Help with Playback Skips-Cubase LE4 Tascam US-144

[OSCAR777]

Ok, I hope this is in the right place. Sorry guys its my first post.


I'm having problems with my playback. It tends to skip sometimes during playback, but the skips are not there when I export it and listen to it.
The skips are bad, and make me lose my timing or rhythm if Im recording something else. It usually happens when I record 3 or more tracks. The
weird thing is, I had 4 tracks and it didnt skip, I open it up the following day erase one of the tracks to re-record it, and BAM skips galore.

okay, My set-up:

HP dv6707us 2GB RAM 2 GHz Processor AMD 64 AthlonX2
Tascam US-144 and Cubase LE4 All effects are pre tascam so go in directly,
and it is currently 4 audio channels, and Addictive drums on another channel. A total of 5.

What do oyu guys think?!?

Thanks in advance.

[NYMorningstar]

Skips, cracks, pops etc. are indicative of system interrupts caused by using the same drive for your programming and music data. The easiest thing to do is get another drive and dedicate it to your data only.

[OSCAR777]

As in an External Hard Drive?!? I thought it was a RAM or sound
card problem.

Okay, so if I get ANY size Hard Drive, and save all my Cubase
Recordings and anything I use for recording it will work???

Also, what would you suggest saving in the External HD? Im a little
new to this, and appreciate all your help.

[NYMorningstar]

Another internal hard drive would be good and they're pretty cheap these days. If your using you workstation for web surfing then you may want to get the spyware off it and check for viruses especially if this problem just creeped up on you.

you want to use the extra hard drive for just your audio files.

[OSCAR777]

Ok, sorry if I sound like a jackass, but your suggesting me to put
another internal hard drive. On the internal hard drive, I would
install all my music production stuff (Cubase, VST's, MIDI, etc.), and
run all the software off of there instead of my original hard drive?!?
Am I on the right track, or completely out of it?!?

So, the playback is skipping due to the hard drive running my Cubase,
& all of a sudden trying to run something else causing it to overload and
skip??? I hope I got that right.

Also, I notice on the VST performance, the ASIO marker sometimes
shoots all the way up. What does that mean?

Thanks in advance.

[NYMorningstar]

Originally Posted by OSCAR777

On the internal hard drive, I would
install all my music production stuff (Cubase, VST's, MIDI, etc.), and
run all the software off of there instead of my original hard drive?!?
.

No. You run the programming (Cubase, VST's, MIDI, etc.) off the original harddrive and just use the extra one for the audio files. In other words when you start a new project you tell it to put the audio folder on the new drive.

Originally Posted by OSCAR777

So, the playback is skipping due to the hard drive running my Cubase,
& all of a sudden trying to run something else causing it to overload and
skip??? I hope I got that right.

Sorta, it's a streaming audio with buffering and when the buffers don't handle the load you get the skips, pops and clicks. Also, multiple cores need system resources to synchronize. This leads to peaks, drop-outs and a generally higher basic load.

The asio part of VST performance window indicates the resources left to calculate the ASIO block and forward it to the audio driver in time. Try increasing your latency to increase the time available.

[OSCAR777]

WOW your good!!! I really appreciate everything.

Now, increasing the latency, wouldn't that mess me up
when recording? Or, it's not that much of a delay to actually
mess me up? (as far as timing and rhythm is concerned)

I appreciate everything you have answered.