Is this normal latency behaviour?

[laptoppop]

I was transferring 24 20-bit tracks at a time from 3 ADATs to Sonar 2.1 through a MOTU 2408. The CPU and Disk meters were *wonderfully* low (less than 5%) and the transfers came across just fine.

Now, when I play them back with no effects, the disk meter seems to be around 35%. The CPU meter is still down below 5%. Is this normal? I've played with the latencies and buffers a bit, and this is the best I have gotten so far. The disk meter just seems higher than I'd expect, given the outstanding performance during recording. I am not using any effects or recording any more channels at the same time, just playing back the raw tracks.

Is this normal? Is there any way for me to get better numbers on playback?

Thanks,
-lee-

[dachay2tnr]

35% disc usage with 24 tracks seems pretty darn good to me.

Adding effects will most likely boost your CPU usage (due to the real time processing), without increasing your disc usage any further. Disc usage is primarily from reading the tracks (.wav's) off the hard drive.

[laptoppop]

I can certainly live with 35% usage, and I'm expecting the CPU to go up as I use effects and automation, but I'm confused about why it would be so low during the initial recording and so much higher during playback.

My system is a reasonably configured box, not a killer, but not bad:
1.6 gHz P4
Asus mboard
512 mb RAM
Western Dig 120 gig hard drive (2 mb buffer, not the nice 8mb one)

I'll keep messing with it, but I won't worry about it if 35% sounds normal.

Thanks for the info!
-lee-

[dachay2tnr]

Originally posted by laptoppop
but I won't worry about it if 35% sounds normal.

Thanks for the info!
-lee-

Don't know that there is any such thing as NORMAL. Too many variables involved (CPU, memory, sound card, OS and OS optimizations, hd size/speed, fragmented files, background programs, etc. etc.).

However, as I said earlier, 35% for 24 tracks sound pretty good to me.

[Zad]

With CWpro 9 I some times get drop out messeages would adding more ram to my computer help even though I running a 40 gig westren digtial 7200 rpm HD 500 mhz P3 processer. Thanks Zad

[dachay2tnr]

I believe ram tends to help more in running real time effects. So if you are using plug-ins more ram might help - particularly if you only have 128 Mb or so. I would take it at least to 256. Since ram is pretty cheap, you might even want to go higher.

So my answer is - it can't hurt.

[Janic]

35% of what? Was your audio HDD empty before you put those tracks on there?
Perhaps too simple, but when was the last time you cleaned the audio disk and did a defrag?
Or do you only have just the one hard disk?

[laptoppop]

I don't know *exactly* what the disk meter in Sonar is measuring -- but it was at about 35%. I've actually been able to reduce that to 28% by adding a second IDE controller so that each device is on its own cable.

I've got an OS disk, an Audio disk (recently defragged), a cd burner, and a dvd burner. All are now masters on their own cables.

I'm not too concerned at this point -- the system is nice and stable and running well. I am still puzzled at why the reported number during *recording* was so low, but I suspect it was because *all* I was doing was recording. If I was playing back a track or three along with the recording, I would not be suprised if the usage jumped up.

Thanks!
-lee-