Mulab's CPU efficiency ...

[solipsvs]

wait maybe jo intends to mask whats actually happening in the core of the audio engine by being ambiguous when providing an explanation or a working solution to your spec. ok in this case perhaps it is a decent excuse for inaccurate info. jo doesnt wanna be hacked and my guess is this is a window into how mulab operates. much like uh-e masked processor usage in the latest pro-one demo thingy recently. someone might be able to tell something about the algorithms used by closely watching the processor load. am i way off here?

Nah, there is nothing for Jo to deliberately hide. If anything there is some unknown issue...

U-he only did that with their synth in order to keep people from thinking that the most demanding filter model must also sound the best.

yeah i know i got his point. i was really trying to provoke a different explanation or further exploration into this mystery

[LYTZ]

Easy guys. Just checking in here quickly, because when I was using Mulab I noticed a CPU inefficiency as well.
*HOWEVER*: Bear in mind that on OSX Mulab is still 32bit.

NI Polyplex for example uses nearly 15% more CPU in Mulab than in Logic Pro X, which is 64bit.
(Also there are sometimes differences between VST and AU on load in general.
Sometimes bigger, sometimes smaller, sometimes the same.)

Now the interesting part here is that when running Polyplex in Energy XT (32bit) its *the same thing*.
Also high load. When running in Tracktion 32bit also. Changes in 64bit tracktion, but also different changes when you use the AU or VST version of it.
So in my experience this has nothing to do with MuLab, but some plugins run way better on a 64bit host.
Some, not all of them. So I think honestly there is really not much that can be done about that.

Also strong point here:
Some time ago I tested Polyplex with various DAWS at that time, because its pretty heavy on CPU and
I wanted to know what the hell is going on with some programs.
And what was more interesting is the result I got on Mulab:
Even with the CPU load being much higher on Mulab, Mulab was still pretty smoothly running with nearly maxxed out CPU cores.
Thats highly unusual and speaks for good multicore utilization.
In some other DAWs you start to get dropouts and crackles sometimes already around 60-70% on load.

You can push Mulab pretty far, which gives you an extra "upside buffer" so to speak and it is still working smoothly unlike some other DAWs where the GUI tends to slow down as well or the DAW gets instable, and is prone to crashes, which I particularly hate with some other DAWs. So I think the Mulab code is f****n rocksolid.

(On a sidenote: The best multicore management I have seen by far has Renoise. By miles. Kicks the sh** even out of Reaper and Logic. Thats also one of my reasons why I am back in the tracker camp since quite a while now because they are by nature superefficient and lean and slick in many ways and I can work so friggin' fast with theese, but thats going offtopic and is not the point I am trying to make here. )

Ah yeah, by the way, someone asked for a realtime monitoring/measuring per core utility for OSX.
This is what I use: https://www.ragingmenace.com/software/menumeters/
Its free, highly configurable and very consistent.

Be nice to each other..

Best,
tL.

[fluffy_little_something]

Yes, it seems that Mulab handles loads well, judging from what I hear, or don't hear for that matter
Still, I would like to have some additional indicator for real CPU load, not just my ears.

Is the CPU meter in Mulab linear? I get the impression that it easily goes to 40 to 60%, but after that the increase is slower, until finally the first red bars and audio issues appear.

[LYTZ]

Still, I would like to have some additional indicator for real CPU load, not just my ears.

lookie here. An in-App measuring tool is not available AFAIK, so this of course is systemwide but extremely percise.:

Ah yeah, by the way, someone asked for a realtime monitoring/measuring per core utility for OSX.
This is what I use: https://www.ragingmenace.com/software/menumeters/
Its free, highly configurable and very consistent.

If you are on OSX, that is.

[fluffy_little_something]

W7

[LYTZ]

W7

Aah, sh*t..

[pekbro]

https://www.rainmeter.net/ is what I use under windows.
I'm sure you could find a skin to monitor whatever you want.
I've been using it for years. Mostly because Conky is not available
for windows. I switched to it because the old windows gadgets used
75 MB of ram to run while rainmeter used 10 MB. And was a lot more
interesting on top of that.

4 versions later it now uses 11 MB to run.

-Cheers

[syntonica]

Yes, I am aware it is not an efficiency issue as such, we have already settled that. The problem is simply that I have no idea how much CPU power is actually being used under Mulab because unfortunately it handles these things differently compared to other DAW's, leading to bogus values on the Windows task manager core meters.

I was just throwing my experience with CPU efficiency into the ring for others who may be trying to test for themselves.

[syntonica]

Ah yeah, by the way, someone asked for a realtime monitoring/measuring per core utility for OSX.
This is what I use: https://www.ragingmenace.com/software/menumeters/
Its free, highly configurable and very consistent.

Be nice to each other..

Best,
tL.

I live and die by these meters! My music rig is frozen at 10.9 so I can use ALL my VSTs, new and old.

Wish Menu Meters worked with 10.11, though... There's nothing else like it that I have found.

[MuTools]

Tried one of those demo tunes.
Mulab meter values:
1 core: 27% avg, 45% max
6 cores: 15% avg, 23% max
Task Manager values:
1 core: CPU 8%, about 20% on one core, the rest 0 to 5%
6 cores: CPU 20%, 10-20% on all six cores

Note that, as explained already, MuLab's CPU meter and the task manager measure different things and so the values are not be compared.

About the impact of using multiple cores on your CPU usage: It's depending on the project. For example Dream of the piano demo project has only 4 parallel racks and 2 effect racks and so it will maximum use 4 cores at the same time because the effect racks can't be processed before the intrument racks are fully processed. So in fact i should not have suggested to test things with one of the demo projects as they're all too small for a 6 core machine. The bigger the project ie. the more parallel racks, the more you'll take advantage of a multi-core setup.

[fluffy_little_something]

Sorry, but I don't think you really understand the issue at hand, judging from your comments. I couldn't care less what Mulab's meter measures and says, the Task Manager is what matters to me as the not so proud owner of a weak CPU. And in that TM Mulab leads to wrong values for individual cores and the global CPU. The scaling based on the number of cores used is screwed up somehow. When I do similar tests in Mixcraft, i.e. using 1 vs 6 cores, the results shown in the TM are very different and they make sense to me.

And regarding your comment on project size, I am a minimalist, I don't use zillions of tracks.

[MuTools]

The values in TM are not 'wrong' nor is MuLab's multi-core engine 'wrong'.
This already has been explained in this topic.
And also on http://www.mutools.com/info/docs/mulab/audio-setup.html

[LYTZ]

I live and die by these meters! My music rig is frozen at 10.9 so I can use ALL my VSTs, new and old.

Wish Menu Meters worked with 10.11, though... There's nothing else like it that I have found.

MenuMeters El Capitan Port by some Japanese guy..

http://member.ipmu.jp/yuji.tachikawa/Me ... ElCapitan/

[fluffy_little_something]

The values in TM are not 'wrong' nor is MuLab's multi-core engine 'wrong'.
This already has been explained in this topic.
And also on http://www.mutools.com/info/docs/mulab/audio-setup.html

I just think it makes more sense the way it is done in Mixcraft. There TM shows how much CPU is actually being used, there are no idle threads running and showing fake CPU loads on cores.

As a user I don't want to be bugged with such nerdy decisions as the number of threads to be used. The DAW should pick the ideal settings by itself, based on the current project specs and needs.

Have you renamed that parameter by the way? I think it was number of cores instead of threads previously...

[MuTools]

Have you renamed that parameter by the way? I think it was number of cores instead of threads previously...

No, not that i can remember. Anyway, "threads" is technically the right term as the user cannot choose the number of cores on a machine. (well, besides making such choice upon purchasing a computer)