I got some great responses last time i posted here looking for help finding a PC for my home. Now I’ve got a friend that’s come to me looking for help selecting and setting up a PC for music recording with the app Reaper. I’d be installing Linux Mint and the machine would be used primarily for music recording, no other major applications. It doesn’t sound like it would require a real powerhouse, so we’re hoping to keep the costs down if possible. Form factor doesn’t really matter in this case, we really just want something simple and reliable.

Last time i inquired here, the consensus was that I’ll probably be best taking my specs/needs to the nearest Microcenter and see what they recommend. Does it sound like i should do the same in this case?

Thanks for reading! I appreciate any help you all can provide!

  • anamethatisnt@sopuli.xyz
    7·
    25 days ago

    There’s a great forum for your friend!
    https://linuxmusicians.com/viewtopic.php?t=27775

    My understanding is that the Focusrite USB-C cards works as expected in Linux but you want a third party GUI such as:
    https://github.com/geoffreybennett/alsa-scarlett-gui

    Case: I’d go for a case with sound dampening and dust filter, a cheap mATX one would be Chieftec Pro Mini
    PSU: I always want a modular PSU and I always aim at one with at least 80+ Gold. A quiet one would be the Seasonic Core GX V2 650W ATX 3.1. Can’t go wrong with Seasonic.
    CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 9600 is low TDP, cheap, latest gen AM5 and should be enough for Reaper without problem.
    Motherboard: I went for a cheap B850 board but verified that the PCI Express slot had PCIe 5.0. An example would be ASUS Prime B850M-K.
    Drive: An M.2 NVMe Gen 4 2TB should be enough to store both sounds/instruments and the reaper projects.
    RAM: I went for 2x16GB DDR5 6000MHz CL30 with AMD EXPO. If your friend knows he uses abnormally large sample libraries it doesn’t cost all that much to increase it to 2x32GB but should be unnecessary.

    My total cost ended up ~€840 with that.

    • frunch@lemmy.worldOP
      2·
      25 days ago

      This is awesome, thank you for the suggestions–and thanks for the site recommendation! Looks like we have a lot of reading ahead, but this is exactly the stuff we need to get started. I appreciate your help and consideration 🙂