# What Requirements For New PC Running Reaper?



## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

I can't deal with my old POS desktop PC anymore. What would you recommend for the minimum specs for a new desktop PC to run Reaper on? Recording and mixing.


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## player99 (Sep 5, 2019)

Get a refurb i7 with about 16 gigs of ram, a solid state hard drive (250 gigs to 1terrabyte) and a regular hard disk (2-5 tb) for files and data storage. Should be under $500.


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## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

Where would you get that? Canada Computers?


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

Reaper's site should list minimum specs. Personally 16gb ram.and 512gb ssd would be my minimum.

The important question is budget.


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## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

$800?


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## cboutilier (Jan 12, 2016)

for $800 you could get a pretty solid used PC too. That puts you into the range of couple year old used gaming rigs.

If it were me, I'd be shooting for an i7 rig, 16gb ram, ~500 gb SSD + a 1-2TB SSD or 2-6TB HDD for storage.


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## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

What do you look for when looking at a used computer? I feel like I would be handing someone $800 and hoping for the best.


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

Look up what computer stores near you sell used machines and check out their inventory. Best buy does refurbs too.


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## Eric Reesor (Jan 26, 2020)

Not much at all, best to turn off anything that can hog I/O streams that require cpu cycles like running faceplant or the net on a continuous basis in the background while doing stream intensive work that requires higher time priority to not cause pops and clicks and the other crap that happens. Don't forget that it is not so much the speed of ram needed to stream audio data it is the processor core access speed times necessary to do the work of trancoding and the quality of the usb remote or onboard chips that are doing the initial encoding in the first place. Watch out for cheap usb cords they can cause issues as well as cheap usb recording devices with terrible software that causes more issues than they solve. Good recording gear first. GIGO is a given if you put in garbage you have no way to get decent sound out.

If you intend to do streams into a video editing program then that is a different kettle of fish and a minimum of 4 processor threads and a decent fast video and high end system bus is called for. Audio processing and transcoding is not as processor heavy as video, so if you try to do both at the same time then high end gear with a powerful multicore of at least 5 cores is called for. I do my audio work on a duo core and have no drop out issues because I do simple 2 and 4 channel mix of 24/96 pcm audio transcoded into various codecs. I don't use reaper I mostly use opensource like good old simple audacity for stereo and Ardour for a more intensive multitrack mix.

If you do heavy amounts of sampling and midi and record solo audio with reaper in a mix it will take a decent usb audio input and Reaper must be able to use the usb bus of the computer without the operating system stepping on the stream. Windows audio does have ways to set usb audio to a higher priority but sometimes you have to do things like shutting down the network to stop causing interrupts on the intel designed bus. It makes no difference which multi core you chose, it is the system bus and the operating system that makes the difference. It can be a nightmare setting up real time priority for audio on some systems if you cannot get the daw software to have a higher priority than the network or other system run stuff like Windows update and the like. Running a browsers or facebook in the background is a hopeless proposition and you will just wind up going nuts swatting at facebook adds and other internet garbage taking over your computer. Run your computer as a recording device not a media consumption catch all and you will do fine.


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## bolero (Oct 11, 2006)

+1 to Eric's notes

my DAW doesn't go on the internet at all, I use an old generic computer for web browsing

also USB audio interfaces can really suck, as USB was never designed for audio & it's easy to get difficult to find ( and sometimes imposssible to resolve ) ground noise from the motherboard/power/mystery sources


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## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

bolero said:


> +1 to Eric's notes
> 
> my DAW doesn't go on the internet at all, I use an old generic computer for web browsing
> 
> also USB audio interfaces can really suck, as USB was never designed for audio & it's easy to get difficult to find ( and sometimes imposssible to resolve ) ground noise from the motherboard/power/mystery sources


What's the alternative to USB?


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## Chito (Feb 17, 2006)

I have had my Tascam US1641 USB audio interface for over 10 years now. It works for me and I have never had any issues with latency or any of that stuff. It is running in my least powerful laptop/desktop and no issues at all. I record my full 6 piece band with it using 10 channels. USB is good. Specially with USB 3 now or USB-C.


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## knight_yyz (Mar 14, 2015)

Be careful with i5 vs i7. Some i5 chips are better than the i7 depending on generation.


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## BlueRocker (Jan 5, 2020)

Guncho said:


> What's the alternative to USB?


Thunderbolt 3. Just to be confusing, they use the USB "C" connector for Thunderbolt 3, so all PCs with Thunderbolt 3 have USB "C", but not all PCs with USB "C" have Thunderbolt 3.

Thunderbolt 3 is still not widely supported outside of mass storage devices and 10gb network adapters.


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## Kerry Brown (Mar 31, 2014)

I use an older high end HP laptop, I7, 8GB, 500GB SATA drive. Works fine for Reaper. I use several USB input devices, Scarlett 2i2, Apogee Jam, Apogee Mic+. No problems with any of them. I don't expect professional quality recording but it's good enough for me.


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## knight_yyz (Mar 14, 2015)

Today vidéo out has 4 options. Thunderbolt, HDMI, HDMI mini and Display Port. They all have pros and cons


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## bolero (Oct 11, 2006)

Guncho said:


> What's the alternative to USB?


you may get lucky and be fine with USB

IMO PCI cards are the best. RME makes really good stuff with reliable drivers






PCI-e Audio Interfaces for PC and older Mac. High performance super low latency. ADK Pro Audio | 423-254-0492 | This is the Pro Audio gear and Digital Audio Workstation you've been looking for


Professional low latency PCI-e audio interface sound cards for Windows desktop workstations. PCI-e still offers the lowest latency and some of largest number of I/O options. A PCI-e audio interface tends to be the best option for large commercial studios, video and audio post production studios...




www.adkproaudio.com





you could find some less expensive older gear by M-Audio etc probably used


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## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

I ended up with this PC onsale for $600.






Canada Computers | Best PC, Laptop, Gaming Gear, Printer, TV, Cables - Canada Computers & Electronics


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www.canadacomputers.com





To that I added a 2TB SATA hard drive and 8GB more RAM so $720 in total before tax.

Reaper is running like greased lightning.


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## MarkM (May 23, 2019)

Ok I know jack s#|+ about computers, my bride brought this old one home when it was replaced at her workplace. I wonder if this is an adequate computer to run Reaper like greased lightning? If not what should I upgrade?

Thanks computer wizards!


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## Guncho (Jun 16, 2015)

That fan looks loose.

You can pretty much run Reaper on anything. How fast it is comes down to your ram and cpu. Your pics don't really show the details of either but the hard drive is five years old.


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## MarkM (May 23, 2019)

I can not find details of the ram and cpu?

Any idea where to find thee details


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## laristotle (Aug 29, 2019)

MarkM said:


> I can not find details of the ram and cpu?
> 
> Any idea where to find thee details


Type 'about' in your search bar.


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## MarkM (May 23, 2019)

Type the computer model or the hard drive model in the search bar?


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## laristotle (Aug 29, 2019)

MarkM said:


> Type the computer model or the hard drive model in the search bar?


Just the word 'about' and hit enter. Your info will pop up.


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## MarkM (May 23, 2019)

laristotle said:


> Just the word 'about' and hit enter. Your info will pop up.
> View attachment 340025
> 
> View attachment 340026


I did not know about this sorcery and witchcraft!


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