Cubase PC Audio Struggling - Memory? VSTs?javascript:emotico

[bof]

Hi

My PC 3.0ghz with 1.5G of RAM, from Digital Village, is struggling, and i can;t work out why. My songs are usually say 10 tracks of MIDI, 5-10 tracks of audio, with each channel of audio using usually 2 or 3 VST fx. The MIDI tracks are usually Kompakt VSTis, or other VSTIs like Triangle, Minimogue, etc. I usually have about 5 VSTIs plugged in each song.

What happens is that during playback, the soundcard (EMU404) often starts to freak out and sound like it is bitcrushing the whole track... pc slows right down, and i have to wait until it's calmed down. It means that i am forced to export master audio mixes without hearing the overrall balance, which is a nightmare of course. If i check the VST performance when i open the song, usually it is running at about 75% minimum....is that normal?!?!

I am ordering some new high-speed ram from Crucial which i think i need to do anyway, bringing my RAM up to 2gb. I wonder whether i have got too many VSTs in the plugins folder (prob about 300). I seem to have enough free memory in the different partitions (the main one with the programs has 8gb free).

Any help that anyone can give would be extremely well received!

My e-mail is the_edventure@yahoo.co.uk and myspace.com/bofmusic is my stuff.. cheers - Ed

[LfmC]

First of all.. the nuber of installed plugins has nothing to do with your computer slowing down. As far as I can tell, this is all normal. You use VSTi's, effects, and your CPU usage has to go up. On the other hand, you might wanna check your asio latency (if you don't know what this is, it's probably what's causing the problem). It could also be a bug with the emu driver (it happened to me once) which can cause that "bitcrusher" sound. I'm not sure how I got rid of that, though. You might wanna try removing the channels and effects you don't need from the e-mu mixer and using 44100 samplerate.

[Deric]

What version of Cubase are you using?

Once you've verified your latency settings - and increased them to see if the problem disappears:

If you run Windows Task Manager (press Ctrl-Alt-Delete keys) and then select the Processes tab, click on the CPU field until the processes with the highest numbers appear at the top of the list - do this to check whether any other programs are running (in the background).

Then click on the Performance tab and make a note of the average CPU utilisation and Physical Memory (K) Available.

Do both the above when the PC is struggling.

[bof]

Thanks - I will have a look at those things. I am using 44.1 so that's ok. When you say "try removing the channels and effects you don't need from the e-mu mixer", do you mean; within each song, or from the actual EMU software? Thanks - Ed

[pschelfh]

Do you have a direct connection to internet that's open at the same time ? A friend of mine had the same problems with his internet connection open.

+ also check this : http://www.musicxp.net/tuning_tips.php
Great tweak guide.

+ remove any programs from your Startup folder that are not needed. Most of them don't need to start up automaticaly (Acrobat, Winzip, Office,...).

+ Check your registry for startup programs that are not needed. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE -> Software -> Microsoft -> Windows -> CurrentVersion -> Run. If you don't know which ones to remove, do a Google search on the file names to see if it's safe to delete them.

+ It might be wise to put your Cubase audio stream on a different partition. I use one of only 15 Gb for this because it's faster to defrag.

Peter.

[LfmC]

Thanks - I will have a look at those things. I am using 44.1 so that's ok. When you say "try removing the channels and effects you don't need from the e-mu mixer", do you mean; within each song, or from the actual EMU software? Thanks - Ed

I'm talking about the e-mu mixer aplication, yes. the one in the tray. All most people need are one channel for wave out and one for asio out, but I had qute a of them open. Also had those send effects in the mixer (above the master channel) which are quite useless most of the time. Try recreating the bug and while your DAW is playing, try messing with the mixer, removing channels/effects till the stuttering stops. That's how I got rid of it, anyway. Hope it works for you. But this is all irelevant unless you're sure this is not an asio latency problem (which is probably the mose common problem on any audio forum). Did you try encreasing the latency in your DAW?

[bof]

No i didn't try that. Shall look at that as well. Seriously thanks for help.. Ed

[keiross]

bof - I'm in the same boat as you. You've more or less described what's happening to me too. I've got the Emu 0404 card as well. Have you been experiencing latency issues? Because I have.

You may want to cast your eye over my thread on the same topic as it could be helpful.

[bof]

I'm talking about the e-mu mixer aplication, yes. the one in the tray. All most people need are one channel for wave out and one for asio out, but I had qute a of them open. Also had those send effects in the mixer (above the master channel) which are quite useless most of the time. Try recreating the bug and while your DAW is playing, try messing with the mixer, removing channels/effects till the stuttering stops. That's how I got rid of it, anyway. Hope it works for you. But this is all irelevant unless you're sure this is not an asio latency problem (which is probably the mose common problem on any audio forum). Did you try encreasing the latency in your DAW?

OK - Last night i had a go at a few of the things suggested:

1. I removed the 'spare' tracks from the Proteus mixer, so that i now have 5 channels (i think); 1 stereo ASIO out 1/2, PCI Card in L, PCI Card in R, PCI Card S/PDIF L/R, and Wave 1/2. I removed all the effects, which as you say are fairly pointless, as one uses fx in Cubase. All of this made a noticeable but VERY small difference to the glitching.

2. I checked my latency, and checked that nowhere did it say 'simulated ASIO'. Latency in general is set to 8ms. I tried moving this to 100ms and this made a TINY difference. What should the latency be set at?

3. Double checked the songs, and the fx , etc used therein: The worst song uses the following:

Audio tracks 9, midi trax 11, VSTIs 3, VST fx on master 2, VSTI repeats 2, Max CPU 98%, min. 72%
Best song: Audio 9 , midi 7, VSTIs 6, VST fx on master 4, VSTI repeats 2, Max CPU 71%, min. 59%

4. I tried playing around with the mixer during a glitching song, BUT it takes about 3 min to swap applications, as the CPU is running at 99%, so that was impossible!

5. Also went through all the MusicXP tips, and particularly increased the virtual mem to about 3000mb. Didn't seem to make any effect as Digital Village had already done all of the other tweaks.

Q: How do you put an audio stream on a separate partition? I've no idea. My partitions as they stand are:

Disc 0 (80gb): System 24gb (10gb free), 'Backup' 1gb (27mb free), 'Music' 50gb (9gb free)
Disc 1 (80gb): 'Backup and iTunes' 75gb (54gb free)

All of my songs and sounds are stored in the 'music' partition, and nothing really in the 'backup and itunes' one. Any advice on whether this sounds ok?

I know people have said it's nothing to do with Audio/VSTfx processing, but it seems to be worse on those songs where there is more of that floating about...

Q: Should i consider a new soundcard?

Again - thanks for everyone's help; this is a great community - Ed (myspace.com/bofmusic)

[pschelfh]

Q: How do you put an audio stream on a separate partition?

Just point to a folder (or create a new one) on your 'Music'-partition when you create a new project in Cubase.

Peter.

[CANE CREEK]

another tip , once your CPU hits around 50% start freezing instruments/plugins try and get into the habbit of not running your PC over 50% CPU , i use this system and can use as many instances of vst's as i like.

some folk wont use the freeze system until their PC's are buckling and then claim its slow , obviously it will be as theres no CPU left for rendering.

[bof]

another tip , once your CPU hits around 50% start freezing instruments/plugins try and get into the habbit of not running your PC over 50% CPU , i use this system and can use as many instances of vst's as i like.

some folk wont use the freeze system until their PC's are buckling and then claim its slow , obviously it will be as theres no CPU left for rendering.

Hi - do you mean 'locking' with the padlock system in Cubase?; tried that - it made no difference. Still, with no music playing, the CPU is running at 75% when idle!

[CANE CREEK]

75% whilst idle ? you have a big problems there , do you just use your PC for music purposes or do you have all sorts of software installed.

I have no anti-virus / firewall / internet or anything but music software installed on my PC so i know exactly whats zapping the CPU.

I have a separate PC for internet etc which im using now.

[bof]

75% whilst idle ? you have a big problems there , do you just use your PC for music purposes or do you have all sorts of software installed.

I have no anti-virus / firewall / internet or anything but music software installed on my PC so i know exactly whats zapping the CPU.

I have a separate PC for internet etc which im using now.

I have no crappy software, and no internet connection....see! Bizarre eh? Maybe it's a troublesome VST/VSTI? Any out there that suck CPU?