Karaoke Forums

Suppose you could download the demos. I didn't know until I got it & tested it.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Ask the compuhost folks.

Best Buy Iowa--sucks Best Buy Indiana---sucks Best Buy Toronto Canada---- sucks. After multiple suckies at 3 different parts of the country, they've struck out with me with lots of foul balls. I don't want to hijack this thread so leave it at that.

Misquote--2 parts of the country AND in another country. Sucks. Sorry.

How do they suck? Online purchases? I have never had any issues with Best Buy in store & customer service for a TV I bought.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Multiple suckies. Last one was for a 42" plasma and when I started having problems with it, as usual Best Buy doesn't know how to treat a person as, well,,, a person. Went 10 weeks without a tv while they decided my fate. Just the last bad deal I had with them. And I do mean last! And I'm not exaggerating, 10 weeks!

I'm running an acer with zero problems. DVD-writer compatable with CDGRip and Pwoerkaraoke's cdg burner. Don't know about microstudio or hoster but would assume they would work as well.

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The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

HDMI to video and audio adapter cables dont work. you have to use a vga to video adapter on those machines. I know I have one, and have tried everything.

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I'm Not Dead yet...... But every day Im getting Closer !

Dell XPS that is about 4 years old. Duel Core 2.3 gHz and 256k video card. I run compuhost on it and the built in sound card works well enough with my mixer that I don't need a USB type card. This XPS also has color changing LEDs in it so it adds to the show atmosphere and all that.

It's a monster however and I use a USB power cooling mat with 2 fans just to be safe. The karaoke programs don't come close to using the CPU in full but I used it for graphic artwork and stuff so that's why it likely to be overkill for a karaoke computer.

Let me help you with this please!

You need 4 gigs of RAM minimum, and you need to decide what hosting software to use.

I downloaded a lot of DEMOs, and finally picked Compuhost, and have never regretted it. I have a lot of KJs who come to my shows, and when I show them the features IN ACTUAL USE they are frequently jealous. The filler music deck, and rotation software is awesome. One app, and this thing does EVERYTHING you could want.

Second, you MUST use an external audio interface (USB), you can't come out from the headphone jack. Otherwise you'll hear the laptop's fan noise through your system. Futher, the additional processing will improve your audio quality significantly. All you need is something basic like this:

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/FastTrackUSB.html

Third, to maintain the quality of your audio, you can't compress your files to much so hard drive space is a must. I recommend a portable external hardrive. I use a 500gb free agent go from Seagate. Also, use a 75% VARIABLE compression for great sounding audio, while maximizing compression.

Fourth: Heat is your enemy. You will need to get a cooling pad, and ELEVATE your laptop to keep it cool during shows. Otherwise the audio and video quality will suffer during performances even with the best laptop.

Fifth: Your laptop will need to have an s-video out. You can easily convert this to RCA with a simple $5 adaptor, and you will need a multi-distribution amplifier to split the signal to multiple TVs.

Any other tech questions, let me know!

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Good music, good friends, howling good times!

Not at all. I use only 1 gig in my laptop.. and I run a singer screen and a usb projector with absolutely no problems

Not true. I run Compuhost easily -- for hundreds of gigs now -- with 1G on XP. You should be good with 2G on Vista.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

The one I use cost 77cents! !

Granted there was $1.57 shipping and handling, but what the hey??!!

Yes, and I suspect that you folks are using XP. Most laptops come with Vista now, NOT XP.

If you don't have 4 gigs and are using Vista you WILL have problems, period, the end. I'm a GEEK, trust me.

Furthermore, additional RAM adds maximum flexibility when running multiple apps, improves your audio quality, and reduces heat as the processer doesn't have to constantly switch out data.

The laptop will run smoother, longer, and sound better.

RAM is cheap when buying new, why not do yourself a favor and maximize you RAM?

Or to put it another way: More RAM, GOOD! Less RAM, BAD!

Let me also add, that after all of that you need to go into display setting and click 16 bit colors, and then go into control panel> advanced tools> adjust appearance and performance options for windows,and when the appearance options window pops up select: sdjust for best performance. This will uncheck every box, turn off animation, reduce fonts, etc.

Let me also recommend that you uninstall all the packed software, and remove all the extras from your startup, and turn off all firewalls (don't connect to the internet!), and adware protection.

Trust me, your system will scream speed after that.

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Good music, good friends, howling good times!

Being involved in computers professionally for 30 years, I am not impressed.

I have 20+ laptops in operation with Vista, and 2G is fine for applications like Compuhost.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

And been I've been involved with computers for 25 years. I don't care if you've been involved since Jesus was a corporal, that doesn't change that Windows sucks as on OS that constantly sucks RAM at idle! When running an intense four to five hour gig, for which I'm well paid I'm going to ere on the side of caution.

My point is RAM is cheap. My laptop only cost $840, and came with a big hardrive, and 4 gigs of RAM. Why wouldn't you maximize your memory now when you know it'll be more expensive to upgrade it in the future?

Besides, who know what other apps I'm going to be running in the future? Why not nip it in the bud and be prepared?

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Good music, good friends, howling good times!

Aha, so I see that you really have no solid reason for saying this. Just a suspicion, and "erring on the side of caution".

We have a number of people here who have been gigging with Compuhost and Vista for some time. I think most of them have 2G laptops, and I have never seen the "run out of memory" complaint. In fact, if you are not using the computer for anything except that one application, it would take a heck of a memory leak to run you out of memory. One so bad that constant problems would be reported.

Are you sure you don't have one year of experience 25 times over?

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

You read my post and all you got was "erring on the side of caution" and that I listed noother logical reasons for the additional RAM?" Read much?

Having been in computers so long, and you would actually recommend to someone to go ahead with the MINIMUM amount of memory for their laptop to run an application that continually expands and updates??

In a stagnant world, that never moves forward, improves or adds additional functionallity I have to admit: You're right.

I'm not trying to flame here, trust me, but your logic completely escapes me.

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Good music, good friends, howling good times!

Karaoke Koyote, just my .oo2, but as a new member with only 21 posts to your name, you started out delivering decent info, but now you're picking on a seasoned poster in reference to Mckyj57 whom has been here awhile, is RESPECTED, and has nearly 2500 posts of great info to his name.

I know you said you're not flaming, but it appears that way when you become sarcastic, condescending, and emotional. This being just my opinion.

It would be a real shame if you lost credibility 'outta the gate' when i'm sure you can become a good source of info for the rest of us.

Respect is earned here over time, and the ones who come in domineering in the past usually get shunned by the rest of us. I won't mention any names, but one has a 'picture-taking name'... and the other lives in kansas........but what do i know?

I hope you do the right thing and keep it informative. Cheers.

Not even so, my older system has been running MTU Hoster 3 with 788 MB without a glitch for the last 4 years - it is a Win 2000 Pro machine (hey if it ain't broke). I believe in the adage having more, but to say it's a minimum requirement is rediculous.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!