What drives you crazy in Bitwig?

[antic604]

Thanks for the tips

My pleasure

1. Specs only tell half the story. For realtime audio it's enough that one component doesn't work properly or creates a bottleneck. Observe what your system's doing while you get the glitches - how's the per-core utilisation? What's the CPU clock rate? Run LatencyMon and see what it finds? Adjust your audio interface settings (proper driver, buffer size adequate for project stage, optimal audio rate & resolution, etc.)? Pay attention which plugins causes this most often? Try different plugin version (e.g. VST2 instead of VST3)? Experiment with plugin sandboxing modes (in Settings / Plugins)?

2. Really try getting familiar with mouse wheel. It works great for moving around the project. I only ever use the vertical bars to double click on them to zoom to centent (although this was added in 3.2 or 3.3, too )

3. Yeah, free content scaling - and other 3.2 and 3.3 features - are awesome

4. I'm 100% certain all three work, unless you're doing it on a CLIP not TRACK HEADER, then only Ctrl+R will work (I'm trying to convince support to make Alt+click work too, because it's much more convenient and works everywhere else).

[Hanz Meyzer]

I have some real headaches with Bitwig when it comes to missing detail features, but maybe I simply do not know how to do it, can you help me? These points constantly drive me crazy:

1. There is no audio buffer reset / clear like in Renoise (double press stop button). So if I use fx with lot of feedback, I’ll have to wait some minutes until the audio buffer is empty and I can rerender! This seems to be pretty absurd to me, what the hell? The new render will contain a rest of the old play. Pretty annoying. Is there a way to workaround this or can I even clear the audio/plugins’ buffers?

2. Everytime I switch the samplerate in the settings, the whole project will reload. But I often render multiple samplerates to hear some unknown rendering differences, kind of interesting. But reloading the whole project all the time, will make these tests very annoying. Why is that?

3. Each time I developed a further composition, I all the time have to manually refresh the render area, each time I save a new song version, I manually have to reenter a new rendering filename. Also while live rendering, I can’t mute the audio! So I can’t continue to work an other audio stuff while rendering. These points drives me nuts.

4. The note chase feature is a nice addition - for live editing/looping etc. But what the heck, it also will be applied on rendering! Why is that, makes no sense to me.

5. After switching tracks and going back, it does not remember the last scroll position of the dsp bar in that track. But it seems to already remember the last highlighted device. So why it’s not scrolling to that device on switching? I don’t get it. Lot of nonsense mouse operations.

6. I can’t reset LFOs? So each start of the song might be a total random combination! I then have to rerender multiple times, until I get the balance I want. Really timeconsuming and annoying. I neither seem to be able to reset a LFO modulator nor the LFO in the chorus, etc.

Maybe this sounds like 1st world problems to you, but in the sum it really frustrates me… Should I have a better frustration tolerance or do you agree here? Maybe once you are used to such comfort like in Renoise, it is pretty difficult to “downgrade” your habits again… Any tips to workaround or do it the right way?

[MegaPixel]

1. Specs only tell half the story. For realtime audio it's enough that one component doesn't work properly or creates a bottleneck. Observe what your system's doing while you get the glitches - how's the per-core utilisation? What's the CPU clock rate? Run LatencyMon and see what it finds? Adjust your audio interface settings (proper driver, buffer size adequate for project stage, optimal audio rate & resolution, etc.)? Pay attention which plugins causes this most often? Try different plugin version (e.g. VST2 instead of VST3)? Experiment with plugin sandboxing modes (in Settings / Plugins)?

CPU is @ 4.6Ghz to 4.7Ghz on all cores, 1 core will boost to 5Ghz I think when needed.

The bit bitwig cpu monitor thing, shows a massive spike when it happens but task manager shows about 8% on CPU usage, no spikes.

As for which plugins cause it, it's completely random, it's sometimes kontakt, then its sometimes hive2, then sometimes it's massive... And I can't always get it to repeat, eg load song, play stutters on 1st play. Close bitwig, re-open same song, play and all is fine... Then maybe next time I open it, it's all stutters again. It's very random.

The latencymon tool says things are fine.


The bitwig monitor tool has a period jitter which is always bouncing between 1 and 100% if I use the Focusrite thought.

https://youtu.be/esSCE3m7w6o

I've emailed bitwig support about this about 6 months ago, they had no ideas...

[antic604]

I have some real headaches with Bitwig...

1. I believe if you right-click on the DSP meter (ot that "CPU" icon next to it?) you can turn the audio engine on/off, but that reloads the VSTs as you say in #2

2. Yeah, that's annoying

3. I think Bitwig uses master track's name for naming the audio export. Rename it.

4. I don't know why you'd say it doesn't make sense for rendering. Maybe it's not what YOU expect, but it makes perfect sense.

5. Yup, not ideal

6. Well, I love that they can be random! But I can understand why you wouldn't Just use the LFOs that have option of syncing to transport (called "Sync" or "Transport" - most modulators do have that, I think), which means they'll be anchored to the beginning of arrangement and will always output the same value at the same arrangement position.

[antic604]

The bitwig monitor tool has a period jitter which is always bouncing between 1 and 100% if I use the Focusrite thought.

That Focusrite driver behaves really weird, indeed.

Do you get those stutters using other drivers, too? What about WASAPI, instead of ASIO? I'm assuming your PC has some internal audio, so have you tried that (for reference, obviously)? In power settings check if USB isn't set to some power saving mode, perhaps?

[Hanz Meyzer]

Thanks man! I will try your tips, great

[MegaPixel]

That Focusrite driver behaves really weird, indeed.

Do you get those stutters using other drivers, too? What about WASAPI, instead of ASIO? I'm assuming your PC has some internal audio, so have you tried that (for reference, obviously)? In power settings check if USB isn't set to some power saving mode, perhaps?

RE: WASAPI
Jitter is bouncing between 6 and 18% then, for all other modes bar the focusrite one it's locked at 100%. But WASAPI playback with the keyboards just sucks.

RE: USB
No USB low power mode, sleep modes etc all disabled. Sleep disabled etc. Might buy a scarlet solo gen 3 which is usb 3, see if that improves things. But that's an expensive fix for just having to listen to the whole track to eliminate any possible playback stutters before I start editing...

I will try leaving it on the ASIO4ALL v2 driver for a few days see if that helps.

[pdxindy]

I have some real headaches with Bitwig when it comes to missing detail features, but maybe I simply do not know how to do it, can you help me? These points constantly drive me crazy:

1. There is no audio buffer reset / clear like in Renoise (double press stop button). So if I use fx with lot of feedback, I’ll have to wait some minutes until the audio buffer is empty and I can rerender! This seems to be pretty absurd to me, what the hell? The new render will contain a rest of the old play. Pretty annoying. Is there a way to workaround this or can I even clear the audio/plugins’ buffers?

Yeah, would be handy to have a manual reset. Also, there could be a reset option on the render page.

Option-A (on Mac) will disable and if repeated re-enable the selected device or track or group that is having the feedback. The device or the plugins on the track will reload.

[pdxindy]

6. I can’t reset LFOs? So each start of the song might be a total random combination! I then have to rerender multiple times, until I get the balance I want. Really timeconsuming and annoying. I neither seem to be able to reset a LFO modulator nor the LFO in the chorus, etc.

There are 3 LFO modulators... the Beat LFO, Classic LFO and LFO

Beat LFO - This one is free running and resets on transport start. There is a phase parameter to control the start phase.

Classic LFO - Same like the Beat LFO it is free running by default and restarts on transport and has a phase parameter. It does have an option to be retriggered by incoming notes.

LFO - By default it is set to 'Free' and will not reset on transport. If you set it to 'Sync' then it will be free running (not retriggered by notes) but will reset when transport is started. 'Note' option resets with each note on. There is a phase parameter.

So I am assuming you are mainly using the 'LFO' modulator cause both Beat LFO and Classic LFO always reset with transport start. And if you set LFO to 'Sync' mode it will always reset too.

[Hanz Meyzer]

Ah thanks! Will setup this up. Any idea how to reset the chorus LFO? e.g. shortly setting it to 0ms or so?

[pdxindy]

Ah thanks! Will setup this up. Any idea how to reset the chorus LFO? e.g. shortly setting it to 0ms or so?

Hmmm... just checked, I see no way to do so.

I have a few 3rd party chorus plugins and none of them have a reset on transport option either.

You could automate the mix parameter to start from 0 and fade in a bit to hide any initial difference?

[pierb]

The thing that bothers me the most is not being able to set default settings for the piano roll.

For example, I have to click on the button to show velocity bars every f**king time.

[Hanz Meyzer]

Hmmm... just checked, I see no way to do so.

I have a few 3rd party chorus plugins and none of them have a reset on transport option either.

You could automate the mix parameter to start from 0 and fade in a bit to hide any initial difference?

Renoise can do that!

[antic604]

I don't work with audio very often, but when I do using fade handles drives me crazy since 3.3, because you have to be super precise to have them pop-up. It's like the clip gain handle takes 98% of the length of the clip, whereas fades get 1% each. Making clip bigger and/or taller doesn't really help, either.

In general I think lot of hit-boxes for "smart" features are too small and - I think - don't take into account track width/height.

I cannot really explain it, but Live seems to have this tuned better, because things kind of "snap" in place, feel more "firm" and "rigid" (in a good sense) for some reason. Whenever I'm moving between the two, I feel like Bitwig is more "loose" or "sloppy" in a way that things don't align so firmly or quickly. It's really a very subtle thing, to the point that it's possible I'm imagining it; but I think it's there

[PieBerger]

I don't work with audio very often, but when I do using fade handles drives me crazy since 3.3, because you have to be super precise to have them pop-up. It's like the clip gain handle takes 98% of the length of the clip, whereas fades get 1% each. Making clip bigger and/or taller doesn't really help, either.

In general I think lot of hit-boxes for "smart" features are too small and - I think - don't take into account track width/height.

I cannot really explain it, but Live seems to have this tuned better, because things kind of "snap" in place, feel more "firm" and "rigid" (in a good sense) for some reason. Whenever I'm moving between the two, I feel like Bitwig is more "loose" or "sloppy" in a way that things don't align so firmly or quickly. It's really a very subtle thing, to the point that it's possible I'm imagining it; but I think it's there

They are more fiddly than Live, but proper multiclip fading more than makes up for it, at least it does for me. Working with audio in Bitwig is so much better overall compared to Live, that small things like this don't really bother me. Also I've only ever known 3.3 so I don't know what I'm missing