Korean Job Discussion Forums

[davidbowzy]

Hi,

I'm going to be moving to Seoul at the end of the summer and I was thinking of possibly buying an Apple Mac when I get over there and I was wondering if this was a good idea, will it be cheaper and will I be able to get a an English keyboard with it as standard.

I will also be in the market for buying studio monitors for music production purposes, again I'm wondering if it will be cheaper and will stuff like that be widely available.

Cheers!

[the oak llama]

I don't speak from experience, but I've read on here that things that aren't korean made will be comparably priced.

So if you're after a mac it will probably cost you the same, possibly more?

Don't know about korean audio gear.

[davidbowzy]

[the oak llama]

Yeah I'm going to be looking to get some audio stuff.

I would bet that Samsung is cheaper. I would guess that you can at least order one with English keys and get the OS in English if they're not in the stores. Seoul would definitely be your best bet.

[Forward Observer]

I was watching CNET news this week, they said that if you're buying apple products - never get the base model. Why? Because the base model always uses cheaper parts, etc. Always upgrade, you'll get better performance and life out of the macbook.

[superacidjax]

Any of the aluminum MacBooks or higher will be first rate.. I used a MacBook Pro before the new MacBooks came out and I find that my new MB is plenty fast.. I needed the 13 inch screen because I use the computer as part of my DJing and the 15 and 17's took up too much space in the booth.

I've been using the MB since October and zero problems.. that includes some brief tour-time and living out of hotel rooms and being in cluttered DJ booths.. No scratches, no crashes, no freezes mid-show (that would be an absolute nightmare!)

If you're interested in serious music production, get a Mac and Logic. Unless you are setting up a Pro Tools system, there is nothing in the PC world that competes with Logic. Just read a few production magazines (especially Remix (www.remixmag.com)) and you'll see that Mac and Logic (and frequently Ableton Live) are the de facto standard.

Pro Tools is an exception to that generality and Pro Tools is very good, although for electronic music, I still like Logic better because the MIDI implementation is much much easier to use as are the on-board synths and the sampler. I've used both, I've made decent stuff with both.

The major, major factor that is something to consider is the stability of the Mac when running audio production or DJing programs.. it's rock-solid. I wouldn't DJ with Windows (especially Vista) under any circumstances. Also the various devices that you will eventually decide to add to your studio -- well with Mac, you simply plug them in and everything works. With Windows, it can be frustrating sometimes!

If you by a Mac in Korea, it will have a Korean keyboard, but the layout is in American English. You can use the Korean keyboard and not even know the difference.. My ex-gf bought a MacBook there two years ago and the keyboard is fine (no letters mismatched like with those blasted French keyboards!)

The aluminum Macbook (any speed, just as long as it's the newest generation) with extra RAM would be perfect for production. I run Logic on a 2.4Ghz/4GB ram, aluminum MB that I bought when they came out in October and it runs Logic along with the Waves plugins and a whole suite of Native Instruments softsynths, Ableton simultaneously with no problems with latency and no crash/hanging issues.

You can certainly get a Samsung laptop, and I'm sure they're great (but not for a production platform!), but just as pro news photographers only use Nikon or Canon (sometimes Leica) the majority of producers use Mac or a ProTools-specific pc. You CAN make great music on anything with any program, but I would be conscious of the industry standards specifically because the standards will have the best support, the best community and the best stability.

As far as buying monitors goes.. I have never heard of any native Korean monitor manufacturers, you're going to pay a premium for any pro-audio. There might be some great Korean monitors, but if so, I haven't seen them.. Be sure to do your research on monitors before buying. The sweetwater site I mention below has some great "how-to" buying guides.

I recommend sweetwater sound.. they'll ship to Korea and they know their business very well.. all of the sales guys are either musicians or trained audio engineers.. My sales guy is Carson McClain, he DJs and does dance production but he's qualified on everything recording related: [email protected]

I order almost all of my stuff from there because they're good, but they also know how to ship stuff to Korea with minimal fuss and at a decent cost.

If you find anywhere that sells Mackie 824s in Seoul, let me know!

Good luck!

If anyone cares, here's a link to my May progressive house promo mix. It's about 53 minutes..

http://web.me.com/superacidjax/Sparkling_Chaos/Music.html

[davidbowzy]

[superacidjax]

[bassexpander]

Use IE to view this:

http://www.enuri.com/view/List.jsp?menu=1&cate=020307

You might see some montors mixed in there.

Here is a sample of Paradigm's in V.5:

http://itempage3.auction.co.kr/DetailView.aspx?itemNo=a092682150&frm3=V2

The v.6 model is a bit more.

[ChinaBoy]

Korean keyboards are just like all the others, just have an extra splotch in a corner of the key.

[davidbowzy]

[Trevor]

I can sell you a pair of Tannoy PBM 6.5 passive monitors for 100,000 Won plus shipping (which isn't much).

[bassexpander]

Thought you might find some monitors in there. Here are some shops. There are some places selling this stuff in the Yongsan I-park building, and just North of it across the street:

http://www.saehansound.net

http://pazone.co.kr

http://www.naraesound.co.kr