performance killer revealed

[KrzysiekK]

Looks like I've found the solution for my longtime problem!

The problem was that when a plugin used some automation and its GUI was opened, the playback slowed down and CPU hit 100% easily (one edit with just one simple plugin running).

It is hard to belive, but imagine that when T3 keeps plugs in subdirs (in its internal structure - that is, VSTCache list including SUBDIR tags), T3 may slow down COMPLETLY (up to 100% of use).

Here's what I did: I removed all "SUBDIR" tags in VSTCache file (opening and closing tags), so it became a flat structure consisting of just VST tags (and of course VSTINFO and an opening xml tag) - I did not removed any plugins from the list, just SUBDIR tags.

After this operation, all plugins are just visible in one big list and no hiccups during playback! (up to 5%).

This is very strange but it worked out for me.


---- edit

it worked for one plugin, but same problem with plugs like FM8... i.e. as soon as on the plugin list is just FM8 and nothing more, there are no hiccups with automation, but with all other plugins on the list, CPU consumption jumps to 100% easily (no sound played, the cursor is just passing through automation curve).

Krzysiek

[UncleAge]

Sorry, I responded to your other post before I read this one. However, you may not have found a solution but instead a workaround

[KrzysiekK]

according to the discussion in new thread, the problem is not yet revealed; just like You said, there are only workarounds not fully satisfying for now - for one plugin removing SUBDIR tags helped, for the other plugin - putting it in the higher position of VSTCache list. But here we can clearly see that the problem is not on the plugin side, rather on Tracktion side.

[metamorphosis]

Just to confirm, T1 and T2 do not have the constant loggin you're talking about-
Cheers,
Matt

[oxbee]

Well, it's time for Mackie to come back on Tracktion's track and post some updates then... That loggin thing itself is a mistake.

[flamin-gitaur]

Well, it's time for Mackie to come back on Tracktion's track and post some updates then...

THAT would be nice!! Heck even if there were no plans for a T4 in the future, if they at least made T3 rock solid, I would be happy using it with the features it has now.

[Gabriel_S]

TIP TO ALL TRACKTIONERS (in some circumstances may improve the performance greatly):

- in "SETTINGS" tab, go to "FILE SETTINGS" group; check the temp directory path
- close Tracktion3
- with any file explorer, open the Tracktion3 temp directory and find log.txt file there - give it readonly attrib

Tracktion3 will not log anymore - it will probably still attempt to do this all the time as I doubt it will give up when recognizing readonly attrib (but who knows...), but there are no write op1erations performed to harddrive anymore.

for refference: this is Tracktion3.0.4.8 running on PC machine

Krzysiek

Excellent, this just reduced my CPU usage by Half. Went from 100% to about 47% give or take a few

[metamorphosis]

That's retarded - how could they've slipped so far? Leaving a debug feature on... and NOBODY picked up on it in the development Team?
Pretty weak.
M@

[MarioC]

TIP TO ALL TRACKTIONERS (in some circumstances may improve the performance greatly):

- in "SETTINGS" tab, go to "FILE SETTINGS" group; check the temp directory path
- close Tracktion3
- with any file explorer, open the Tracktion3 temp directory and find log.txt file there - give it readonly attrib

Tracktion3 will not log anymore - it will probably still attempt to do this all the time as I doubt it will give up when recognizing readonly attrib (but who knows...), but there are no write op1erations performed to harddrive anymore.

for refference: this is Tracktion3.0.4.8 running on PC machine

Krzysiek

Excellent, this just reduced my CPU usage by Half. Went from 100% to about 47% give or take a few

Has this workaround had any other effect on Tracktion3?

[Gabriel_S]

TIP TO ALL TRACKTIONERS (in some circumstances may improve the performance greatly):

- in "SETTINGS" tab, go to "FILE SETTINGS" group; check the temp directory path
- close Tracktion3
- with any file explorer, open the Tracktion3 temp directory and find log.txt file there - give it readonly attrib

Tracktion3 will not log anymore - it will probably still attempt to do this all the time as I doubt it will give up when recognizing readonly attrib (but who knows...), but there are no write op1erations performed to harddrive anymore.

for refference: this is Tracktion3.0.4.8 running on PC machine

Krzysiek

Excellent, this just reduced my CPU usage by Half. Went from 100% to about 47% give or take a few

Has this workaround had any other effect on Tracktion3?

So far only performance improvements. Huge thanks to KrzysiekK for taking the time to find this issue !!!!

[MarioC]

Thank you for the info I think I will try it as well.

[KrzysiekK]

Huge thanks to KrzysiekK for taking the time to find this issue !!!!

my pleasure; I had no choice btw. anyway, while disabling the logging did not tremendously improved the performance in my case, the other workaround (http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=237790) helped a lot - a reorganization of plugins list (w/o removing any single plug); I was astonished revealing the fact that position of a plugin in VSTCache list (a file in T3 temporary dir) can affect performance so much (as well as its hierarchical struct). For example, when I had FM8 listed on line #2520 the GUI worked very slow (GUI controls like sliders) and the application tend to freeze (high CPU use) so I just changed its "name" attibute so it landed on position #14 and all the controls started working smoothly, low CPU use. Thus I changed "name" attribute to all the demanding plugins that I use often, so they are now at the top of the list and do not tend to perform slowly anymore. A bug definitely IMO.

Krzysiek

[aMUSEd]

Doesn't it make a new log file every time it is run or is it permanent?