Why are REs so CPU friendly?

[IncarnateX]

Hi
I have recently rediscovered Reason while being off since 6.5. I do not recall the first instances of REs to be more CPU light than some VSTis. I recently bought a Macbook Air MQD32H/A 13 with something as humble as 1,8 i5 processor and 8 GB ram and Catalina. While Logic X performed as I would expect, not offering too many simultanous synths and effects before hicking, my experience with Reason is almost surreal to me in comparison. I have had a patch going with 42+ modules, including a good deal of synths, drummachines, players and utilities without peaks going much more above average in Reason's CPU meter. I also have a Windows 10 labtop with 2,7 gh i5 and 8 gb ram that deals with Reason just as easily. I have no line of bookmarks to show, but I do not really think I need some to conclude that Reason and its REs seem more CPU friendly than ever. How can it be so?

Thanks in advance.

[Passing Bye]

You used Logic's stock stuff only?

[IncarnateX]

You used Logic's stock stuff only?

At first. Then I used Reason as VSTi instead and released a massive amount of power using only the autodrummer in Logic.

[Passing Bye]

Logic stock stuff is pretty low on CPU, it's almost same stuff from eMagic days that got optimized even further on few occasions down the line, it was running great on single and dual cores, it should be even lighter now with proper multi core spread, Logic as a DAW is highly optimized too, which was always the case.

Having said that, never used Reason, but are you saying that it was resource hog before and now they managed to optimize it to run better than Logic?

[IncarnateX]

but are you saying that it was resource hog before and now they managed to optimize it to run better than Logic?

I am not that sure about before but I do not recall it being THAT cpu friendly. I had an older PC then and only 4 GB ram, but I it is still way beyond expected. Take a look, here I use Reason in Logic Pro X with every effect in Logic´s mixer exchanged with Reason VSTs, a Reason track consisting of a Combinator with 39 modules in play, besides from an audio track and drummer track in Logic, and it has just started making small hick ups when I added the last two modules. Cleaning up the ram before running makes it deal with it. I may lack knowledge here but my experience says "unreal" though it is real enough.

[Passing Bye]

Still don't get it, you wrote that Logic couldn't handle more than few instances, but as someone who was working on much weaker machines with Logic for ages, I know that's not true, especially Logic X which got optimized two times for greater performance.

[IncarnateX]

Yes, compared to Reason, Logic certainly cannot handle 39 plus units of its own on my Mac. I could handle up to 6 VSTis apart from drummer of it own before it began to complain. I also tested scriptor, which is a randomizations script for Logic and a good one, but I could only use up to 4 instances and a few tracks in Logic before it quit. In contrast I can use over ten complex probability based units in Reason with no problems. You think I am lying?

[Passing Bye]

No, I just don't think you are making fair comparison, I used Logic with his stock plugins on different versions of everything, much weaker machines than yours and that's not my experience at all.

[IncarnateX]

Well, in that case our experiences differ, and you will likely not provide the answer to my question. I do not need further comparison to understand the relative relation between 6 VSTis + a script and some channel effects and 39 modules including most types you can think of. Let it be and let others give it a shot if they differ from you.

[Passing Bye]

There's no relation to 6 VSTi + script and some 39 modules, it's random apples vs oranges test.

[IncarnateX]

I cannot understand that. I had 6 synths going in Logic and 16 synths going among the 39 modules, that is not apple's and oranges. Scripts versus scripts are not apples and oranges, neither is reverb vs reverb and so forth. As said, leave it. This of no help to me. I got your disbelief, thanks, but it is contrary to my experience and therefore not of further use.

[Passing Bye]

You aren't doing fair comparison, "6 Logic synths", what that even means, there is tons of different things in there, there's actual Alchemy, there's Sculpture, they are not that simple, what you built there in Reason, did you really built anything comparable what you had in Logic, sorry, but 6 random things with something random in Reason rack seems like random test, one instance of Diva can bring your machine down, but you can have easily 50+ instances of EXS24, ES1, ES2 and those oldies, same goes for effects, stock EQ, compressor and plenty of other stuff are very low on CPU, but new ChromaVerb uses little more than EnVerb and all other old reverbs from Logic, probably sound better than most stock reverbs in every other DAW, up there with best 3rd party plugins...(I'm not the one that gave you thumbs down)

[IncarnateX]

double

[IncarnateX]

Sorry, mate, but you keep denying my premise in a way that does not make sense to my experience. A lot of hypothetical excuses that amount to denial and explain nothing about the case in question. The difference in performance was overwhelming, even with a large margin of error. If it I such a threat to your perception of reality I cannot understand why you just won't leave it alone. Meanwhile, I will enjoy running 16 synths in Reason compared to 6 synths in Logic. Simple as that as far as I am concerned. Suit yourself.

[Passing Bye]

Perception of reality? You got into Logic yesterday, I have been using it for ages on different machines, that again I repeat, were much weaker than your Macbook Air, I know very well how and what you can do in it with stock plugins, you did one random test and treat those result as anything but random, but on other hand you kinda expected it will under perform, based on what really, you have no prior experience with it, Logic is known as being one of the most efficient DAW's around and those stock plugins are the same ones from way back, even back than people managed to make full blown projects with it, now you can't load 6 instances in it, sorry, but it's all highly questionable.

I cannot understand why you just won't leave it alone.

Because you are kind of guy that will bring this same failed random test as some kind of fact to every Apple, OS X, Macbook, Logic and whatever thread in years to come and I saw you doing that already, so it's much suitable thing to say what I have here, than go off topic somewhere else.