KVR Audio

nicolasvr · Post by **nicolasvr** » Sat Feb 18, 2017 6:16 pm

hello

i recently bought a Dell Inspiron laptop to make music out of the house. i already had for some years a
HP Z1 workstation. I thought that the Dell could easily handle my projects made on my Z1 but when i opened a track made in my DAW (Maschine 2.5) who had a lot of plugins inserted etc. it started to glitch while the CPU-indicator in Maschine was reaching maximum.. On the Z1 the CPU-indicator is at +/- 50%
for the same project.
I must say that i use a Scarlett 8i6 (1st gen.) as audio interface with my Z1 while on my laptop i use its internal soundcard for playback, which is Realtek Audio. I don't think this makes a difference because the audio interface doesn't do any digital signal processing concerning the processing power demanded by the used plug-ins. I even tested this out by using an NI Audio 2DJ audio interface with my laptop and it made no difference.

the specs;
- Dell Inspiron laptop:
Intel Core i7 - 6500 CPU @ 2.50GHz
16GB RAM
Win10 Pro 64-bit
system drive and storage drive are SSD

- HP Z workstation
Intel Xeon CPU E31245 @ 3.30 GHz
8GB RAM
Win 7 Pro 64-bit
system drive and storage drive are HDD

Is there something i can upgrade on my laptop to give it more power or should i just bounce my tracks more often?

ere2learn · Post by **ere2learn** » Sat Feb 18, 2017 6:35 pm

The dell has about half the power of the HP,the dell is a U processor which next to useless for audio production as its low grade made for mobile use

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu ... 40+2.50GHz

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu ... 40+3.30GHz

Intel mobile processors summary

nicolasvr · Post by **nicolasvr** » Tue Feb 28, 2017 12:33 pm

ere2learn wrote:The dell has about half the power of the HP,the dell is a U processor which next to useless for audio production as its low grade made for mobile use

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu ... 40+2.50GHz

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu ... 40+3.30GHz

Intel mobile processors summary

oohw okay.. makes indeed a big difference. thanks for the info doc!
so upgrading on the processor should do it?

incubus · Post by **incubus** » Wed Mar 01, 2017 3:46 am

Call me wacky, but the first question that came to my mind is are you using asio4all, or simply the realtek drivers? Also, you said you tried an NI device, have you ever tried it with the scarlett?

Using wasapi in bitwig (which isn't as low as my babyface pro obviously) I get terrific performance compared to my desktop (a 4770, not overclocked) with the SAME host/plugs/projects. It's a 7500U which isn't dramatically better in testing.

Fact is, you should be running most laptops at a higher buffer unless it's something really powerful.

Benchmarks don't always tell the whole story (though useful)

egbert · Post by **egbert** » Wed Mar 01, 2017 4:02 am

DPC latency issues can be another reason why laptops are crackle-fests even when the CPU isn't flat out. I would try a decent USB interface on the Dell with an ASIO driver to see what potential it has in that scenario. If DPC latency issues are afoot ( there are apps like latencymon.exe you can use to check ) you may be able to fix the issue by turning off some drivers (eg wifi) when using audio apps.

nicolasvr · Post by **nicolasvr** » Wed Mar 01, 2017 2:58 pm

egbert wrote:DPC latency issues can be another reason why laptops are crackle-fests even when the CPU isn't flat out. I would try a decent USB interface on the Dell with an ASIO driver to see what potential it has in that scenario. If DPC latency issues are afoot ( there are apps like latencymon.exe you can use to check ) you may be able to fix the issue by turning off some drivers (eg wifi) when using audio apps.

it was an issue i wasn't known with.been checking out the causes of DPC latency and it may be my NVIDIA graphic card maybe.. i'll check it out and will do the test with the same audio interface to be sure
thanks for the reply.

nicolasvr · Post by **nicolasvr** » Wed Mar 01, 2017 3:06 pm

incubus wrote:Call me wacky, but the first question that came to my mind is are you using asio4all, or simply the realtek drivers? Also, you said you tried an NI device, have you ever tried it with the scarlett?

Using wasapi in bitwig (which isn't as low as my babyface pro obviously) I get terrific performance compared to my desktop (a 4770, not overclocked) with the SAME host/plugs/projects. It's a 7500U which isn't dramatically better in testing.

Fact is, you should be running most laptops at a higher buffer unless it's something really powerful.

Benchmarks don't always tell the whole story (though useful)

yes i tried with Asio4all and had the same clicks, glitches, pops. i didn't try it with the Scarlett because of the thought that audio interfaces don't supply DSP-power, but now with the possible cause explained by Egbert i think it may something to do with the driver of my internal soundcard (although it's up to date)
or the NVIDIA graphic card, so i'll try it with the same audio interface to see the reaction.
is a higher buffer size safer?

egbert · Post by **egbert** » Wed Mar 01, 2017 5:07 pm

Yes - raise buffer a couple of notches eg from 256 up to 512 or 1024 to see if that clears the clicks and pops. The lower the buffer size the less chance the machine has to keep the task streaming smoothly. Clicks and pops are basically buffer underrun errors.

incubus · Post by **incubus** » Thu Mar 02, 2017 12:15 am

And even though it doesn't "technically" work in new windows version, try the DSP latency checker as mentioned. If it comes up with red bars, it might be something else.

egbert · Post by **egbert** » Thu Mar 02, 2017 7:01 am

Latencymon works with Win 8 and 10.

HP Z1 workstation vs. Dell Inspiron laptop