KVR Audio

Nimrod7 · Post by **Nimrod7** » Sun Apr 28, 2019 7:46 am

Hi guys,

I brought a new Mac Mini 2018, with 32GB ram, i7, and plenty of SSD. Mac is connected to an external 4k Monitor, and an UAD Apollo user interface.

Live currently seems to not behave correctly. Either simple songs can't be played back without momentarily freezing, stuttering, or degrading the sound quality with artifacts as playing back.

I have tried to open up Serum, add 2 oscillators 8 unison in each, play a chord and even that didn't played smoothly.

I have created a video here, which is just unable to play 9 tracks concurrently:

That doesn't supposed to happen.

Things I tried,

- Contacted customer support. Told to reset live by deleting some config files, set the refresh rate to 30fps by adding a parameter in the options.txt file.

- Tried to disconnect midi interfaces such as my controller, and push as suggested by support again.

Nothing fixed it.
And I don't have any other ideas.

I will appreciate any help.

Thanks,
Bill.

antic604 · Post by **antic604** » Sun Apr 28, 2019 9:35 am

The DSP meter seems to be jumping quite a lot, which would suggest CPU power saving is enabled. I've no clue how to check it or disable it on Mac, though

If there's some equivalent of Windows' Task Manager, the fire it up and see what the CPU is doing - what's the clock, is it stable, are all the cores being used, etc.

sprnva · Post by **sprnva** » Sun Apr 28, 2019 9:55 am

It might be the T2 chip bug. Update Mojave to 10.14.4 and see if that helps.

If it doesn't, try disabling the time daemon (you can find instructions on how to do that online).

risome · Post by **risome** » Sun Apr 28, 2019 10:34 am

Def update to Mojave and also turn location services off and see if that helps.I don't know why but it help me with enormous cpu spikes

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Sun Apr 28, 2019 2:47 pm

See if Live has "Accessibility" under Security & Privacy; Privacy tab: 'allow Live to control your computer'. It's a goofy way to phrase it but my hypothesis is full interaction with other components means this.

BDeep · Post by **BDeep** » Sun Apr 28, 2019 3:57 pm

sprnva wrote: Sun Apr 28, 2019 9:55 am It might be the T2 chip bug. Update Mojave to 10.14.4 and see if that helps.

If it doesn't, try disabling the time daemon (you can find instructions on how to do that online).

It’s most likely this. There’s an article on CDM about it.
Anyway, it seems to be less when I turned WiFi off.

jonljacobi · Post by **jonljacobi** » Mon Apr 29, 2019 11:49 pm

Definitely looks like the T2 bug. I didn't see mention of a fix in 10.14.4 in the release notes. My sympathies, not what you want when you buy new hardware.

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Tue Apr 30, 2019 1:55 am

unloading that daemon unloads a kext, do not try this at home

mgw38 · Post by **mgw38** » Tue Apr 30, 2019 2:47 am

The T2 chip bug is supposed to only effect systems where a USB2.0 audio interface is connected to one of the Thunderbolt 3 ports. What Apollo interface do you use? Is it a recent one?

If you have access to a USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt audio interface I would try to see if switching to that solves the problem. It has also been suggested to use a certified Thunderbolt 3 powered hub in between the Mac Thunderbolt port and any USB 2.0 audio interface. Not a cheap fix though.

Does the problem also appear if you play the audio through internal audio? I would at least try to see if the problem persists if you do not use the external audio interface. If the problem goes away if you do not use the Apollo, then the issue is the communication through the Thunderbolt port (i.e. the T2 chip bug).

jonljacobi · Post by **jonljacobi** » Tue Apr 30, 2019 6:28 pm

Well, he seems to be gone. Hopefully, something worked.

DrGonzo · Post by **DrGonzo** » Wed May 01, 2019 7:00 am

Sad the OP disappeared. Would be nice to hear if he solved it.

/C

teilo · Post by **teilo** » Wed May 01, 2019 4:16 pm

I have a Caldigit thunderbolt dock. Connecting my Scarlett 6i6 to the dock resolved any issues I had.

Nimrod7 · Post by **Nimrod7** » Wed May 01, 2019 6:16 pm

Hi guys,

Sorry for disappearing, work consumes my life!

Thanks for the suggestions. Some really good ideas here!

I have updated to 10.4.4 - no change.
Tried disabling the time updates (T2 bug?), by disabling that ktext - No change.

Some stuff still pending to test.

Still got to test granting permissions to accessibility.

But what really got my attention is the USB to T3 problems.
I have an Apollo 8 Rack mount interface (2nd generation I guess) Thunderbolt 2 connected to Thunderbolt 3 through an apple adapter:
https://www.thomann.de/ie/apple_thunder ... dapter.htm

Can this be the issue?
I don't have access to a T3 interface. I can get this which is not cheap but I am not willing to do that unless I am sure it's the reason:
https://www.thomann.de/ie/universal_aud ... 3_card.htm?

Blaster · Post by **Blaster** » Wed May 01, 2019 8:13 pm

How is the performance without the Apollo connected? At least you will be able to tell if it's the device or not.

Lucastyle · Post by **Lucastyle** » Wed May 01, 2019 8:34 pm

I would suggest logging in to the Ableton beta forum and leaving a comment, this is a know bug affecting Live for a while now, on laptops disabling the dedicated graphics card makes it less buggy but I'm not really sure how to fix it on a Mac mini, maybe someone from Ableton can help you there in the Ableton beta Forum.

Live 10 don't play back smoothly on new mac hardware.