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Ingredients
NC10 – no upgrades (may upgrade memory to 2MB at some point) Hard Drive partitioned (approximately) as follows:C: XP – 30GB
D: 60 GB – Misc
E: 60 GB – Ableton Files, Samples, Music Library.
Restore Partition untouchedUsed XPLite and YourUninstaller to remove bloatware (Magic Doctor, Outlook Express, Media Player 9, Net Meeting, EDS amongst others
Music Software
Ableton Live 6.1
A variety of free VST synths and FX.
Reaktor 5 – not installed yet, considering using older version to decrease CPU overhead.
ASIO4All – Free ASIO Drivers for laptop soundcards.
Audio Editor for sample editing and mastering – have Wavelab but consideringOther Software Installed
(not required for music but good general purpose plugins for playback and Firefox):
Mplayer Classic (Lightweight alternative to Media Player 9)
Real Alternative and QT Alternative – Free lightweight Real and Quicktime codecs without the bloatware, stat collection and phone home.
K-Lite codec pack.Method
The Story So Far
So far I’ve got about as far as installing Ableton some VST instruments and giving it a bit of a run out, I opened up a completed track from another machine which played back fine even though it contained two soft synths and a reasonable amount of FX CPU was running at around 50% to 60%.I’m now in the process of doing my first track which is going ok, I’m sticking mostly to samples to reduce processor overhead, I’ve always been fascinated by how such restrictions lead me to be more creative so am quite excited about the possibilities.
Initially I was incredibly put off by the restricted screen size but persevered and eventually found a tip here (http://www.sammymobile.com/plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?4356) to increase the screen resolution which although means I have to move the screen around a bit is a lot easier than opening, closing and resizing windows within Ableton
Sound Quality of the on board audio through headphones (Beyer DT770’s) is pretty good, although there is some popping and crackling which is to be expected, this can reduced considerably by switching the Realtek card to 44.1Khz.
Shape Of Things To Come
I have a USB audio Interface (first generation Griffin iMic) which when I get chance well test out to see if audio quality and CPU usage is better, especially with the ASIO4All drivers, if successful I may purchase a more professional USB Card. I also have some processor intensive Native Instruments software I want to try for a laugh, but to be honest I don’t think will run too well. As mentioned above I may use old versions, particularly NI Reaktor as I have version 2 or 3 knocking around on disk somewhere, the results of these tests will probably lead to a memory upgrade.If anyone wants more specific detail about any aspect of the above please PM me or preferably post here so we can produce a nice resource. I’m interested in other peoples music or indeed video experiences as well (LINUX anyone), I read on one forum that someone had Adobe Premiere running.
To get an idea of the music I produce check out: http://www.myspace.comlaptopacidxperience
http://www.alrealon.co.uk/ (link to some free tracks).I’ve got Reason 4 running on my NC10 (1GB RAM) and I tried Asio4all but got crackly audio at anything approaching decent latency settings. To get clear audio I had to up the latency so high it’s impossible to play real-time parts accurately.
I can still program drum machine and analog seq patterns, and compose by drawing notes, so it’s not a dead loss and it’s great to have some kind of music making facility available when I’m travelling. I may try a small external audio interface sometime.
dunc
i could not get fl studio to run at all with out shitty latency , after a samsung update and a fiddle with asio 4 all drivers I get a respectable 23 ms latency , wich is not bad for an onboard soundcard , I have a usb soundblaster that i will install when I get time , that should sort out the latency quite a lot , i plan to use this net book as a very portable recording studio , I play guitar and bass , I use guitar rig 3 , cubase sx and groove agent mostly , let me know how the external audio interface went
If anyone wants to talk specifically how their NC10 fits into their music production then they would be very welcome to post something to the front page in the “what do you create series“! You can link to your work and hopefully get a bit of extra traffic.
jason, what samsung update did you get, I’ve not been able to get asio4all to work at all without crackling and freezing, maybe it’s ableton.
I’ve not had chance to use my usb interface yet (griffin imic) but I’m now running Ableton Live 8 without much issue, as long as I don’ t use powerful VSTs or too much effects. I found an old copy of FM7 which seems to work well. Latency is not great, but I don’t play real time anyway.
i’m sure if I put more memory in and found the right combo of software and settings the NC10 would be a very workable music notepad.
MrSammy, I also use my NC10 for script writing, so I may take you up on your offer, if I get time.
I’m by no means a professional but…
On my NC10 I use Reaper 3.11 (registered), Drumcore 3 FREE, Acmebargig various vst’s that emulate amps, darn good they are too, Line 6 Toneport GX (outdated now but suits my needs) rgc soundfont player, i don’t use the onboard audio for recording i use the toneport, i have a pair of m-audio studiophile av40’s attached to the toneport, if i’m doing a rough mixdown i’ll use the onboard with a pair of headphones, all final mixdowns are completed on my main pc though as running lots of vst’s and eq’s, compression etc hogs the little nc10 up a bit..I updated the audio drivers , and fiddled with asio 4 all, I use an external soundblaster usb now as it works perfectly , the internal card was just fine though with FL studio , guitar rig works great as well with the external card .
I know – Holy thread resurrection Batman!
I have now ‘downgraded’ to Reason 2.0 on my NC10 and I get latency of 5ms with built in audio at 44.1 kHz / 16bit, no audio artifacts, only medium average CPU hit – and that’s using the default DirectX drivers!
I’m going to try version 2.5 next, as I do like the extra fx it has. Provided I don’t use too many RV7000 reverbs, I think it should run OK.
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