RE: The set up

["Kevin Mulvihill" <kmulvihill@mediaone.net>]

Hi Michele,

I don't know if you gave me enough of what I need to answer your question
but I'll try...

Multimedia files through a multimedia projector, eh? That's the part that's
vague.

Generally, get the best laptop - meaning the most powerful - that you can
for your money. If your multimedia files are Director files, then you 
should
know that multimedia developers (like me) have had problems getting 
Director
audio to play properly through IBM laptops. This is due to the sound
technology IBM uses. I think it's called mWave, but I could be wrong... I
stay away from IBM laptops these days and, since there are so many other
good ones out there anyway, if it were me, I'd stay away from IBM laptops
for your needs as well. Good brands are Sony, Toshiba, Dell, Gateway and
Compaq; I have a Dell. Clones are available too but, while I build my own
desktops and servers, I just don't like clone laptops. If you don't mind,
you can probably save some money here but, again, I'd be careful and
selective about what I buy. You don't want it to fail in the middle of a
presentation.

What kind of multimedia projector? What are the inputs? Most any laptop has
a VGA video out, but if you have a projector that you know you'll be using
each time you give a presentation, then I would look in the Owner's Manual
to see what inputs are available and which will give you the best quality -
if there's a difference. Match that up against the video outputs on your
laptop to make sure you can get a connection.

Although it's generally true that "the more the merrier," I don't think
you'll need 6 GB of storage, unless you'll need that for other things.
You'll have to check but Sonic Foundry's ACID may save files in something
like a MIDI format. If this is the case, then your looping sound files will
be very small. And BTW, if you're using Director, it won't import ACID
files. You'd do better to build it as a wave (which will take some disk
space), and set the Loop property to TRUE in the Cast Member properties.

I'd take some of the cash saved by buying a smaller hard drive (again, if
this is all you'll use it for), and spend more money on RAM. You can't ever
have enough RAM, especially on a laptop. If you haven't had a laptop 
before,
be prepared to find it sluggish compared to a desktop of similar CPU and
overall quality. RAM really makes a difference here. I have 96 MB on my
laptop, but I'd prefer to have 128. When I had 64 MB of RAM on it, Windows
98 would load about 62 MB just on bootup. (Of course, it is a fully loaded
laptop and I have a number of TSRs that run in the System Tray.) Point is,
if Windows 98 feels like it needs that much RAM and I'm getting ready to
show some flashy Director presentation, well, I'd just as soon add the
Director stuff on top of that 62. Even with 96 MB, you can load a large
Director presentation completely in RAM before it launches, thereby giving
you just about the best performance you can get.

Good luck,
Kevin

P.S. I'm pretty new to this list too, but just wanted to give you a 
heads-up
that you aren't likely to find many ACID users here... yours is the first
post I've seen. Most of the folks here (including me) are real musician
types, or at least so we'd like to think... :-)


> hi! I just subscribed to the loopers delight and have a question to post.
> Can anyone offer me any advice on what type of laptop to purchace for
> constructing loops and  being able to output multimedia files through a
> multimedia projector? I know that I need at least6g.b ofhard
> drive and 64m.b
> of Ram. I am a mac user but it seems it might be easier to go the
> p.c route
> for using acid and sonic foundry. Any imput would be helpful.
> Thanks, M
> www.hyperspacestudios.com
>