Re: OT: Here's what I want to do... what do I need?

[Bill Fox <billyfox@soundscapes.us>]

Tony K wrote:
> >I know my computer can do all this... I just don't trust it!!
> Why not?  I'm just curious.  I hear this a lot in this group and in 
> some others.  Is it just because of 'bad press' ?? Or bad experience?  
> I used to do a lot of process control programming and we used PCs 
> quite a bit.  We didn't have issues with crashing any more than any 
> other piece of equipment.  Stuff fails, but heck, I've had strings 
> break, batteries die, cables go bad, tubes blow out... Why is it that 
> people think a PC/Mac crash/failure any more likely than any other 
> hardware failure?
Hi Tony,

I guess it depends upon how much of the sound depends upon the 
computer.  Just like strings, batteries, cables, and the like, if the 
computer is responsible for a small portion of your show, then a crash 
isn't catastrophic and you can continue making sound and entertaining 
without it or, if you're a multitasker, while you reboot.  But if all of 
your sound sources go directly to the computer where they are processed 
and mixed and sent out to the PA, a crash becomes catastrophic.

Now the question becomes, how stable is any computer.  I've seen the 
most stable of computers go TU because of the local power grid being 
unstable.  Last minute programming can find that one bug or combination 
of programs that are incompatible.  While John 3 and I were Metlay's 
cohorts for Mind3Spiral <http://mindspiral.com>, Chainer blew up in the 
middle of the planetarium gig, spewing lots of high volume hash.  John 
calmly rebooted while Mike and I soldiered on.  Months later, John 
reported that he found out how to make all of his software play nice in 
Vista.  The list is endless.

That being said, I'm the keys playing bass player in Pinnacle 
<http://pinnacleband.org> and 100% of my synth sounds plus the samples 
triggered by Greg our drummer are generated by my laptop.  (We use drum 
pads, Roland PK-5 pedals, and an Alesis synth as controllers.)  While 
I've had problems setting up once in a while, once things got going, all 
has gone well at shows.

However, when I'm playing with Xeroid Entity <http://xeroid-entity.com>, 
for some reason everything goes wonky during almost every show.  One 
year at electro-music <http://event.electro-music.com>, I spent every 
spare moment rebooting and telling software where to find the audio 
interface to no avail until the show was 98% over.  Thank goodness for 
my Nord Modular G2, guitar, slide guitar, and Boss effect pedal going 
through a mixer.

It's the same laptop and M-Audio 410 interface in both cases.  As far as 
I'm concerned, I'll continue to depend upon my laptop.  I'm even 
considering using Guitar Rig 3 instead of the Boss pedal and mixing 
within the computer.  That will be living dangerously!

Pinnacle will be playing at ProgDay <http://progday.com> on Labor Day 
Weekend and two weeks later opening for Riverside at a NJ Proghouse 
<http://njproghouse.com> concert.  Wish me luck.

Cheers,

Bill