Garritan CFX is the best sounding virtual piano in existence. The ravencroft is quite good, but needs an iLok. Having said that, I usually end up using pianoteq. Whats the Best Mac. Book for Making Music Updated January 2. Whats the best Mac. Book for making music Is it the Mac. Book Pro or Mac. Book Air What size is bestUpdated January 2012 Whats the best MacBook for making music Is it the MacBook Pro or MacBook Air What size is best 11 inch, 13 inch, 15 inch or 17 inch Run virtual instruments and effects using the innovative, dedicated performance muscle of the Muse Research Receptor. Professional musicians rely on this hardware. Virtual Pianos Comparison Keyscape, Ivory, PianoTeq, NI, Motif, Roland, EZkeys, Reason and more. Garritan Personal Orchestra 5 Orchestral Sample Library with Over 500 Symphonic Orchestra Sounds MacPC Standalone, AAX, VST, AU. This article considers Mac OS X Lion and the latest 2. Mac. Book Air models with faster Intel Core i. If your planning to buy a Mac laptop for music, theres some links at the end of the article where you can save some money. Which Mac. Book for Making Music Things to Consider. Here are questions to consider to see which would be the best Mac. Book music rig Do you want a new or secondhand Mac Book Do you want the best possible setup youre happy to spend a lot or a good enough setup spend just enough money to get the job done Do you know what music software youll use Logic, Pro. Tools, Cubase, Live, Garage. Band, Reaktor, Kontakt, Traktor, Reason, Sibelius, Vienna Symphonic LibraryDo you have any existing instrument or sample librariesGarritan Steinway Vst Piano WhiningIf so, how big are they Will the Mac always be used in a portable music setup, or mostly in one place To set the scene for your purchase, you may want consider the different ways you might use your Mac to create music, and in what settings Will you be recording real instruments Does you sound interface use USB or Firewire Mac. Book Pro models all have Firewire. OXMj8cWSMFmn5Xfvi9rms2C9.jpg' alt='Garritan Steinway Vst Piano Download' title='Garritan Steinway Vst Piano Download' />Mac. Book Air models dont have Firewire. Will you be using the Mac at home, in a studio or at gigs If youre moving around, smaller Mac. Books are more convenient. Will you be using pre recorded samples or loops Will you be loading sampled instruments, e. Galaxy Steinway piano Mac. Books hard disks will generally be big enough to swallow lots of sample and instrument libraries. Mac. Book Airs have faster but smaller capacity flash storage a consideration if you have a large amount of music tracks, software and samples. Will you be using any special hardware, e. Guitar Rig pedal. Is your hardware compatible with Mac OS X Lion on new MacsWill you be scoring music Will you need to print sheet music Is your software compatible with Mac OS X LionWill you be using the Mac to play liveMight you do some live DJing, mixing and beat matching e. Acid Is your Mac. Book big enough for the screen to be useable, but small enough to be easy to carry aroundWill you be making soundtracksIf so, youll probably want a bigger screen to make room for the video track. My friends answer to these questions were Im looking to use Ableton, with a portable set up and about 3. GB worth of soundssynths. I guess I would like bang for buck as opposed to spending for no reason, but if its worth it I will get it. Something that I would use live but I also travel a lot, so portability is important. Heres the good news. All Macs are great for music. All the Mac. Books are Good. All the current model Mac. Book Pro and Mac. Book Air models are good for making music. So, really its a choice between Mac. Book Air 1. 1 inch. Mac. Book Air 1. Mac. Book Pro 1. Mac. Book Pro 1. Mac. Book Pro 1. Lets look at choosing between Mac. Book sizes first of all. Choosing Between Mac. Book Air and Mac. Book Pro Sizes. In choosing between the sizes, theres a trade off between three factors. No. 1 How Big a Screen Do You Need for Making Music with Your Mac On the Road When making music, its great to have a big screen, so you can see and get straight to all your tracks and virtual instruments. Youll probably find the smaller screen Mac. Books Mac. Book Air 1. Mac. Book Air 1. 3, Mac. Book Pro 1. 3 cramped for making music. Theyll be lots of scrolling and shuffling windows around. You might be okay with a smaller screen if youve just recording a few live instruments or if your patient. The 1. 5 inch Mac. Book Pro screen is workable, and 1. Mac. Book Pro screen is good. You dont necessarily need a big screen on the laptop. If youre mostly making music in one place, Id recommend buy a 2. HD screen for 1. I have one cheap HD display for Mac. Book Air. No. 2 How Much Weight are You Prepared to Lug Around The 1. I would not recommend travelling with it unless you really, really want a big screen. Ive travelled with a 1. Im over it Its just big enough to be awkward. If you can cope with the smaller screen, and you can get to a big screen when you want to work quickly, the 1. Windows Xp Media Center Edition 2005. It wont take over your entire backpackNo. Do You Need the Power of a Quad Core CPU Versus a Dual Core CPU for Making Music The 1. Mac. Book Pro has two CPU cores. The 1. 5 and 1. 7 inch models have four CPU cores. This means that a 1. Still the 1. 3 inch will handle a bunch of tracks. It will handle a bunch of virtual instruments, samples and recorded vocals and live instruments. If youre doing massive arrangements with 6. Otherwise, you may not even notice the difference in power between a dual core and quad core. No. 4 The Current Mac. Book Pro Models, and the Larger Screen Mac. Book Models May Be Quieter. Macs get hot from thinking hard, for example when playing back a 2. When this happens, the fan runs to keep the processor from overheating. The harder the Mac works, the hotter it gets, and the faster the fan runs to compensate. The faster the fan runs the more noise the fan makes. Since the heat also passively dissipates to the Mac. Book Airs case, larger Macs may be able to sink more heat into the metal shell before the fan is seriously needed. The current Mac. Book Air the model released mid 2. This may be because its the first generation of a processor technology from Intel that combines a Core i. HD3. 00. 0 graphics on one silicon chip. In the Pro, the processors are still on two separate chips, which may spread out the heat. Reports are the Mac. Book Air can get hot fast, even under moderate load. That means fan noise. There is a fair bit of conjecture here it hasnt been measured, tested and proven that the Pro stays quieter longer than the Air. It hasnt been proven that the smaller Mac. Books need to fan earlier. I could be wrong. I thought its better I mention it, as I have had a lot of people whinging about fan noise for the current model Mac. Book Air. Best Mac. Book for Music The Simple Answer. The safe bet for a Mac. Book Pro for easily portable music production is a 1. Mac. Book Pro. The screen will be big enough, if not roomy, to work with. Its okay to carry around. Its got a quad core processor, so the technology is never likely to slow down your creativity with a quad core you can have music projects with many, many tracks, virtual instruments and effects. If you want really portable, and i if you can work off a big screen where you mainly create music, and ii if an 1. Mac. Book Air 1. 1, Mac. Book Air 1. 3, or Mac. Book Pro 1. 3. The Mac. Book Air is thinner, lighter, more portable than the Mac. Book Pro and has flash storage instead of hard disk. The flash storage or solid state disk SSD is much faster than a hard disk, which is great for loading virtual instruments and music projects quickly. The downsize is flash storage is relatively expensive, so typical flash storage capacities are much less than hard disks. Mac. Book Airs dont have a built in DVD drive. If your music software comes on DVD, youll need to buy an external DVD drive from Apple 7. You can read more about choosing a Mac. Book Air 1. 1 vs 1. If you want a big work space, dont want to ever use an external monitor, and dont care about lugging around a giant laptop, the Mac. Book Pro 1. 7 inch is a amazing laptop for creativity.