Building a Windows DAW Computer part I

The days when it was expected for audio software to be run on a Mac are gone. Sure, there’s still an industry bias towards them, and particularly in the Studio world, but it certainly isn’t necessary. A well built and thought out Windows PC is every bit as capable as a Mac, and in many cases quite a bit less expensive. We will not be diving into a Windows/Mac war here.

While it’s certainly possible to find a prebuilt PC that is up to snuff even with a boost in RAM or similar, if you want to have a great Recording computer building one yourself isn’t as hard as it may sound and can save you some money. So, let’s build a nice Windows-based recording computer!

Components

There are several different types of components we’ll need to look at:

CPU

Motherboard

RAM

Storage

Case/Power Supply

Peripherals

Additionally, we should probably at this stage talk about what audio interface you’re planning on using since the protocol by which it attaches to the computer needs to prioritized (USB2/USB3/Thunderbolt/etc) 

CPUs

So right off of the bat, you’re going to have to make a decision as there are two paths forward. It’s either Intel or AMD. So which is better?  That’s not only difficult to answer, it depends on when you ask the question. Intel and AMD have gone back and forth over the years piggybacking each other in terms of CPU maximum performance. I have a personal bias towards Intel as historically speaking they’ve been slightly more reliable and less prone to crashing in certain circumstances .

Other than just raw ‘speed’, the other big question with CPUs is how many cores are present. A core counts as a single instance of a CPU on a chip. For a while a ‘quad-core’ or ‘octo-core’ CPU was fairly standard. Having multiple cores means your computer can divide up tasks into smaller bits so that things get done more quickly overall. These days 16 or more cores per CPU is fairly common. More recently, not all cores are necessarily equal though. Intel CPUs can incorporate what they call ‘performance cores’ and ‘efficiency cores’. The former have more horsepower and typically get assigned to doing more of the heavy lifting.  The latter are designed to save power comparatively. The one I use personally has 8 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores. In the Intel nomenclature it’s referred to as “8p + 8e”

Motherboards

The Motherboard is the main board in the computer that everything else attaches to in some manner. Motherboard manufacturers are numerous, and not only will quality vary from one to another, the features offered can vary greatly. Commonly, manufacturers will have several lines of Motherboards that fall into different categories. Let’s call the first one ‘budget’. Typically these will have just the basic necessities for a simple computer that maybe you use just for Internet/email. Mid-range lines will add some features or course, but it’s usually the big gamer motherboards that have the horsepower you’re going to need for a music studio machine. These will typically have lots of IO ports of different types and PCIe slots for maximum performance. Also, the Motherboard options in front of you depend upon whether you've chosen an Intel or AMD CPU as they are not compatible with each other.

There are a few areas you can ‘cheap out’ a bit in this project. The Motherboard is not typically one of those.

Stick to a major brand like Asus. Their ProArt line is excellent for most people.

RAM

Long story short it's impossible to have too much RAM these days. Large virtual instrument sample libraries, higher recording sample rates, higher track counts and more all make Windows very hungry for memory. These days the bare minimum you'd want to go with is 16GB. 32GB is better, 64GB is good, and 128GB or more is excellent. You'll need to consult with the Motherboard manual to find out what speed/generation of RAM your machine will require. Most Motherboards will be compatible with a variety of RAM speeds. If you decide you want to get into overclocking you'll want very high quality RAM from the likes of Kingston, Corsair, ADATA, or G.Skill. For the record, the need for overclocking these days is minimal as generally speaking 'average' speeds are pretty zippy. Of course, there're always those that want to squeeze every last ounce of power out of their computer.

Storage

Once upon a time having two fairly robust hard drives was sufficient for a good recording computer. These days, SSD (solid-state drives) are common, and have gotten quite cheap relatively. Get the fastest SSD for your main (OS) drive and a second one for recording to. In the case of the second drive, you can probably focus more on size than speed as even the slowest SSD is more than sufficient in speed for the requirements of recording. Generally, it's better if you can keep your OS drive solitary from the recording process and just focus on running all the services that computers need to run in the background.

On my current computer I have 5 drives in total. The OS drive, a project drive just to record/playback to, 2x drives to hold sample libraries, and a fifth as a system backup. That fifth drive is not an SSD but an older Hard Drive. Getting a 16TB drive for backups is typically less expensive than a 2TB SSD, and for backups you want to be more concerned about volume size than speed.

SSDs can get confusing nowadays as they come in many formats. A SATA 2.5" SSD fits into a physical hard drive slot (usually with an adaptor). Faster these days are what are called M.2 SSDs (NVMe). They consist of a little board typically not much longer than a USB flash drive, and they're installed into tiny slots on the Motherboard. Be careful though and make sure to read your Motherboard manual however as some of those M.2 form factor drives are not NVMe but in fact SATA. There's nothing wrong with that and are typically cheaper, but SATA is slower than NVMe. Be extra careful when buying as some M.2 slots can read both NVMe and SATA.

Case/Power Supply

Some people like a fancy case with all the bells and whistles with RGB lights on every component, and a transparent case showing off all the sexy lighting effects.

Some people like myself are a bit more utilitarian in approach, opting instead for a classic black case with no extras.

There are a lot of options these days to trick out your machine, and you can spend whatever you like. However a basic ATX size case and a robust power supply, with a few fans and a CPU cooler are all that you actually need.

Power supplies come in a variety of wattage capacities. To know for sure if the one you're looking at is sufficient, you have to know ahead of time all the components and add up their wattage ratings. You can't have too big a power supply of course, but you also don't want to blow all your money on overkill.

Despite what you might think, the power supply is arguably the most important part of the computer. A poor quality, or underrated power supply can leave make your computer unstable and prone to crashing. i.e. not good.

Peripherals and Others

If you've ever built a gaming computer before you'll notice something significant missing from our parts list: a video card. The tech that goes into cutting-edge high-end graphics cards is kind of flabbergasting, and, in the case of a recording computer, entirely not necessary. Save yourself whatever hundreds or thousands of dollars you'd put into a video card and reinvest it into other components. The built-in HDMI output on the Motherboard is fine. Seriously. If you do opt for a dedicated graphics card, many companies have quiet 'fanless' versions that cool passively instead of adding another noisy fan to your system.

Cooling

CPUs running hot, RAM getting overclocked, and other components in a modern PC build up heat incredibly quickly. A good solid CPU cooler/fan is definitely recommended. Look at solutions from Noctua or Thermalright. Your CPU when you buy it will come with a cheap little fan. Throw it away. There's also the option of a water-cooled instead of air-cooled system. I've never seen the need for one although they are typically quieter, and fan noise for a studio computer can certainly be an issue. Water cooling comes from the overclocking world and again, unless you plan to squeeze every ounce of power out, it isn't worth the hassle.

Case fans are important. A CPU cooler/fan will help keep heat away from the CPU itself but now you have to get that heat out of the case. There are a number of options out there. Some have fancy lights and others don't. It really doesn't matter, however, what is important is coming up with a cooling strategy so that for instance all of the case fans are not blowing into the case or out of the case. You need to come up with a balance that keeps air moving through the computer for maximum efficiency.

Audio Interface

Before we start building the computer, you should have a good idea of what kind of interface you'd like. You'll need to consider how many ins/outs you need among other things.

Protocol

Every interface out there has to talk to your computer in one form or another. Popular protocols are USB 2, USB 3, PCIe, Thunderbolt (1/2/3/4), or Dante/Ravenna (Ethernet) While USB 2 can handle higher IO counts than it used to, on average, larger IO counts are associated with PCIe, Thunderbolt or Ethernet.

Most PCs don't have thunderbolt, although Motherboard manufacturers have been decent about having a Thunderbolt PCIe card available as an option. Technically speaking, Thunderbolt is a combination of the PCIe bus, and a Video bus. Those companies that do make the aforementioned Thunderbolt PCIe card include a video passthrough for those who are purists. Fortunately, this doesn't affect Thunderbolt interfaces in the slightest. However, you will need to check if the Audio Interface actually support Thunderbolt on Windows or not, it isn't guaranteed.

Conclusion

If it wasn't obvious from the beginning, building a recording PC isn't necessarily a generic endeavor. Knowing what your overall needs for processing power and IO counts are, is relevant to the size and scope of the DAW machine project.

In the end, if you decide not to build a PC but to buy one, consider looking at machines marketed for gaming as they are typically very robust even if their graphics cards are overkill.

Next time we'll look at putting everything all together.