SX / Nuendo Performance Loss - A Myth ?

[ResonantOrder]

Sorry. Sonar is not the answer to all. I finally had to give up on Sonar 3 cause it was spazzy on Vstis. Sanity returned when I went back to Sx 2.35.

Sonar 3 could be a pain in the ass, and it almost had me quitting as a cakewalk customer. Sonar 4 is much better. The upgrade to 4.4.4 of the adapter fixed 99.9% of my problems. Out of all the plugs I have, only Sophia 1.1 won't load. Other than that, it's glitch free. The new update will add a gapless engine, so I couldn't be happier at this point.

[Scotrick]

and this thread moves to fast for me
but I was trying to suggest that, generally speaking, older versions of programs perform a bit better than newer versions of programs, as 'feature creap,' of 'feature bloat,' or 'features,' are added...
so that comparing Logic 5.5.1, a very old version (by computer standards, heck two complete numbers old)
and SX 3 is a bad comparison, as you're comparing older 'leaner,' code, with newer, more 'bloated,' or 'feature rich,' software...
And in Cubase land, it's well known that while Cubase SX 1 is missing a bunch of features from the newer versions, it runs more 'efficiently,'

and see, here's the problem with comparisons like this one, you should in theory be comparing the most recent versions of every program...
but you can't, because as we all know Logic has ditched the PC....
okay, so why are so many people still using an 'outdated,' sequencer on an unsupported platform?
Because it WORKS... and that's the most 'efficient' program usually... the one you're used to...
in desktop publishing land, it's even worse, if you guys think Steinberg is a stuck-up no support company, try dealing with Quark....

[original flipper]

HI

One thing that has not been mentioned here is the fact that SXV3 supports dual cpu machines - my dual Xeon (2x3000ghz) managed 12 instances of 'Ambience' before I got bored and returned to a project - this is technology on the move - when I was using Logic 5.5 on my previous 2400ghz DAW - Logic spluttered on 4 instances.

I can tell you that Logic 5.5 apparently had some rudimentry dual cpu support but before I sold it I loaded it up on my current DAW and got the same old 4 instances - if anything indicating an even poorer performance on a more powerfull system!

Another observation is that when I used Logic previously the cpu would crawl up on occassion - even when a propject was not playing, so I don't know so much about dynamic close down of non active plug-ins, or are you talking about Logic on an Apple?

Dual core, dual cpu, 64bit, PCIx cards and new operating systems are all part of what the present and future holds - if people want to run mamoth projects with stacks of plug-ins I suspect that they blame the host before they look at the raw power they have to power such projects - compatability is one thing but bitching about a dongle ... life is too short.

Flipper.

[egbert]

and this thread moves to fast for me
but I was trying to suggest that, generally speaking, older versions of programs perform a bit better than newer versions of programs, as 'feature creap,' of 'feature bloat,' or 'features,' are added...
so that comparing Logic 5.5.1, a very old version (by computer standards, heck two complete numbers old)
and SX 3 is a bad comparison, as you're comparing older 'leaner,' code, with newer, more 'bloated,' or 'feature rich,' software...

Sorry - nice theory but this is actually nonsense.

SX1/Nuendo was a complete rewrite from scratch - they junked the VST 5.x code which was built up of patches on patches dating back to Atari days.

Logic PC 5.5.1 is much older code - much longer since a complete rewrite.

To get back to the central point of this thread:

In order to measure the full drain on CPU consumption due to copy protection in SX3 you would need to compare the dongled version with a version with no copy protection - no encryption, no USB calls etc. This we cannot do - Steiny can do it of course. So only they know how much this is costing us.

Eg

[Sascha Franck]

I can tell you that Logic 5.5 apparently had some rudimentry dual cpu support but before I sold it I loaded it up on my current DAW and got the same old 4 instances - if anything indicating an even poorer performance on a more powerfull system!

Hm, that's weird. I can get 7 instances running fine on my current (rather cheap) single CPU machine.

Others than that I agree: Dual CPU support certainly is something Logic/PC will never ever offer.

And btw, I'm not on a Logic/PC defending crusade or whatever. It's all too clear that it will be outdated one day.
No offline processing, no freezing, no MIDI plugin support, no full PDC, no audio stretching in the arrange, etc etc - defenitely quite some things that are nice to have, pretty much good to show how it's ageing.
Still, it's tough to beat on the MIDI editing side of things, IMO the ergonomics are way better than what you get with most others as well (namely when it comes to screen layouts and the mixer), and, amazingly enough, audio engine efficiency is still easily on par with the latest versions of any competitors, as all my tests have proven.

You can trust me, I wish it was any different. I'd really like going with another sequencer (preferably a platform compatible one, that's why I've chosen SX over Sonar or Samplitude) - but for what I need they're just not there yet, so most likely my next "studio" update will involve buying a Mac (in addition, I need to stay up to date with Logic for "business" reasons).
As said, I'd be happier if it wasn't so, especially considering that Macs - apart from the dual CPU support and the easy to maintain OS - aren't all that shiny machines.

[original flipper]

HI

'Sascha' - when I decided that I could no longer use Logic realiably (I have mentioned reasons before but here goes - I started to get projects I could no longer open, I had LOTS of problems with plug-ins, I started to get crashes for no traceable reason ect) anyway I looked at a G5 and went to the osx forum - people were crying over there with terrible problems running Logic, some users (Putte?) were having 12 crashes a day ... I though f... that!

So I got the dual Xeon, it looks like the latest Logic up-date is better but at that time - I was not going to go from one nightmare to another ... I wish I had waited, yes Logic rocks - when it is stable!

FWIW I was told that 5.3 was more stable - I tried it and on ocassion it opened projects that 5.5 refused to open!

If I have some success with some releases coming out soon I might still go look at a G5 though - I just don't produce 50% of what I did on Logic.

Flipper.

[Sascha Franck]

If I have some success with some releases coming out soon I might still go look at a G5 though - I just don't produce 50% of what I did on Logic.

You know, all CPU issues or whatever aside, that's actually my major grief with SX - I just don't feel inspired.
Yeah, there's some scientific reasons for me to prefer Logic over SX, but on the other hand, there might be as much reasons to prefer SX - so that's not just it. It's more like a "feel" thing.
To me, Logic feels much more like an instrument but a tool only. And mind you, I've been using Cubase from version 1.0/Atari until 3.6/PC. It never felt that organic to me though.
I could get more accustomed to SX certainly, but I'm almost sure it still just won't feel the same.

[original flipper]

HI

I have been through practically EVERY host available and SXV123 or whatever does not inspire me, beyond the fancy graphics ... and I am a user!

You know what though - Logic for me was like Tracktion, I will tell you why, with 1 monitor I could (and Logic has not changed so this is how I would work if I used it tomorrow) very quickly move from arrange page to edit audio or midi by clicking on the clip - if I wanted the mixer/vst/eq ect I could simply click on the track number colum.

People don't realise how close to the likes of Tracktion (for simplicity of movement) Logic is.

If those boyz at Tracktion could sort the midi editing side of things out to MY liking (some people love it as it is) then that would be a serious contender.

I was even thinking of trying Logic 5.3 again!

Such is life!

Flipper.

[Cosmic Bandito]

If I have some success with some releases coming out soon I might still go look at a G5 though - I just don't produce 50% of what I did on Logic.

You know, all CPU issues or whatever aside, that's actually my major grief with SX - I just don't feel inspired.
Yeah, there's some scientific reasons for me to prefer Logic over SX, but on the other hand, there might be as much reasons to prefer SX - so that's not just it. It's more like a "feel" thing.
To me, Logic feels much more like an instrument but a tool only. And mind you, I've been using Cubase from version 1.0/Atari until 3.6/PC. It never felt that organic to me though.
I could get more accustomed to SX certainly, but I'm almost sure it still just won't feel the same.

Cubase is funtional, but certainly not 'inspiring'. Sort of like like how a new roland(or korg) synth feels compared to a classic one...on the sterile side IMO. I'd say the up & comers are Live4 & Traction...even if they're not quite there yet, at times they feel like an instrument!

[bduffy]

Huhn. I just don't get it. As a long-time (and increasingly frustrated) Cubase-user, I've gotta say I've tried Logic, and I simply could not get the hang of it! It seemed like everything but "inspiring" or even "logical". All these "Objects"...anything can be anything...I was totally confused.

"Cubase is functional"...man, that bad? Seems to be a tad more than "funational" to me.

Now, I'm sure this is a regular occurence - there's nothing worse than any other sequencer than your own - but I wish I could sit down and see WHY Logic is so bloody wonderful! I mean, I left Sonar because I found Cubase inspiring, but increasingly less so (but I just assume this is from human burnout, not necessarily DAW design). But of course Apple pulled the plug on PC Logic, so I'll never know. Unless I go Mac. Which won't happen soon, but I'm considering it.

[Sascha Franck]

Now, I'm sure this is a regular occurence - there's nothing worse than any other sequencer than your own -

As said, I've been using Cubase for years and switching to Logic felt like... hm, dunno how to say it - just like something finally meeting my personal requirements.

but I wish I could sit down and see WHY Logic is so bloody wonderful!

Apart from the "factual" advances (permanent visual control about quantization settings, configurable mixer, easy access to any plugin straight from the channel strip) it seem to be the little things.
Screenset arranging and switching is just feeling natural, the velocity tool is marvelleous, tool handling just comes like a second nature (one tool on the left, another on the right mousebutton), part handling just feels right too, just to name a few.
Apart from that, dealing with the internal plugins is very nice. Once you know how one of them "feels", you know all of them as their layout and knobs are just following a consequent style.

But as said, it might all be personal preferences.

[bduffy]

...Apart from the "factual" advances (permanent visual control about quantization settings, configurable mixer, easy access to any plugin straight from the channel strip) it seem to be the little things.
Screenset arranging and switching is just feeling natural, the velocity tool is marvelleous, tool handling just comes like a second nature (one tool on the left, another on the right mousebutton), part handling just feels right too, just to name a few.
Apart from that, dealing with the internal plugins is very nice. Once you know how one of them "feels", you know all of them as their layout and knobs are just following a consequent style.

But as said, it might all be personal preferences.

Right...man, I just couldn't get that deep with it! I think one of these days I'll go down to the music store and get one of the Logic guys to walk me through it. I mean, this is the app that every pro uses, with just little dents being made Cubase, etc. Actually, pros like DP too, and I've never tried it as MOTU doesn't believe in demos, it seems.

Anyways, I'd like to see it in action. I'll try to find a clinic or something. Just want to know what all the fuss is about.

[jasonsantiago]

"And in Cubase land, it's well known that while Cubase SX 1 is missing a bunch of features from the newer versions, it runs more 'efficiently,'"

Well known? I've never heard that. Do you have benchmarks to back this up? Have you actually tested it? I'd be interested!

I just never understood the logic buzz. I have Logic 7 and cubase SX3, but Logic seems to crash so much and doing simple things seemed so hard to figure out, where in SX I figured out how to use the program extremely fast... I wish I enjoyed Logic like everyone seems to, but I don't know how to get into it. I've heard with Logic you need to set key commands up to really get things going, kinda like SX. Once I had key commands set up in sx, its like lightning. Plus with 2 24 inch wide screens I have so much desktop space (1920X1200 times two) that I am never changing windows... I love SX, but there are little glitches here and there that piss me off, like sometimes when a file starts or stops sometimes I get a glitch. Someone called this a 'cpu denormalization' but i don't know how to stop it.

[Scotrick]

And as for 'benchmarks,' being used to back-up the claim that Cubase SX uses less resources than SX 3... well, look, perhaps I shot myself in the foot by using specific software examples, all I'm trying to suggest is that there is, near as I can determine, NO WAY, to easily compare different versions of software...

for example, if you were to have the same projects, with the same plug-ins, on my machine, SX 1 used less 'resources,' than SX 2... do I have 'benchmarks,' to back it up?
well, no, I just used the CPU meter in Windows and Cubase SX 2 (I haven't yet upgraded to SX 3)... and I'm not the only one, as on the Nuendo forum and the Cubase forum it crops up occasionally where someone finally gets around to upgrading from either Nuendo 1 or SX 1 to one of the new versions and there's a bit of a shock as you watch the CPU meter climb up...

but some of the drain is due to the way Cubase handles plug-ins, and thus Steinberg added a button to make SX 2 act like SX 1 in how it handled certain plug-ins...
And I imagine the rest of the drain comes from the new features... and over all, is it a lot? no... not really...

and my point about logic 5.5.1 versus Cubase SX 1 isn't meant to be about how old the code is, but rather feature sets and versions...
I'm sure we could all hunt around through our old softwares and operating systems and find some combination of discontinued products that work very very fast at doing SOME things...

I just think it's a bit off to compare an old discontinued product, with a currently shipping software version.... and then you ask me, well, how can you compare then? and that's when I say, 'well, gee, it seems to me it's a bit hopeless to even try to measure the useability of software against each other,' when the User Interface and feature set matter most,

in other words how easy is it to record and effect the sort of music you want to make, rather than how many of what each system can run...

and here too I know people will shout out:
Yeah! but I really do need to be able to run two hundred tracks with an ambience and equalizer on each channel with fifty internal VSTi sync'd to 50 external VSTi... and I need to know which host will let me do that!

[jasonsantiago]

Hey man, I consider the CPU meter to be the best benchmark we have (unfortunately).

but some of the drain is due to the way Cubase handles plug-ins, and thus Steinberg added a button to make SX 2 act like SX 1 in how it handled certain plug-ins...

What button is this? Did the cpu go down?

I just think it's a bit off to compare an old discontinued product, with a currently shipping software version....

I agree, but I still can't feel disheartened to hear that the same plugins in Logic 5.5 used up less CPU.