Synthmaster is KILLING my Computer!!!

[onesevent33n]

Don't get my wrong, Synthmaster is hands down my favorite VST/AU in my arsenal of plugins, but damn it very CPU intensive (for me at least). If I'm running 2 channels w/ Synthmaster on them, My computer heats up, Ableton CPU shows approx between 40-90%, etc.

Is there anything I can do to bring down how CPU Intensive this plugin is? I'm just using it on a Mac (8GB Ram/250GB Flash Drive, Macbook Pro Retina). I'm using the basic presets it came with as well as a couple of the Rob Lee packs. I've already tried taking the audio quality down to "draft" but that really isn't doing much.

Any suggestions??

[tehlord]

I'll add that I'm also finding CPU use to be very high on my Mac Mini. I'm using a 2.5ghz i5 Mac Mini, and using onboard audio I can max out the CPU on Logic Pro 9 (where it only uses one core, ggrrrrrr) with one single pad patch that uses Unison.

[b15fliptop]

You can go into the settings tab and change the quality to "draft" or "good", and then when you render, change back to "best". Don't try this in the top panel, as that only affects the current patch. Another thing to note is that the quality settings can dramatically affect the sound of some patches, and in unexpected ways. Even things like ADSR envelopes change, which makes no sense to me, so your rendered tracks might differ somewhat from what you're hearing while composing in draft mode.

[sprnva]

I can max out the CPU on Logic Pro 9 (where it only uses one core, ggrrrrrr)

Have you tried changing Preferences -> Audio -> Processing Threads from Automatic? That should work.

[kv331]

The following would help:

1. Lower "unison"
2. Lower "polyphony/voices", or reduce the release of envelopes, so that polyphony will decrease.
3. When tracking, set engine quality to draft, when bouncing to disk, set engine quality to good/better/best
4. When tracking, set engine buffer size to large, when bouncing to disk, you can set it to medim or short

[tehlord]

Personally I have made all the necessary adjustments.

Lowering Unison is not an option on patches that require unison, although there are a couple of ways of achieving unison I see. I wonder if one is particularly less taxing than another?

It seems to me that on Mac at least, SM seems to use a disproportionate amount of CPU on unison heavy patches compared with other synths.

[kv331]

Personally I have made all the necessary adjustments.

Lowering Unison is not an option on patches that require unison, although there are a couple of ways of achieving unison I see. I wonder if one is particularly less taxing than another?

It seems to me that on Mac at least, SM seems to use a disproportionate amount of CPU on unison heavy patches compared with other synths.

Instead of increasing unison, you can also increase Osc voices parameter. That works on oscillators only, WHEREAS unison applies to ALL voice modules including modulators filters and envelopes!

I believe in many synths unison is applied at the oscillator level, not at the filter level.

Here's what I mean, let's say we have 2 presets A and B. Osc1 and Filter1 is turned on on layer1 for both presets

Preset A: Unison is set to 8 voices -> We have 8 oscillators + 8 filters running for each voice

Preset B: Osc1 Voices is set to 8 voices -> We have 8 oscillators and 1 filter running for each voice.

If the filter category is "analog" that'd mean a LOT of CPU cycles because analog algorithm consumes a LOT of CPU compared to digital!

[tehlord]

I'll give that a try tomorrow.

Thanks