Which Acer Aspire Desktop is best for music production and recording ?Aspire TC-780

Thrip
Thrip Member Posts: 65 Devotee WiFi Icon
The Acer Aspire Desktop has been recommended to me for the purposes of recording music.
-Thankfully these devices fall within my price point range.
-The trouble is, -there is a few different types of Acer Aspire desktops....
Can anyone tell me exactly which of these Acer Aspire Desktop models would be ideal for audio recording & producing ?
Thanks

Thread was edited to add model name to the title


Answers

  • ttttt
    ttttt Member Posts: 1,947 Community Aficionado WiFi Icon
    @Thrip

    Almost all Aspire desktops sold nowadays ( having 9th, 10th and even 11th generation Intel CPUs coming ) can be used for that purpose. It is the matter of what kind of fancy sound card or programs that you will add to it. Even if you bought one PC with inadequate memory to start with, adding a memory stick is usually easy and rather cheap. I only use 16GB memory out of the 32GB maximum allowed and that is more than enough already. People can generally start with one memory stick 8 GB first.

    I would say it is important to buy one PC that comes with M.2 NVMe Solid State Drive. Avoid those that have old style spinning hard drives, as a PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 NVMe SSD will be like 20 times+ faster than the old style HDD. You will appreciate how fast the PC is.
  • Thrip
    Thrip Member Posts: 65 Devotee WiFi Icon
    ttttt said:
    @Thrip

    Almost all Aspire desktops sold nowadays ( having 9th, 10th and even 11th generation Intel CPUs coming ) can be used for that purpose. It is the matter of what kind of fancy sound card or programs that you will add to it. Even if you bought one PC with inadequate memory to start with, adding a memory stick is usually easy and rather cheap. I only use 16GB memory out of the 32GB maximum allowed and that is more than enough already. People can generally start with one memory stick 8 GB first.

    I would say it is important to buy one PC that comes with M.2 NVMe Solid State Drive. Avoid those that have old style spinning hard drives, as a PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 NVMe SSD will be like 20 times+ faster than the old style HDD. You will appreciate how fast the PC is.
    Hello ttttt,

    Thank you for your early mourning reply. This information was good. But its Yes & No as to whether or not it answered my question. 
     
    I was already told to get one with at least 8 GB RAM, -and now because of new Pro-Tools requirements people are recommending at least 16 GB RAM. -As well, Ive been advised to go with at least a 3.0 processor that is at least a quad-core -more specifically, an Intel Core i5 or AMD equivalent. ( the Acer Aspire models that Im currently looking at do seem to have Intel Core i5 )

    -So far the Acer Aspire TC-780 -with Quad-core,16 GB RAM and 1TB HDD, (-perhaps this is the old style HDD that you advised me to avoid ?-) was cited as good for audio prod., though I havent yet located one.

    What I did find was an Acer Aspire TC-895-EB11,( what seems to be suitable and at the right price point) -but the store only has a few specs about it, -stuff like,
    • 2.9 GHz Intel Core i5-10400 processor and 12 GB DDR4 RAM offer good power to easily handle your day-to-day multitasking
    • 1 TB hard disk drive offer plenty of storage space for your files, media and applications
    • 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet port, 802.11ax/ac/a/b/g/n, Wi-Fi 6, and Bluetooth 5.1 offer seamless and efficient connectivity options
    • One card reader, 5 audio jacks, 1 USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-C port, 5 USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type A ports, 2 HDMI ports, 1 LAN port, 4 USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type A ports, 2 USB 2.0 Type A ports offer plenty of options for external device connectivity
    What I need to know is whether the, Acer Aspire TC-895-EB11,  is a good model for my musical purposes ? 
    -Its 2.9 processor is smaller than the recommended 3.0 processor and has 12 GB DDR4 RAM instead of,16 GB RAM, (-though I dont use Pro-Tools and do not foresee doing so in the near future.) 

     You said it is important to buy a PC that comes with M.2 NVMe Solid State Drive.-and to avoid those that have old style spinning hard drives, as a PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 NVMe SSD will be like 20 times+ faster than the old style, -but I dont know if this thing has one of those old style spinning hard drives or not.

    I need an Acer technician or someone expert enough to know if the, Acer Aspire TC-895-EB11 specs are right for music production, -and if not the TC-895-EB11, what other Acer Aspire model, (or models) are best suited .   
      




  • billsey
    billsey ACE Posts: 31,436 Trailblazer
    It looks like the TC-895-EB11 is a Canadian model? If we knew where you are located we could perhaps give some additional insight into what's available in your locale. With the TC-895-EB11 model you would likely want to upgrade it by adding the SSD to it, using an M.2 NVMe SSD. The i5-10400 processor will likely be just fine, the 3.0GHz spec they are referencing is for an older generation of CPUs. The real question was touched upon before: what are you planning on using as audio hardware? A box like one of the Behringer or Roland or an internal card, or ???




    Click on "Like" if you find my answer useful or click on "Yes" if it answers your question.
  • ttttt
    ttttt Member Posts: 1,947 Community Aficionado WiFi Icon
    @Thrip

    Even my i3-9100 PC (should be considered low end new PC nowadays) has 4-cores and will run as high as 4.0 GHz (self controlled) from its 2.4GHz base speed. That's why I assume all 9th, 10th and 11th generation new Acer desktops should have exceeded your expectation. Pairing up with M.2 NVMe SSD will make you feel the PC is fast if you upgraded from a PC with traditional spinning HDD.

    For the reason of attractive price and the feeling of higher storage capacity, those 1 TB (or even 2 TB) HDDs that come with the PC must be spinning HDD for entry level PCs. My TC-885-UA91 PC came with WD SN520  500GB  PCIe 3.0 x2 M.2 NVMe SSD. This x2 model is like half the speed of x4 models but the speed is still like 11+ times faster than spinning HDD. Acer could lower the price by $20-$30 by giving us the x2 model.
    I have swapped this x2 M.2 NVMe SSD with a x4 model, thus fully utilizing the speed of my PC.

    If you don't mind wasting a little bit of money you can go ahead and get the PC with 1 TB HDD and then swap to M.2NVMe SSD with Windows 10 on it. The original 1TB HDD can be formatted for data only and for your future sound collections.

    One thing I would like to mention is that hopefully you won't want to add a really powerful graphics card  that would need more than 550W power to the TC-895-EB11. Currently it is hard to find 12 Volt Only power supply of more than  500W from the outside market other than Acer (Acer has a 500W one). This 12 Volt only power supply is used in TC-895 models.

    So the answer is "YES" to almost all  new Acer Desktops, they are all capable if you don't mind doing some upgrades (such as adding memory) or change of configuration (such as swapping to a x4 M.2 NVMe SSD).