tips...052.
so you cant afford an i7.
whats a cheaper solution ??

well imho i7 right now is king.
a great processor.
and i predict this is the start of big moves by intel.
if your well off i say go for it.
lots of ram and two hi performance drives 7200 rpm with
32 mb cache in each. use one drive for OS
and one for tracking.

but lets say your leery on spending big money on a new system..
and anyhoo prolly a i7 mk2 will come out so your worried that
what you buy today might be replaced by something better tomorrow..
(note ..i have no inside info..just my gut telling me the i7 is the start
of a new era in computing.)
whaddya do ?? whats the strategy ??
this is sorta the predicament i'm in as of jan 2010.
i would love an i7 ...but its the total cost to my wallet.
so i'm leery.

heres an alternative to check out.
no its not an i7. but if your crafty you prolly
can get a hell of a lot done with it.
unless you go crazy on huge numbers plug ins on traks
that consume lots of processor n memory resources.

the deal right now is i feel the amd 620 quad processor.
read about it here...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16819103706
99 buks.

in summary if your thinking bout a new system you might want to think
about one with this processor in for those on a budget.
remember 8 and prolly 16 and more cores are coming prolly in the next few years.
this might just tide you over and save up your buks for when
8 or 16 core processors are cheap.
as always try n run tests on any system before buying if you can.
to assess its performance for you.
another alternative is amd quad phenom or intel i5.

retired puter engr....powertracks on amd......NICE !
"what is the black art of audio engineering ?"
my silly songs...motagator.com/bmanning
see my tips in the tips section.