Well I finally went ahead and got the M-Box for Windows.

I see that DigiDesign is recommending that I use an external hard drive.

1) Can I go to any retailer that sells external hard drives and get one, as
long as they are 7200 rpm and a decent size? I was thinking a 60-80 gig
aught to do fine.

2) Do I need to install XP on the external drive as well, or can it do fine
the way it is on the current (C?

3) Do I install ProTools on the external drive where I'll be saving my
recordings?
Or the one I'm currently using (C, with all my other programs?

4) Why do I have to disable "clear font" to be able to operate ProTools?

Thanks.

IS.

"IS" wrote in message
gy.com

Well I finally went ahead and got the M-Box for Windows.

I see that DigiDesign is recommending that I use an external hard
drive.

1) Can I go to any retailer that sells external hard drives and get
one, as long as they are 7200 rpm and a decent size? I was thinking a
60-80 gig ought to do fine.

Right. Depending on what interfaces your PC supports, either USB-2 or
Firewire are fine.

You can buy Firewire or USB-2 external drive enclosures separately and
install the hard drive in its yourself, or you can buy both as a unit.

2) Do I need to install XP on the external drive as well, or can it
do fine the way it is on the current (C?

You most defiantly don't need to install XP on the external drive. Just go
into the XP Disk Manager and follow the procedure for allocating it, and
formatting it. Use a large allocation unit size.

To format a drive using NTFS in XP, right-click My Computer, then choose
Manage. Under Computer Management Storage, select Disk Management. In the
Disk Management utility, right-click the appropriate drive and choose
Format. In the provided dialog box, specify a volume label for the partition
you are creating. From the File System list, select NTFS. Set the Allocation
unit size to 64K. Do not select the Enable file and folder compression
option. If you are formatting the drive for the first time, do not select
the Perform a quick format option either.


3) Do I install ProTools on the external drive where I'll be saving my
recordings?

No.

Or the one I'm currently using (C, with all my other programs?

Yes.

A good firewire drive with the oxford 911 chipset spinning at 7200 rpm will
work great.

Protools application on main hard drive. Ext drive for audio only.


Actually, one Digi rep made what I considered to be a good suggestion. If
you're migrating to OSX, put PT 6 , your upgraded pluigins and system X on a
separate drive, leaving your current setup alone. Boot from the external
drive. Or when you want to go back to PT 5, boot from the internal. The nice
thing about this is that if you go to another studio you can take your entire
system, including mix and plugin settings, on a single Firewire drive, plug
into somebody else's hardware, and ther you are, as if you never left home.
(except for the huge SSL that you're now mixing through)

Of course, you should then still have another external drive to actually record
your data too. But you should have a zillion drives anyway, for backup and so
forth.

-R

I've been looking at some of the hard drives available.
Thanks for the recommendation and the help about them.

Could anyone tell me the difference between SCSI and ATA hard drives, and
which type would be better for my situation (storing music and files from
ProTools etc)?

Thank you.

IS.