I record and mix in Logic. I have plenty of memory and processor juice to run multiple plugins on 20+ tracks at a time but my question is should I?
You can run whatever plugs on whatever tracks you wish, that's fine. But there's absolutely no need or reason to chew up CPU cycles why having them all run real-time.
I don't know whether it's called "lock" or "freeze" in Logic, but under either name it's a function that allows you to build your effects as you wish on any given track and the "lock" them in place as you move on to another track. What this does is create a temporary pre-rendered copy of the track with the effects rendered in place so that as you work on the other tracks, you can play the pre-rendered tracks back with all effects already processed and in place without having to use any extra CPU to render them on the fly every time you hit the play button.
The beauty about this is that it still keeps the un-rendered version with active plugs, so that you can always go back and change things again if you want to. just un-lick (un-freeze) the track, and your back to the original with real-time unrendered plugs, no pain, no foul.
Personally, I get into the habit of starting my session with every track locked, unlocking only that track or group of two or three (at the most) tracks that I am currently working on at that moment. Once I get those where Iwant them in the mix an move on to another track or two, I lock the just-completed ones and unlock the new ones.
That's not so much about CPU savings - though that CAN become important when you start throwing multiple convolution reverbs and room modelers and such at the CPU all at once, even when you have 3GHz of dual core - as it is about project management and avoiding mistakes. There have been times when just about any of us have gotten tired or distracted in front of the DAW and discovered oh so late that we accidentally edited or processed the wrong track five minutes ago and then spend an extra hour just trying to recover from that mistaken edit and everything we have done based upon it since then.
By keeping only that track or those couple of tracks we are currently working on unlocked at any given time and keeping the others locked, we greatly reduce the opportunity for such costly mistakes.
And it takes virtually no extra time or work to follow the process. Just a couple of clicks per track as you go. Yeah the rendering of the lock files takes a second or two, but if your CPU is as juicy as you say, that'll be virtually unnoticable.
G.
