New hardware?

[TweakHead]

Yep, I've seen them listed on music stores. These are dedicated audio workstations, right? I think even Roland/Cakewalk sells some complete solutions as well. But I think it would be a lot better for high end computers - the mac pro is just an example of this, of course - should incorporate some of this high end features within their main configurations. A better, more reliable sound card is just the obvious improvement I'd like to see implemented. I mean, there's great internal sound cards that can be expanded with external interfaces for extra connectivity from vendors like RME or Apogee for example. This two offer really high end low latency, very impressive word clocks for syncing hardware devices and top notch audio quality.

To some extent, what I've been ranting about here is that the standards should be placed higher. It's easy to convince people to buy a new computer based on the looks alone (like the majority of Apple's computers), but if we're serious about making computers better suited for demanding applications, they could just as well come packed with higher quality components overall. My idea of introducing a new component at this "basic configuration level" is another way of saying that we should be getting more for granted based on the price tag of such computers and even that the industry should focus on setting new standards - because ultimately it would help the programmers (not having to translate the same plug-in to different formats) and the users because we'd be getting better software with access to more resources and ultimately a performance and quality boost.

It's easy enough to say this, but if we take into account how the market works it seems a daunting task. I'm going to stress again that it isn't positive when the interests of particular brands surpass the interests of the user or even go against him. Making profit is not only an objective here, but also a surviving necessity - that's granted. But to which extent are we willing to go before we start making more compromises that would allow better solutions to be achieved? It's like politics, diplomacy is much needed here! No one can win alone, and if no one steps back just a little bit, we'll be seeing this plenty of standards, protecting trade secrets versus open attitude - even for users and hobbyists - stretch beyond reason.

I agree with you about CPU, even though the performance has been getting higher non the less.

Cheers