jonknowles8 wrote:Thanks for the suggestions. On thinking further about it, I gather one would have to put all the libraries into the same folder, either on the HD or the external HD (or point N3 from one to another while loading instruments, which would be inconvenient). Since I have 3 libraries now on my main computer HD, guess I'll put Miroslav there too. And likely backup some or all of them on an external HD.
I thought I had read posts on this forum about the usefulness / desirability of putting libraries on an external drive and I thought Lubo Astinov mentioned something about that in one of the tutorials on VSTi's - which is why I was wondering.
Jon
The VSTi libraries for Notion 3 need to be in the same parent folder, but this is not a requirement for third-party VSTi libraries like the ones from IK Multimedia (Miroslav Philharmonik, SampleTank 2.5, Xpansion Tank 2, SonicSynth2, and so forth) . . .
As you can see in these two screen captures, on the Mac the Notion 3 Sounds are in a completely different parent folder from the various IK Multimedia VST and VSTi components . . .
Notion 3 Sounds ~ Mac OS X 10.6.6IK Multimedia VST and VSTi Components ~ Mac OS X 10.6.6I do not use Windows, but I think that the folders on a Windows machine will have a similar organization and structure, although some of the higher-level folders will be a bit different with respect to location and naming conventions, where to be specific "higher-level folders" is referring to different aspects of the operating system and so forth . . .
On the Mac, the "higher-level folders" typically are "Library" and its subfolder "Application Support", with the application-specific folders being subfolders of the "Application Support" subfolder of the "Library" folder . . .
Regarding external hard drives, LaCie has some very nice units that have several different interfaces (eSATA, USB 2, Firewire 400, Firewire 800) . . .
LaCie d2 Quadra Hard Diskhttp://www.lacie.com/us/products/product.htm?pid=11156On the other hand, internal hard drive prices have dropped significantly over the past year or so, and a 1TB Seagate Barracuda 7200 RPM internal hard drive costs approximately $60 at Other World Computing (as contrasted to the 1TB LaCie d2 Quadra Hard Disk price of approximately $150) . . .
It is virtually trivial to add an internal hard drive to a Mac Pro, and depending on the specific type of Windows computer it should be just as easy if there is an open slot and the motherboard and power supply have the required hard drive cables, and I think that some of the newer Windows machines probably have the same type of internal hard drive bays that a Mac Pro has, where you do not need to mess with cables, at all, since you only need to open part of the computer case, at which time installing an internal hard drive maps to pushing the internal hard drive into a slot that already has the required cables attached . . .
The internal hard drive will need to be partitioned and formatted, no matter how you do it, but so what . . .
So what! It has been a while since I did any hardware work in the Windows universe, but there probably are hard drive controller cards, and for the most part they will be very fast if not faster than some of the onboard hard drive controllers, where for example 10 years ago there were ultrafast SCSI cards (PCI) and external SCSI hard drive bays, which is what people used for multimedia and whatever, since they were considerably faster than IDE drives . . .
Whatever! eSATA and USB 3.0 are considerably faster and more readily available, but the 1TB Seagate Barracuda 7200 RPM internal hard drives are very peppy, and at some point it becomes a bit absurd to wander into making everything super fast, unless you are doing video work or 3D modeling . . .
There are eSATA and USB 3.0 PCI cards for the Mac Pro, as there are for Windows machines . . .
You can get an eSATA or USB 3.0 PCI card for about $30 to $35 at Amazon.com, and when this is combined with an eSATA or USB 3.0 external hard drive, it will be as fast or perhaps faster than the internal hard drives, depending on the motherboard, processor(s), system design, and whatever . . .
Whatever! Nevertheless, if have a Mac Pro or a Windows machine with a case that allows you to access the hardware, something so simple as getting a faster internal hard drive with a higher storage capacity can be a very inexpensive way to boost the overall performance and throughput of your computer . . .
There are software utilities that make it possible to clone an internal hard drive, and if you have the ability to add an additional internal hard drive, you can clone your primary internal hard drive and then boot to the new internal hard drive, which depending on the various licensing schemes might require reauthorizing some of the software and the operating system itself, but there are provisions for doing this . . .
It is very easy to do on the Mac, and it probably is easy to do on a Windows machine, although with respect to Windows machines running anything beyond Windows 2000 Professional, I hesitate to guess what might be involved regarding licensing schemes, although the reality is that hard drives fail and it is fair and reasonable to expect to be able to replace a failed hard drive without being required to go through an endless series of strange and bizarre licensing procedures, no matter what the operating system might be . . .
In the grand scheme of everything, it is difficult to determine which of the two major operating system vendors (Apple and Microsoft) are the most paranoid overall . . .
Apple definitely is very paranoid with respect to its hardware and operating systems, but my solution for the Mac is to get a family-license for everything, which does not cost much more than a single-user license, so that I typically have 5 licenses for all the Apple stuff, hence for example I can have at least 5 separate internal hard drives that are fully licensed for OS X 10.6.6, and since it takes just a few minutes to swap an internal hard drive on the Mac Pro, what do I care . . .
Not much! And I think that you can do something similar in the Windows universe, which at least in theory should not require much more than connecting to the web and going through an authorization procedure and perhaps downloading some updates . . .
[
NOTE: Microsoft support for Windows XP SP2 ended last summer, so you need to be running Windows XP SP3 to get automatic updates from Microsoft. How this applies to replacing a hard drive is another matter, but you can call Microsoft and ask about it . . . ]
I suppose that after working on Windows machines since the first version of Windows, I should not be surprised to discover that hardware prices at the component level continue to drop, but I have not checked internal hard drive prices in a while, and I am a bit surprised that 1TB internal hard drives that a few years ago were in the $150 range now are approximately $60 or less . . .
It all depends on a lot of factors, but if your motherboard and hard drive controller(s) are sufficiently fast but you have a slower internal hard drive, then upgrading your internal hard drive can be a stellar way to get a performance boost and a huge jump in storage capacity, but even if the internal hard drive performance is the same, upgrading to a larger capacity internal hard drive gets you more storage space, which in the Windows universe for a machine that has easy access to the internal components is not a difficult upgrade . . .
On the other hand, I did some upgrades on an Apple 20" iMac 2.1-GHz (G5) iSight computer, and it was a bit frightening, since it required removing everything from the front, which begins essentially by removing the flat-panel display, and it is
not something that Apple supports or advises as a do-it-yourself activity, but so what . . .
So what! At the time, there was a website in France that had detailed photographs of all the steps, and I did the upgrade successfully even though the instructions were in French, really . . .
Really! Summarizing, doing internal hard drive updates on a Mac Pro or a Windows desktop computer that has an easily opened case is not very difficult to do if you have the required tools and know enough about working on electrical stuff to avoid injuring yourself, which mostly is a matter of disconnecting the computer from the electrical outlet or power strip and avoiding touching capacitors unless you properly discharge them . . .
There are some rules for avoiding damage to the computer caused by static electricity, but
the most important thing is to avoid electrocuting yourself, since the fact of the matter is that
doing anything involving electricity and electrical components requires following safety procedures very diligently . . .
Another strategy is to have a computer technician do the upgrade, which is fabulous . . .
Fabulous! :)