CPU overload on example track!?!?

[Karbon L. Forms]

Hello all.

Just installed Tracktion from the Computer Music CD. I loaded up one of the demo tracks (Tesseract) and hit play.

plays a few bars OK (the intro I suppose) then fizzly pop crunchity scrunchity - One P4 3.0GHz brought to its knees!

Good lord! I thought this was supposed to be a gentle creature?

I shut down all other shit - like virus checkers, internet, everything.

Still crumbles! Surely if it can't play it's own demo tracks I'll have trouble making music of my own on it right?

Perhaps this track is for testing quad-processor 8Gb RAM machines?

No. I think somethings up.

P4 3Ghz (Hyperthreading)
1Gb RAM
M-audio Delta 66

Usually run Cubase SX with few problems. It won't overload - unless I pile on 15 Moogs and reverbs of course.

I had the web demo of tracktion (1.5) installed a while back and it seemed OK - but I don't remember trying that demo track.

Any ideas? I'd dearly like to get into tracktion. I'd dearly like to sack cubase!

[valley]

it's a p4 denormal issue. A couple of the freebie plugs that Tracktion ships with cause the P4 to go into denormal mode which loads the CPU pretty hard.

If you can spot the track that is causing the cpu peak, then use the freeze function to render it to a wave file then play it back.

[Karbon L. Forms]

Ah! Denormal mode? I'll look that up - new one on me.

So if I make a fairly intensive track using my normal favourite plug-ins I should not have this trouble?

I take it it's the MDA plugs that cause grief?

Thanks for that - was just reading another thread that mentioned denormal as well!

[valley]

Ah! Denormal mode? I'll look that up - new one on me.

It's a little technical and not very interesting, but basically very small floating point numbers bring a performance hit to processing units. The exact defintion of 'very small' differs from porcessor to processor. AMD chips have a much higher threshold before they enter denormal mode, as did PIIIs. P4 processors denormal at rather lower thresholds, and for a while many plugs could trip P4 processors into denormal.

Most plugs have since been updated to protect against P4 denormalisation. The MDA plugs shipped with Tracktion have not.

So if I make a fairly intensive track using my normal favourite plug-ins I should not have this trouble?

Nope, and track freeze will get you out of trouble with any plugs you may encouter that do.

[Ian B]

Ah! Denormal mode? I'll look that up - new one on me.

Have a look here http://phonophunk.phreakin.com/p4denormal.php phonophunk gives a detailed rundown on the why's and wherefores of the infamous P4 Denormal issue.

[Karbon L. Forms]

Problem understood thanks guys. I have no need for the mda plugs anyway and will remove them.

If i'd been writing a tune and decided to unwittingly use a denormal plug (eg mda) and the cpu spiked - I would have just sacked the plug.

Was just that I expected a demo track to run out of the box!

If I ever get round to doing any VST programming (thinking about it) then I am now aware of this issue. (dont think I'll be writing a reverb though - they appear to be culprits)

Time to get in about Tracktion!

[DarkStar]

Was just that I expected a demo track to run out of the box!
(dont think I'll be writing a reverb though - they appear to be culprits)

cjness,
Expecting the demo to run happily is not too unreasonable, and perhaps something is Jules could consider revising, as it would not show T in its best light.

I was going to suggest getting the latest FX pack from the mda site, but the most recent "last Modified" date is May 2003, so I gues they will be the same.

PS if you remove the reverb FX, how is the Tesseract demo then?

[AD80]

FYI, I'm getting about 27% CPU average on Tesseract. Until the end where it bumps up to around 38% Average. I have a PIV non-HT 2.8ghz. So you should see better performance than me with a 3.0ghz once the denormals are out of the way.

[Karbon L. Forms]

FYI, I'm getting about 27% CPU average on Tesseract. Until the end where it bumps up to around 38% Average. I have a PIV non-HT 2.8ghz. So you should see better performance than me with a 3.0ghz once the denormals are out of the way.

denormals out of way? do you mean freeze or replace plugs with better behaved ones?

what did you do?

[Jeremy_NSL]

I still think Jules should make a few deals to include better quality effects/synths out-of-box.

[AD80]

FYI, I'm getting about 27% CPU average on Tesseract. Until the end where it bumps up to around 38% Average. I have a PIV non-HT 2.8ghz. So you should see better performance than me with a 3.0ghz once the denormals are out of the way.

denormals out of way? do you mean freeze or replace plugs with better behaved ones?

what did you do?

I personally didnt do anything. It ran like that out of the box. But it seems like some people have problems with some of the plug-ins so once you replace or dissable those it should run smoothly.

[Karbon L. Forms]

PS if you remove the reverb FX, how is the Tesseract demo then?

Well i had a look and the only reverb on tesseract is the tracktion one. not mda. surely the tracktion one is OK?

it all goes to hell on bar 33. tried disabling all mda fx on all active tracks. screws up on 33!!

[AD80]

I still think Jules should make a few deals to include better quality effects/synths out-of-box.

I agree. Mackie must have some plug-ins laying around that it can lend Tracktion . Although, I dont really use the Tracktion plugs. The only one I use is the Hi/Low pass filter and maybe the EQ now and then. Everything else is covered by freebies and VST's.

[Karbon L. Forms]

right. got it past 33 by disabling all mda AND tracktion reverb!

this is wrong! anyone else in same boat? is there something wierd with my setup?

[AD80]

I heard hyperthreading can actually decrease performance with some audio apps. Is it possible to turn that off? I dont have it so I dont know. Its worth a try.