Sizing a computer
The most common question I see online about computers goes something like this, "I have a <year> Mac with <ram and maybe cpu specs>. Will this run Logic?" I feel at least semi-qualified to try and address this since I am both a formally trained recording engineer (IAR, 1985) and I work in IT across a number of domains in my regular career. (Hardware performance, networking, security, architecture, etc.) I've designed and built out hosting infrastructure for nearly all of the top 10 US banks, global trading networks and so on. The issues we have recording music on computers are not that much different than the issues we have processing stock trades or transmitting data.
So "will it run logic?" is a fair question, but is missing the point, points, really. Here is how I look at it fwiw:
Apple supports hardware for about 10 years, so if your laptop is 10+, you will not be able to download the new versions of Logic Pro or upgrade the OS. Before you buy used hardware, please keep this in mind to avoid disappointment
"Will this 'run' Logic"? - well we really need to quantify that. There is more than the "computer" here. If you are a singer/songwriter and you are going to cut 2 tracks with few effects you will require far fewer resources than if you are scoring a movie and have 110 tracks with sound effects, midi orchestra parts and so on. Put very simply: more stuff needs more "computer". I put computer in quotes because your computer has a number of systems that all have to be capable of whatever task you are doing. It's not a "thing" - much like a car it is a collection of "things" that all need to work together. It is a system.
* CPU - There are both the number cores to consider as well as the clock speed.
More cores is not always helpful - not all tasks can be divided up between multiple cores and often you lose a core to housekeeping chores like keeping the other cores in sync as they cooperate to do some work together.
Clock speed is fairly intuitive, higher is generally better.
Mobile chipsets (laptops) are often optimized for battery life and may be less powerful
Find websites that do performance testing and get the fastest current chipset you can afford. But even then it will not tell you how many tracks or plugins you can run - they are all different. Reverbs tend to be the biggest CPU hogs due to the amount of math involved.
You can run the Logic Pro X benchmark to get a more practical feel for what your current system can handle: https://music-prod.com/logic-pro-benchmarks/ It is biased towards midi/synth instrument tracks so if you don't use those you can get some unhelpful results.
* Disk Throughput:
Each 44kHz/16 bit track requires 10MB/min for a stereo WAV file, or 1.4Mb/sec per track uncompressed. If your SSD can move 50MB/sec continuously, that is 285 tracks in theory assuming no other bottlenecks such as CPU.
Double the sample rate, double the data. (half the tracks, double the storage)
Disk for the record has been the slowest part of a computer as long as there have been computers with disks. Get the fastest disk you can afford, and make sure it has the fastest possible connection to the rest of the computer.
Generally internal disk will be fastest. Research your solution to make sure you are getting what you need if you are putting key files at the end of a cable.
Use SSD, & make sure you format the disk with APFS
External drives should use Thunderbolt 3 or 4 if possible which can support theoretical maximum speeds up to 40Gbps (5GB per sec) which should handle reading and writing your tracks in near real time. Modern disks can transfer up to about 550MB/sec. 10Gb ethernet works as well.
Aside: B = Bytes, where 1 Byte = 8 bits. Little b is 'bit. A bit is a single 0 or 1, but it takes 8 bits to represent a character like a letter A for example. When we talk about pure throughput for a network or disk system we often fall back on bits but when we talk about moving data we talk about Bytes because we care about the characters coming over the wire; no one cares about 1/2 an "A". So 100MB is really 800Mb, and so on. Just don't confuse them or you might find yourself in a bad spot.
* RAM: always buy all the RAM you can afford. Why? DRAM can move 2-20GB/sec and an SSD is typically capable of roughly 50-550MB/sec - Even a fast disk is one to 2 orders of magnitude slower. You really want to run all of your application(s) in RAM if possible. When your machine runs out of RAM, it will write data to disk (called caching) and things will slow down a lot. In a perfect world your entire project would fit in RAM, your plugins and DAW would be running in RAM and whatever work you are doing only needs to periodically save changes to disk in case you crash or lose power. The closer you can get to this ideal, the faster and smoother everything will run. Disk is really just there so that the data (your work!) persists when the system is shut down.
The first system I ever ran (1977) had 4K of RAM. The computer system that landed Americans on the moon in 1969 had 4k of RAM. Over time my machines grew to 16K with a 1 MB hard disk, and then on and on. A few years ago my datacenter servers had 8GB of RAM, and today my work laptop has 16GB. I'm not even a programmer! This is a trend that isn't stopping and which has not slowed in over 50 years. It will keep getting cheaper and software engineers will keep finding better ways to use it. Buy as much as you can afford.
So can my system run Logic?
Now we know the short answer is normally going to be yes but it depends.
Your disk will be the gating factor for recording as well as playing back the tracks
Midi instruments and plugins can make CPU the gate. This is when you may want to start printing some sub-mixes with FX/freezing tracks, etc. in order to save processing resources.
Why can't the new version of Logic run on an older machine or older OS?
There can be lots of reasons, but one of the most basic is software testing. Mistakes in software are unavoidable, and normal. All of the code changes and additions to the OS and Logic need to get tested, alone and together. There are unit tests (test my new feature) and end-to-end tests (test the whole thing) and then you start to consider all of the 3rd party integrations. Apple & Logic are communicating with those folks, but have no control over their timelines or their legacy issues (if they have some) and other factors.
Read the release notes from your key vendors before updating the OS. They will know best if their software will run on the new version.
Asking online forums no matter how well intentioned is not going to produce a reliable answer because it's very likely that no one else has your mix of software & hardware running.
If you don't need the new features and you can handle all the tracks you need - great, don't upgrade. Some Pros will leave their computers alone for years in many cases - precisely because it is more valuable to be able to work and have revenue coming in than to wrestle with broken or unstable tools because you wanted the new and shiny thing but it broke some other tool you depend on. But keep in mind that when the day comes that you need that shiny new thing, your upgrade process may be longer and more complicated because you have fallen however far behind.
Laptop vs desktop
If you need to move around, a laptop makes sense. If not, a laptop is a compromised solution. Everything is a compromise, of course, but you want to find the *right* compromises for you.
Laptops are going to be biased towards low power utilization to extend battery life, low weight, & small size. None of which help with music production.
Laptops historically are more likely to have heat issues that need to be dealt with differently since you cannot have big fans and vents etc. on a laptop. (noisy fans)
They will have a more limited array of ports
A desktop can have as much room as it needs in theory, it is running off of utility power so while efficiency matters, it is no longer critical. Weight it not a big consideration either. The Mac Mini I use to run my studio has no fan. It effectively makes no noise at all; my own breathing is louder. It has more ports to connect to more peripherals. And I use use as big a monitor as I want with it. There is no iMac with a 35" curved screen, and compared to the largest iMac with comparable disk and RAM I saved around $1,500 on my system by using a mini and a 3rd party monitor. It was an easy call.
WiFi vs Hardwired
If you have to move around, then you probably need to use WiFi.
If you don't have to move around you are going to be better off with a hardwired system. They are faster and more stable.
Cat-5E cabling is good for 300' at 1Gb of throughput. Despite all kinds of fancy "maximum transfer rate" specs, WiFi in real life is a lot slower. A LOT slower.
Basic IT Hygiene
My perspective is skewed for sure here; I helped build my first computer in 1977 and by the 1990s was running a datacenter for a multi-billion dollar investment firm. On 9/11, our networks and phones stayed up, our data was protected and our folks were safe. I take this stuff seriously but some of what I take for granted may not be intuitive to others. So here are a couple of things I wish everyone knew:
Take backups! If I had a dollar for everyone on the web who was panicking about losing their work or pictures or whatever, I could buy a nice island somewhere. The Mac is the easiest thing in the world to back up too; just buy an external SSD that is 2X as large as your internal drive (or larger), plug it in to your computer (use a fast interface for best results) and set up Time Machine. For it to be any easier someone would have to come to your house and do it for you. Disks die. Computers die. Things happen. As my buddy at Cyber Command likes to say, "All of your systems will fail". Be ready.
Review OS upgrades and new versions before acting. Again, the sheer volume of angry and/or panicked users who did not spend the 5 minutes doing the reading is breathtaking. There are literally websites devoted to telling you if a specific vendor isn't ready to support a specific code version or if there is a bug messing people up. This is one of my favorites: https://www.production-expert.com/apple-macos-ventura-audio-compatibility-chart
Take Freaking Backups! Please.
If you travel with your computer and connect to strange networks/public wifi, make sure bluetooth is OFF if possible and your firewall is ON. Bluetooth beaconing is a great way to get your laptop stolen or hacked. And there is no reason not to have your firewall on all the time. It is just stopping inbound connections to your system, like people trying to break in...
The less stuff you have installed the better. If this is really a music machine and you are serious about it, do not install games or download other random things. The less stuff, the better. Why? None of it has likely ever been tested together. There could be daemons hogging resources in the background or conflicting with music software. If you can keep the thing clean, please do. You will be better off. Also don't run anything except your music software when it is time to work.
You can back up your old version of Logic prior to an upgrade very easily. It's just a file in a folder. You can simply change the name and it will be there after your upgrade. You can make a copy and compress it as well.
16 vs 24 bit?
Your bit depth determines the dynamic range of the signal you can record. You can think of it as signal to noise as well, since that spec is taken as the highest signal level vs the systems's own noise floor.
Popular music is mixed with a dynamic range of around 10dB (peaks are 10X the power of the quietest bits or twice as loud).
A really good classic 24 track machine has a dynamic range of 69dB* (A-weighted S/N) LPs are (not surprisingly) about the same. (~70dB)
16 bit (CD) has a dynamic range of 96 dB although it can seem like more with dithering.
The human ear has a dynamic range of roughly 140 dB, where 0dB is the quietest sound we can perceive, and 140dB is where we have immediate hearing damage.
24 bit has a dynamic range in theory of 144dB - wider than the human ear.
So how much do you really need? Technically they are all more than the final product, and all more than your reproducing system will be able to handle. So how much is enough?
44kHz vs 48kHz vs 96kHz vs 128kHz?
These numbers refer to the sample rate that the analog to digital converter is using to sample the program material. The basic idea is that you can reconstruct a sine wave using a sample frequency at least 2X the highest frequency of interest. We generally take 20Hz to 20,000Hz to be our "audio" range.
In reality there isn't much going on past 15kHz, and many folks cannot even hear that high. Most people over 18 cannot hear above 17,500Hz. Give yourself a test: https://decibelhearing.com/hearing-loss-overview/high-frequency-hearing-loss/
By the time you are my age (old) and have been to concerts, race tracks, played rock and roll live in bands for 35 years, you are lucky if you can hear over 12,000 Hz. So a 44kHz sample rate should be more than sufficient.
Some folks do not feel like 2X the highest frequency are enough and want more resolution. So 48, 96kHz & 128k are available as increasingly higher resolution sample rates. Analog, after all, has an "infinite" sample rate*. 96kHz is double the data of a 48kHz recording. Only your ears can tell you if you think it is worth twice the data, half the tracks and a lot more CPU time.
[* quantum physics shows that time actually happens in "ticks". It isn't smooth or infinite.]
References
A guide to Audio Bitrate (with data table to show effects of various settings: https://www.gumlet.com/learn/audio-bitrate/
A basic guide to RAM: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/tech-tips-and-tricks/computer-ram.html
Hard Disk Speeds https://blog.purestorage.com/purely-informational/ssd-vs-hdd-speeds-whats-the-difference
Set up time machine: https://support.apple.com/en-us/104984
Mac OS Ventura Compatibility Database: https://www.production-expert.com/apple-macos-ventura-audio-compatibility-chart
Nyquist-Shannon Sampling Theorm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist%E2%80%93Shannon_sampling_theorem
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