Was wondering if anyone with a Mac has upgraded their memory before and if they have any tips. I have a 2007 era aluminum style iMac which is only 1GB and would like to upgrade it to the new Mavericks OS but read it needs 2GB of Memory as a minimum. These are the specs:

2.0 GHz Processor Type: Core 2 Duo (T7300)
667 MHz PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM (200-pin SO-DIMM)

My OS now is Snow Leopard and think it can be upgraded free to the new Mac OS. If anyone's running Mavericks on an older mac does it run good? or should I just upgrade the memory and leave it on Snow Leopard?. Also when I've looked for memory on like ebay etc it mentions about it being for a Macbook Pro or one of the bigger tower style Mac's so would those still be compatiable?. I was thinking of upgrading to 4GB although I think the unofficial max memory is 6GB?. Thanks

some older macs will not allow upgrading because more than the memory changed (boards, etc). I have an old tower from 2007 and I cannot upgrade to Maverick on it (even though I upgraded the graphics card). It's now relagated to Pro Tools work and Itunes management.

Thanks, thats good that Mavericks runs without issues.

Yeah that was what I was thinking at first as my iMac is from 2007. I'm guessing the new OS is more memory dependent then to do with the processor as if that was the case Apple would say you'd need a more recent Mac to run it. Also what processor & ram does your mac tower have?, as I'm not totally sure, but if its not an intel processor, I think thats why it can't be upgraded.

ufoclub said:

It's now relagated to Pro Tools work and Itunes management.

Since we're on the subject, what exactly is ProTools? I know some folks who work on it, but I don't know exactly what it's for, and couldn't manage to get it out of them in a way that made sense to me..... I know it's for audio, is it like Reason or Cubase or one of those? Or is it just for recording? (not that I know the first thing about either of those 2!). But it's not what they call a "softsynth"......?

domainator2010 said:

ufoclub said:

It's now relagated to Pro Tools work and Itunes management.

Since we're on the subject, what exactly is ProTools? I know some folks who work on it, but I don't know exactly what it's for, and couldn't manage to get it out of them in a way that made sense to me..... I know it's for audio, is it like Reason or Cubase or one of those? Or is it just for recording? (not that I know the first thing about either of those 2!). But it's not what they call a "softsynth"......?

It's the software/hardware multitrack recorder and mixer to make music, sound design, or any audio based creative thing. It lets you get down to the nitty gritty with editing little waveform, but also serves as a way to record a whole son, album, or even a live performance.

It's like Cubase or Logic ... but it just happens to be the one that professional people kind of conformed to using.

Prince's music has been produced/mixed on Protools since the early 2000's. He hired a kid who knew how to use it. I say kid. Dunno how old he was.

..... could I ask you to hold my hand a bit more? ....so - this thing, you plug your sound sources into the computer, and then you can set the volume levels and so forth within the software?

domainator2010 said:

..... could I ask you to hold my hand a bit more? ....so - this thing, you plug your sound sources into the computer, and then you can set the volume levels and so forth within the software?

to record you mean?

You need some kind of interface

So you plug your mics into this and set levels here before the signal comes into the software.

Something like that - ufoclub you know better!

hey thanks zombie! how'd you know all that, I thought you were a graphic designer...? you're a multitalented sort of girl!.....

domainator2010 said:

The great thing about Pro Tools now, is that you don't even need to have the hardware (unless you want to record with professional inp[uts and control). The software works with the built in inputs and outputs on a computer as well.

....OK, so what does ProTools do exactly? If all it could do is set volume levels and allow you to record, then you could use your operating system's Mixer and Wave Recorder.....? What exactly IS "sound design"?

Oh, and BOTH of you, check out: http://ubuntustudio.org/

Zombie, how about introducing your husband to Linux?

domainator2010 said:

....OK, so what does ProTools do exactly? If all it could do is set volume levels and allow you to record, then you could use your operating system's Mixer and Wave Recorder.....? What exactly IS "sound design"?

Oh, and BOTH of you, check out: http://ubuntustudio.org/

Zombie, how about introducing your husband to Linux?

I need more than 200 tracks to make film sound design, hence even the regular pro tools I have is not enough. I hire out people with tru Pro Tools HD systems. Pro Tools also processes effects in real time like you have pedals or rack gear going.

There are a number of youtube videos which show what Pro Tools does. Pro Tools is like a full studio with all it's various decks and mics and recorders and even instruments. Using a simple audio functionality on a computer is like using a little voice memo recorder.

domainator2010 said:

....OK, so what does ProTools do exactly?

ProTools is a full featured digital audio workstation for multitrack recording, mixing and editing. It's the standard software of choice in the majority of both home and professional music studios.

My cousins, who are multiplatinum selling producers and have been working with major record labels since the 80's, have been using Pro Tools since the early 90's, when at that time it cost many thousands of pounds/dollars to own your own Pro Tools rig. For a long time, you needed very specific and expensive audio hardware to run Pro Tools, but that's not the case any more.

It doesn't have the monopoly that it once did. A lot of producers are switching to other software such as Ableton Live. I personally use a combination of Ableton and Reaper.

Cubase is used at my house, what does it do?

Take a listen

https://soundcloud.com/manic-city

[Edited 3/27/14 15:16pm]

Zombie, I took a listen, I liked it quite a bit! What does your husband do in the band? Does he play guitar?

Militant, I think the software that is the closest to ProTools that ships with Ubuntu Studio is Ardour, I'd be very interested to know your opinion of it, and how it stacks up to Protools itself.

As I've said before, you can burn yourself a live DVD of it, which will run from your DVD drive without touching your hard disk (except if you want to of course), so you can use it without disturbing anything that you currently have going. Come on, how about it? This'll be tremendously good FUN!

I've had my system dualbooted with Ubuntu for over 4 years. Never used Ardour so can't give an opinion on it.

I've heard good things about Renoise - http://www.renoise.com/ - which is available for Linux, but at the moment I don't have interest in using anything other than Windows for my audio production needs. Ableton Live and a great deal of the plugins I require are only available for Windows or OSX.

domainator2010 said: