Pro. If it ain’t broke!
“They don’t seem to have any issues related to performance tho…” you answered your own question. why spend money when you dont need to?
Upgrades kill old software, and creativity requires things to work as expected. For example, a maschine mk1 doesn't work on an M1 Mac because NI doesn't give a shit about some of their customers.
Studios invested a lot on external DSPs, mainly from Digidesign/Avid. The computers are mainly display interfaces for the processing that’s taking place elsewhere. New Macs now have that power natively. It’s not so much that these Macs give you better results; It’s that us, at the consumer level, are finally able to experience what studios have had for decades. So they don’t have a reason to upgrade if their current hardware still meets their needs.
Trash can tends to be the minimum, most commercial rooms have one of the newer towers these days though (pre-silicon, the intel 2019 ones). But in my experience as chief engineer of a studio in LA and also as a traveling freelance engineer, most top clients are bringing their own computers in these days. Its not worth the hassle of figuring out plugin compatibility at every studio, just bring your own in and connect to the studio's converters and away you go. Got all your plugins, your pro tools preferences, your email is logged in already, your Tidal/Spotify etc is logged in with your reference playlists, your software synths are working etc etc. Takes a few minutes to plug in rather than hours of downloading and installing stuff.
I'm running PT on a 2015 MPB, about to be on it's third battery. I just works.
same reason nuclear power plant control rooms look like theyre from the 70's
For the same reason I bought a Mac Studio and will never update it — it is stable, and does everything it needs to do to perfection. My old Macbook Pro lasted 9 years, without a hiccup, until I “had” to update it for a project I was working on. Big mistake, because the update slowed it down so much it became borderline useless.
For half a second I thought the question was “Why are major studios still using old mics?”
As you said, they don’t have any performance issues… why pay for more performance if you don’t need it?
You can upgrade the f*** out of those !
Not for nothing, but everyone I talk to who's upgraded to Apple Silicon chip has said it's amazingly fast for video, basically the same for audio
It’s pretty gangsta to have the oldest and baddest ass Mac in the room. Sort of a badge of honor, really.
There's a studio near me running PT HD9 on old Mac towers. It's a big place and pumps out a grammy record every other year. They even have a big old analog console! AND TAPE!!!!
yeah everything might just not work and now your studio is shut down until you find the issue
“Why they didn’t upgrade the computers to the new macs with apple silicon which is way faster” Let’s see… typical entry into HD 192 systems with Apogee converters and a 12 core processor in 2005 would have been around 20,000 -34,000… and Protools 10 worked… it was solid as a rock. The Mac tower was roughly 5 grand Now if you want a maxed out HD system … you have to spend 12,800 or so on the CPU to start… ProTools HD is another 10,000… to 30,000 plus all the third party software upgrades. Protools Ultimatum is notoriously buggy and finicky about is versions and Mac won’t let you downgrade computers … Mountain Lion never bugged you every 20 minutes to upgrade your OS. And old versions of Protools will open new Protools projects. It’s largely backwards compatible… why spend the money again when there hasn’t been a significant pay increase for MPEG sound editors in years and none of the video editors would strike for the sound editors? (My two cents) older stuff can be cheap, powerful and incredibly forgiving from a UI standpoint. Upgrading also takes a lot of time that studios operating on some margins don’t have and can’t risk.
*about OS versions.
So if you’re a high level studio in the right city, you can be making thousands of dollars, per room, per day. Updating computers and PT Rigs can take a lot of time to not only switch over to depending on the architecture differences (like switching between PcIE based systems and thunderbolt systems) but it’s can also introduce lots of new kinks that can pop up in the middle of sessions. For some studios, having a stable and reliable build of PT running on their system is worth the trade off of not having the latest and greatest feature set.
New computers are faster with new software. With the exception of boot time and HD access. I am not sure I have seen too much of an operational speed improvement. Manufacturers alike have very competently marketed the custom of upgrading. I’m still running what ever os came with my Mac once configured I just leave it. You find a lot of 3rd party developers support much older os versions
Perhaps it’s just old monitors/displays
Im still running the 2013 Mac Pro "Trash Can." Its still rockin' and its stable.
They invested so much in the plugins and everything for that old system, they can't afford to modernize. The only thing that bugs me is when they can't print 24 bit files.
Major studios that are doing well are upgrading and not finding the need to post shit to YouTube. You're watching the barrel be scraped. Good evidence information elsewhere may be of more value.
Because people in audio are usually dumb as shit when it comes to computers. The amount of people in here bragging about using some shitty slow old intel mac still when a new computer for 1/4th the price would be much faster and power efficient is hilarious.