MacSuccess- First "True Test"

[Deeter]

So this weekend had a party at the house using Hoster 4.2 on my MacBook Pro running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit installed under BootCamp. I'm thrilled to report that in 6 hours of singing and using the "background audio" function there were no glitches or problems at all. I ditched the external VGA amplifier/splitter and used a simple "Y" cable splitter to get the video to my two monitors. The audio now uses a simple 1/8" to RCA cable that runs through a hum reducer and the audio quality was fine. I never could get the USB external sound card to work right but it seems like that may have been unnecessary anyway.
Thanks, MTU!

[ddouglass]

Nice job Deeter!!

[Deeter]

Thanks- It took a little work but I like the outcome. I first tried Parallels Desktop but the memory allocation seemed to be causing problems with Hoster. With Bootcamp everything was functioning properly but I only allocated 50 Gigs to my Windows partition so, with everything else I have loaded under Windows, I couldn't fit my KMA files on the partition. It was so close but no cigar, so they are on an external drive and that makes me a little nervous but I can't help that.
Next issue was getting the sound quality out that I wanted. I tried two different USB sound devices - a iMic and a Audio 2DJ. The iMic was DOA and the Audio 2DJ had a "crackling" that I could not get rid of- and it was only present in Hoster- not in WMP or Winamp. Weird. Anyway, the final solution was splitting the audio headphone out into RCA cables through the hum-reducer and into the mixer. It really seems that the "default" audio out on the Mac is higher quality than the PC laptops I have owned?
After the sound was satisfactory, I struggled with getting the video split. One of the monitors is a Sony 52" Bravia LCD tv and the other is a 20" LCD panel for the singers. Using my VGA powered splitter that worked fine with the Sony Vaio I could not get it to work with the MBP- either under Windows & or Mac OS. It would see either of the monitors plugged straight in, but nothing plugged into the splitter- either one at the time or combined. I ended up getting a Y-splitter and plugged the monitors in and everything worked- one of the cables is a 75' one and there seems to be no appreciable signal loss.
Hopefully, this will help anyone else considering a Mac for Hoster. It can be done and so far so good..........

[Skybird74]

Originally Posted by Deeter

So this weekend had a party at the house using Hoster 4.2 on my MacBook Pro running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit installed under BootCamp. I'm thrilled to report that in 6 hours of singing and using the "background audio" function there were no glitches or problems at all. I ditched the external VGA amplifier/splitter and used a simple "Y" cable splitter to get the video to my two monitors. The audio now uses a simple 1/8" to RCA cable that runs through a hum reducer and the audio quality was fine. I never could get the USB external sound card to work right but it seems like that may have been unnecessary anyway.
Thanks, MTU!

Just curious - did you run Visualizations with B/A the whole 6 hours?

[Deeter]

No visualizations- just the audio. Next time I'll try running both.

[Skybird74]

Originally Posted by Deeter

No visualizations- just the audio. Next time I'll try running both.

Customers really enjoy the visualizations with BA. I'm still fine-tuning my computer, trying to get it to run more than 2 hours or so before causing Hoster to crash.

[WaltR]

Originally Posted by Deeter

Thanks- It took a little work but I like the outcome. I first tried Parallels Desktop but the memory allocation seemed to be causing problems with Hoster. With Bootcamp everything was functioning properly but I only allocated 50 Gigs to my Windows partition so, with everything else I have loaded under Windows, I couldn't fit my KMA files on the partition. It was so close but no cigar, so they are on an external drive and that makes me a little nervous but I can't help that.
Next issue was getting the sound quality out that I wanted. I tried two different USB sound devices - a iMic and a Audio 2DJ. The iMic was DOA and the Audio 2DJ had a "crackling" that I could not get rid of- and it was only present in Hoster- not in WMP or Winamp. Weird. Anyway, the final solution was splitting the audio headphone out into RCA cables through the hum-reducer and into the mixer. It really seems that the "default" audio out on the Mac is higher quality than the PC laptops I have owned?
After the sound was satisfactory, I struggled with getting the video split. One of the monitors is a Sony 52" Bravia LCD tv and the other is a 20" LCD panel for the singers. Using my VGA powered splitter that worked fine with the Sony Vaio I could not get it to work with the MBP- either under Windows & or Mac OS. It would see either of the monitors plugged straight in, but nothing plugged into the splitter- either one at the time or combined. I ended up getting a Y-splitter and plugged the monitors in and everything worked- one of the cables is a 75' one and there seems to be no appreciable signal loss.
Hopefully, this will help anyone else considering a Mac for Hoster. It can be done and so far so good..........

Was the y-splitter an s video as well as the other cables?

[Deeter]

No- I tried an S-video splitter some time back and couldn't get enough signal through to work well. I use VGA splitter and cables- my tv and the monitor have VGA in. Before the Mac the booster/splitter worked great. Now it seems to be not necessary which is good since I couldn't get it to work with the Macbook. One cable is 15' long and the other is a 25 and 50' linked together. The signal strength seems perfectly adequate.

[no vocals]

Deeter, that's great news as i think i am going to move from PC to Mac, for running shows at least. i really can't do it with my day job since MACs don't support a lot of the widows based programs i use.