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Comment by coldtea | Hacker News Reader

>For that kind of money you could buy an M2 iPad Pro with more performance and a lot more battery time than 2.5 hours

This has a strong https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224 vibe to it.

The computing-part hardware specs don't matter at all, the same way you don't compare the cpu specs of a phone or a synth to a laptop or tablet. This is about the interface, pads, firmware, comprehensiveness and convenience as a Live controller and as a standalone performance sequencer/drum machine/instrument.

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The part that gets me is that it’s x86, and not even very recent x86. This CPU model was released for retail in Q3'20. It’s 10nm. I would have much preferred to see something like a 4nm Zen4 Ryzen or ideally, some combination of ASIC / ARM there.

The other annoying thing is that it doesn’t even include a Live standard license at this price, only Live Intro. That’s just being cheap on Ableton’s part.

The big benefit I see of this over something like a Linnstrument + iPad + iConnectivity AUDIO4c is portability and Live compatibility, but I’d personally wait and see how stable the software is before pulling the trigger. Relying on a brand new software stack on x86 to do the exact right things in perfect time for live music is a bet I wouldn’t take. I hope it’s amazing, and I’m sure lots of folks worked very hard on this, but the proof will be in the pudding. There’s a reason that you don’t see Pioneer and Denon decks / mixers or really any other live audio gear rocking x86.

> The computing-part hardware specs don't matter at all

Except when you're trying to run dozens of VST plugins which are extremely CPU hungry.

I'm pretty sure the Push 3 has been calculated to be able to run the plugins it needs to run - and without interruptions or other apps taking over the OS.

> to be able to run the plugins it needs to run

What does that even mean?

How many Diva instances can it run?

Edit:

And BTW, AKAI MPC users hit CPU limits all the time. And that's not even using heavy VSTs like Diva but the ARM optimized plugins included.

It can run zero diva instances. No third party plugins.

>What does that even mean?

It means that it has enough specs to run the plugins and use cases Ableton designed it for, and tested it with.

It's not a complete studio or meant to replace a desktop studio computer for all uses. It's a dedicated standalone thing, and has its own capabilities and limitations. So, like any other "groovebox" style device.

I think this take is also a bit shallow, given the maker touts the specs as a selling point. Arguing about the specs for the price shouldn't be shunned upon in these circumstances.

From the marketing piece:

> Intel 11th Gen Core™ i3-1115G4 processor with 8GB of RAM Built-in lithium battery with up to 2.5 hours play time Built-in 256GB SSD hard drive Replace processor, battery and hard drive as technology improves

Point is not the hardware specs. The point is that the iPad Pro makes an excellent portable musical workstation on the go as well (GarageBand comes with it, and Logic Pro has been ported over). So if you had to choose one this becomes a relevant comparison point.

The other thing about the iPad is that it’s pretty stable and predictable, with a very mature OS and very mature hardware. It’s also commodity, so if it gets stolen on a tour or smashed or beer spilled on it, it’s not hard to find an Apple Store anywhere in the world and pick up a replacement. That’s huge for touring musicians.

They don't matter at all to the market, but they do matter to the quality of the product.

If I can trivially make a better version of the thing you are selling at 1/3rd the price, then something isn't right.

you remember individual comments from 15 years ago?

It's a rather notorious HN comment, pretty much our equivalent of "No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame."

Wow, I had forgotten about that! Could just as well replace it here :)

That one in particular is somewhat famous and gets trotted out as an example of a bad, wrong take, highly upvoted and missing the point of the product because the audience here is so technical they can barely perceive normal users' problems

It's sort of ironic now, though, because Dropbox has not been doing very well the last few years, because their product wasn't novel enough to compete with the better-integrated solutions from Microsoft, Apple, and Google that Dropbox inspired

>It's sort of ironic now, though, because Dropbox has not been doing very well the last few years

Yes, but not for the reasons that famous comment thought it wouldn't (people ...trivially rolling their own with Linux+FTP+SVN or whatever). If anything, for the opposite reasons: because even more turnkey/integrated solutions than Dropbox became available as you say. Which makes that comment appear even more off now!

(Of course the point of that comment was already obliterated when Dropbox turned on to become a multi-billion worth company, even if it's "not doing very well" 15+ years after the comment was made. We could only wish we have that kind of "failure"!).

Well, the original comment made 3 distinct arguments which can basically be summed up as:

1) Its feature-set is easily duplicated (from a technical perspective)

2) It doesn't solve one particular use-case (that it wasn't designed to solve)

3) It's hard to imagine it catching on, let alone making money

Point #1 was widely mocked after Dropbox caught on, but turned out to be kind of correct - it just wasn't end-users that mimicked its feature-set, it was other companies.

Point #2 is irrelevant.

Point #3 was hilariously wrong. It went viral as hell, and the founders could've rode off into the sunset with a boatload of cash if they sold the company to Apple when they were approached. In the alternate universe where that happened, Apple devices just have a Dropbox feature instead of iCloud, a la Siri and Shazam.

Regarding #1, being easily replicated by end-users was the whole point of Point #1 in the original comment. It rested entirely on how easy it is to just slap such a thing together, and how people will just do it and skip using Dropbox which would mean the product would fail.

Whether it could be duplicated by other companies (with billions in the bank and thousands of engineers and OS/device access for integration) is irrelevant to the original comment's point.

This comment is unusually well known. If you google the url wrapped in quotes, you'll see it referred to as "the famous/infamous dropbox comment".

It's become something of a symbol for how hackernews commenters sometimes confidently miss the appeal of products/services. It's relevant here because the Push 3 doesn't compete with iPads on processing power.

The linked comment is something of an in-joke on Hacker News. BrandonM famously provided some quick, critical feedback on a Dropbox announcement. Dropbox of course went on to see a lot of success.

Edit: it looks like a few other folks responded with a similar comment as I did. Sorry to spam you.

No, it's a famous comment that has become sort of a HN/hackerspace meme.

Oh, yes, I know one of those comments too

> No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame.

(iPod launch, CmdrTaco, /. 2001)

“But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.” —Carl Sagan

(Though I'd prefer Galileo in the top spot instead of Columbus; if anything Columbus could replace Bozo: the people that laughed at him were actually completely right, not failing to recognize his genius.)

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