NI Kontakt 8 Performance?

[synchronizer]

Has anyone run performance tests comparing Kontakt 7 and 8 e.g. on mac M* devices? Is there any significant improvement, if any? I am not interested in the new features, only the real-time performance.

[Ah_Dziz]

The overall performance of kontakt has been pretty consistent for ages. As they've added things (replika's algorithms, filters from other synths, softube compressors, etc) over the years instruments using these new DSP blocks have been much more stressful on the CPU, especially when trying to use them where kontakt really shines (hundreds of DFD voices all playing back glitch free). Outside of loading times and the odd script that did something crazy or maybe was less streamlined than it could have been, I haven't noticed much of a performance difference from V3-V7. There's going to be some difference when using playback modes that didn't previously exist and probably some resource differences due to graphics, but I can play the same multi in V3 as in v7 with the same patches and get performance that's so close that it doesn't matter in practice.

One of the reasons that Kontakt did so well in the market was that they had such a well coded direct from disk playback engine. I haven't heard anything about major changes to it over the years and it's still as good if not better than anything else out there.

When using Kontakt as more of a "sample based synth", a good test would be to load one of their (NI's) very synth ish libraries in your DAW with nothing else but Kontakt vX.X and play a bunch of midi. Then load the same patch in the same daw with the same midi V8.x. this makes your only variable the kontakt versions. If you change anything else including the version of the kontakt library instruments, there will be many extra variables. The way all the fancy libraries are structured and scripted can have a rather large effect on the resources used.

[machinesworking]

The way all the fancy libraries are structured and scripted can have a rather large effect on the resources used.

This is the biggest variable. Kontakt on an old 2010 Mac Pro was one of the few VI's that tanked the CPU, but only on things like Cinesamples string libraries with heavy scripting.

If there was ever something to complain about with Kontakt it's that the scripting seams to sometimes lead to spikes in various DAWs, and unfortunately I've never been able to find a specific pattern, Kontakt 5 spikes in DAW x but 7 does not etc. When it's behaving Kontakt is among the lightest sample library players out there.

[machinesworking]

Has anyone run performance tests comparing Kontakt 7 and 8 e.g. on mac M* devices? Is there any significant improvement, if any? I am not interested in the new features, only the real-time performance.

Download the Kontakt 8 Player and check for yourself.

I'm not dismissing your concerns, but like I mentioned above in personal experience Kontakt version Z can be fussy with X DAW on Y machine, and not with W DAW on the same machine, or not with any DAW on V Machine.

[Ah_Dziz]

The way all the fancy libraries are structured and scripted can have a rather large effect on the resources used.

This is the biggest variable. Kontakt on an old 2010 Mac Pro was one of the few VI's that tanked the CPU, but only on things like Cinesamples string libraries with heavy scripting.

If there was ever something to complain about with Kontakt it's that the scripting seams to sometimes lead to spikes in various DAWs, and unfortunately I've never been able to find a specific pattern, Kontakt 5 spikes in DAW x but 7 does not etc. When it's behaving Kontakt is among the lightest sample library players out there.

In my experience (using Kontakt day in and day out from version 2-6) if a script causes issues in 1 daw/ system it's got some issues and they are just causing a buffer underrun due to another variable like DAW ram handling or disk bottlenecks based on other things in the project. For instance, the RTO script for the Broadway bigband library that fable sounds makes, is pretty intense on any system but it really screws things up when running along side a ton of other things in Cubase ( for instance if I try to add it on top of my 200 track scoring template). Everytime I trigger a chord it "spikes the CPU" . This is due to some inefficient coding in the script but it only shows up in the midst of otherwise "busy" projects. If I use only the BBB library and like 10 other random kontakt instances along with AD2, there are no buffer underruns but those "spikes" are still there, they just don't kill the audio stream.

You mentioned cinestrings, Greg from Orange tree samples (one of the best Kontakt scripting guys around ) used to script all the cinesamples libraries and they were rock solid. Starting with Cinestrings, they had someone else scripting their stuff, and that's when cinestrings became a "performance intensive" library. Cine brass, Cine winds, cinePerc, voxos etc. all run smooth as butter even on my old i7 920 with 12 GB of ram and all 7200RPM mechanical drives.

[machinesworking]

You mentioned cinestrings, Greg from Orange tree samples (one of the best Kontakt scripting guys around ) used to script all the cinesamples libraries and they were rock solid. Starting with Cinestrings, they had someone else scripting their stuff, and that's when cinestrings became a "performance intensive" library. Cine brass, Cine winds, cinePerc, voxos etc. all run smooth as butter even on my old i7 920 with 12 GB of ram and all 7200RPM mechanical drives.

Makes sense that some bad or inefficient scripting might affect some DAWs more than others etc.

This make me curious if the Musio version of Cinestrings is lighter on CPU? I just bought Musio this BF mostly for the drum libraries etc. It would be worth testing the Musio version, hadn't planned on downloading it since I own Cinestrings, but it it's lighter on the CPU it could be handy.

[Ah_Dziz]

I haven't really looked into Musio past when it was first announced and it was going to have far less functionality than the kontakt stuff. I'm sure some of that has changed. Anyway I already have all the cinexxxx Libraries and they run fine in kontakt. Cinestrings is my least used of all of their stuff mostly because I have and love LASS and LASSLS along with lots of old vsl strings. The Cinesamples woodwinds percussion and brass are all amazing and worth checking out.

[synchronizer]

For what it’s worth, my specs are mac m1 max 64 GB RAM, Cubase pro 14, Kontakt 7.

I tend to experience drop-outs on low buffer settings, but that’s more common with specific libraries, so the above discussion makes sense.

Also, I had forgotten about Kontakt Player being an option, so that’s fair enough. I’ll try it.

[Ah_Dziz]

For what it’s worth, my specs are mac m1 max 64 GB RAM, Cubase pro 14, Kontakt 7.

I tend to experience drop-outs on low buffer settings, but that’s more common with specific libraries, so the above discussion makes sense.

Also, I had forgotten about Kontakt Player being an option, so that’s fair enough. I’ll try it.

A decent thing to attempt with any kontakt library that's giving you trouble, is to open the edit mode and bypass/delete any fx at the voice (group) level that you won't be using. Many libraries have filters and eqs there that you might not want or need and all that adds up massively on CPU. Many very straightforward sample playback libraries for instance have 1 or 2 filters running on each voice (hi and low pass) "just in case" you want to re filter a vintage synth sound that's already been filtered. Even with a decent amount of scripting and maybe some buss/ output effects, a decent SSD that's also running your OS and DAW etc can run hundreds of DFD voices in Kontakt with it's stock settings. This number drops pretty fast as effects start to be added per voice group.
All this is Windows based but I'd be amazed if the performance was very different on a Mac.

[synchronizer]

For what it’s worth, my specs are mac m1 max 64 GB RAM, Cubase pro 14, Kontakt 7.

I tend to experience drop-outs on low buffer settings, but that’s more common with specific libraries, so the above discussion makes sense.

Also, I had forgotten about Kontakt Player being an option, so that’s fair enough. I’ll try it.

A decent thing to attempt with any kontakt library that's giving you trouble, is to open the edit mode and bypass/delete any fx at the voice (group) level that you won't be using. Many libraries have filters and eqs there that you might not want or need and all that adds up massively on CPU. Many very straightforward sample playback libraries for instance have 1 or 2 filters running on each voice (hi and low pass) "just in case" you want to re filter a vintage synth sound that's already been filtered. Even with a decent amount of scripting and maybe some buss/ output effects, a decent SSD that's also running your OS and DAW etc can run hundreds of DFD voices in Kontakt with it's stock settings. This number drops pretty fast as effects start to be added per voice group.
All this is Windows based but I'd be amazed if the performance was very different on a Mac.

Thanks for the tip.

[jancivil]

From following Evil Dragon's Kontakt threads on VI Control forum I have gathered that K8 should not perform differently then K7, there is no reason it should, in itself. Library to library is anybody's guess.

I've firmly decided against using Kontakt past "Kontakt" (which should have the number 6 in its name but does not) in general. 7 is definitely dead to me.
Because there's more than one compatibility issue in VE Pro (EDIT: as AU. VST3 doesn't have the issues. Apple suggests staying with AU, something something Audio Group but I'm pretty sure NI isn't part of it.), and its GUI changes for me are intolerable.

K6.8 is performing well in Cubase 13 now, no idea how or why. I instantiated Reaktor Kontour in one instance of VEP with samples libraries in another and the Reaktor instance (a fair bit of parameters automated) was using from 5 to 10 times more CPU, brought my system to its knees. The other instance in itself performs well so it's hard to make VSL the culprit. In Cubase I have easily twice as many parameters automated and it seems very efficient. I loaded K8 Player in Cubase, with a new piano they have and it was fine. Similar GUI idiocy, not quite as stupid as 7's IMO. Very playable and not too sophisticated straightforward light footprint instrument. I may use it some day.

[Noisenomad]

I'm still love K7, I don't have any reliable proof but it feels much better than version 8.