T1 - latency issues playing softsynth from MIDI keyboard

[GuyWithDogs]

I'm just getting started with Tracktion 1 (downloaded the freebie) and was playing with MIDI input yesterday. I was trying to use Drumatic 3 to record some basic beats, and was getting a lot of latency.

My setup is Dell Inspiron 8500, XP Pro SP2, 512 MB RAM, using the onboard Sigmatel audio chip. I have ASIO4ALL v2, but if I select it alone, I get not audio output. I have to have the DirectSound configured, and I need it up about 640 samples or higher to get rid of the crunchy sounding blips and quarks.

Keyboard was a Roland JX-3P; MIDI interface is a Turtle Beach 1x1 USB to MIDI thing.

I did some searches on this, and found some hints about stopping extra things that are running, I took out my USB mouse to see if that helped, I got new audio drivers from Dell, etc. Still get a lag that means my simply bass drum beats end up off-beat after 3 bars.

Should I be able to use ASIO by itself for sound output? Are there preferred settings? Is there a tutorial site somewhere on good setup tips?

I'm really interested in using this as a MIDI sequencer to render thru VST softsynths, particularly since it was a legal version for free. But I need to sort out this latency thing for it to work. I've not had this problem playing directly thru brainspawn's forte VST host (and that was with a wind controller, that generates a lot more MIDI data).

Any suggestions on improving the situation (short of replacing the PC - that's NOT an option...) would be appreciated.

[M'Snah]

Is your card an ASIO card? replacing my old cheap card with a new ASIO card helped a lot... but turtle beach is not a bad card AFAIK.

configure XP to give priority to background processes, processing MIDI is a background process.

You'll probably get more tips here... but regardless of all tuning that I did, getting a decent ASIO card helped me more than anything else...

I think ASIO4ALL by itself should be sufficient, although it will not overcome soundcard latency.

--HansM

[GuyWithDogs]

Your question made me do a little digging. Turns out there's two things I neede to change:

1. There's a setting called "Force 16 bit samples" that should be on

2. I could then run at 512 samples (11.6 ms) - but it was still "crunchy". I changed the setting in Tracktion from 44.1 KHz to 48 KHz and things cleaned up marvelously.

Should be interesting tonight when I try this again!

Thanks very much.

[M'Snah]

Maybe Tracktion's settings didn't match your soundcard's settings? AFAIK it's not common that Tracktion has to run at 48KHz to produce a decent result...

--HansM