Noiz2
Sound Ninja
Again I'm not trying to be a PT rah rah boy but there are some misconceptions that get repeated a bunch.
First there are some workarounds but Le does have some semi serious post issues out of the box. However there is no reason to be buying a 003 and the DV tool kit. Now I'm speaking strictly from a film post perspective. If your recording music your needs will be different. There is no added power with the 003 over even the M-Box mini. The Mini runs under $300. Since the mini has no inputs it's not a great post choice so the real low priced all digi solution would be the M-Box at ~~$350. In post your not going to need more than two inputs, you actually hardly ever use any these days. You can cut a film with 32 tracks, until the "mix" systems came out in the late 90's PT was effectively limited to 16 mono tracks and a whole lot of very good sound tracks were produced on those systems. But TC would be nice and more tracks is always welcome. So the cheap entry is the academic version of PT Le. It comes with TC enabled and runs ~$150. Add a $100 M-Audio interface and you have a decent entry level post system. Sticking with Digi you could get the musicians toolkit (it's called something like that). That's ~$500 and adds TC and gives you 48 stereo or mono tracks. So that is still under $1000.
TC isn't used all that much in post editorial. Well it is but not in the gota see it all the time kind of way. You need it to get your session started in the right place. You need it so you can talk about "adding something at xx:xx:xx:xx". You need it to conform. But you don't really need it to edit. If the session comes from a system with TC and it's set up properly you will get a TC display in Le. I've supervised a number of mixed system shows and it's a little extra work but it's not that big a deal. If your on your own it could be a problem. But on the other hand the cheapest conforming software that I know of is around $800. A decent speaker system will set you back about the same. If your mixing you need a control surface and that's a grand. HD is pricey but you can run it on a G3 decently and very well on a G4. The same power in a "native" app like Le or performer will require a fast G5 at least and will really benefit from something much newer and faster. My point is that if your really working in post a few thousand for your core application is rather small potatoes in the overall cost and you should make the choice on your needs not on whether you can save a few bucks here and there. A full post setup with limited mixing is going to run you $30K - $60K plus whatever you need to do to the room.
I know five people are going to jump in and talk about their $200 post suites. They are all full of it. If you do a LOT on your own and get good used prices etc you can probably set your self up for $12,000. But work for a few years and add up what you added on to that system and you will be shocked. I certainly never had the change to drop $30,000 on a system. But it's well over that now. Little bits at a time, a bargain here getting a show to pay for X there. It adds up. And it's actually cheaper now since you don't HAVE to own a 3/4" deck (at like $14K new retail).
So get what you need. Same advice for OS's. If what you need works on the OS you know, stay where you are.
First there are some workarounds but Le does have some semi serious post issues out of the box. However there is no reason to be buying a 003 and the DV tool kit. Now I'm speaking strictly from a film post perspective. If your recording music your needs will be different. There is no added power with the 003 over even the M-Box mini. The Mini runs under $300. Since the mini has no inputs it's not a great post choice so the real low priced all digi solution would be the M-Box at ~~$350. In post your not going to need more than two inputs, you actually hardly ever use any these days. You can cut a film with 32 tracks, until the "mix" systems came out in the late 90's PT was effectively limited to 16 mono tracks and a whole lot of very good sound tracks were produced on those systems. But TC would be nice and more tracks is always welcome. So the cheap entry is the academic version of PT Le. It comes with TC enabled and runs ~$150. Add a $100 M-Audio interface and you have a decent entry level post system. Sticking with Digi you could get the musicians toolkit (it's called something like that). That's ~$500 and adds TC and gives you 48 stereo or mono tracks. So that is still under $1000.
TC isn't used all that much in post editorial. Well it is but not in the gota see it all the time kind of way. You need it to get your session started in the right place. You need it so you can talk about "adding something at xx:xx:xx:xx". You need it to conform. But you don't really need it to edit. If the session comes from a system with TC and it's set up properly you will get a TC display in Le. I've supervised a number of mixed system shows and it's a little extra work but it's not that big a deal. If your on your own it could be a problem. But on the other hand the cheapest conforming software that I know of is around $800. A decent speaker system will set you back about the same. If your mixing you need a control surface and that's a grand. HD is pricey but you can run it on a G3 decently and very well on a G4. The same power in a "native" app like Le or performer will require a fast G5 at least and will really benefit from something much newer and faster. My point is that if your really working in post a few thousand for your core application is rather small potatoes in the overall cost and you should make the choice on your needs not on whether you can save a few bucks here and there. A full post setup with limited mixing is going to run you $30K - $60K plus whatever you need to do to the room.
I know five people are going to jump in and talk about their $200 post suites. They are all full of it. If you do a LOT on your own and get good used prices etc you can probably set your self up for $12,000. But work for a few years and add up what you added on to that system and you will be shocked. I certainly never had the change to drop $30,000 on a system. But it's well over that now. Little bits at a time, a bargain here getting a show to pay for X there. It adds up. And it's actually cheaper now since you don't HAVE to own a 3/4" deck (at like $14K new retail).
So get what you need. Same advice for OS's. If what you need works on the OS you know, stay where you are.
