PTravel
Senior Senior Member
I compose and orchestrate in X2 and, frequently, can have 20 to 30 tracks. I have a reasonable AMD quad-core under Windows 7 with an SSD but only 4 gig of RAM. When I've finished a piece, I'll export the tracks to wav and then important in Audition 3.0 for final mixing.
Last night, I decided I wanted to break out a drum track into separate instruments -- easier to mix that way. I'm using the Addictive Drums VST for drums on this project. I started adding new soft synths for each drum instrument, i.e. bass, snare, high-hat, tom, etc. and linking the original the part. Everything went fine until I tried adding a fifth Addictive Drums soft synth -- X2 would lock up tighter than a drum and just sit there with the hour glass spinning away. The only way out was a reboot and I tried again. Same result. After a third failed attempt, I got smart and started watching memory use. The original piece, with all drum instruments running into a singe instance of Addictive Drums showed a total use (including, of course, Sonar) of about 2.5 gigs. Adding additional instances of Addictive drums seem to add about 250-500 megs each. By the time I had added four instances, I was almost right on the maximum installed memory for the machine. Adding the additional instance should have forced Windows to place it in the swap file which, on an SSD, should be pretty darn fast (though somewhat slower than system memory). Instead, the machine would just suffer a panic attack and freeze solid.
I immediately ordered more memory on-line (unfortunately, this particular machine will only accommodate up to 8 gig, but that should be enough for now) and expedited shipping so I'd have it for this weekend and not lose another couple of days. However, to my mind, this indicates either a poorly written program, a memory leak or something similar. I have no idea whether the problem is in Sonar, Addictive Drums, or one of the other five or six VSTs I have running for this project. Still, talk about annoying. I'm tempted to connect in my laptop, which is an Intel quad-core with 16-gig, but the physical setup is tight and I like things the way they are.
Word to the wise: watch your memory use in Sonar -- you don't ever want to drive it right up to the line with VSTs.
Last night, I decided I wanted to break out a drum track into separate instruments -- easier to mix that way. I'm using the Addictive Drums VST for drums on this project. I started adding new soft synths for each drum instrument, i.e. bass, snare, high-hat, tom, etc. and linking the original the part. Everything went fine until I tried adding a fifth Addictive Drums soft synth -- X2 would lock up tighter than a drum and just sit there with the hour glass spinning away. The only way out was a reboot and I tried again. Same result. After a third failed attempt, I got smart and started watching memory use. The original piece, with all drum instruments running into a singe instance of Addictive Drums showed a total use (including, of course, Sonar) of about 2.5 gigs. Adding additional instances of Addictive drums seem to add about 250-500 megs each. By the time I had added four instances, I was almost right on the maximum installed memory for the machine. Adding the additional instance should have forced Windows to place it in the swap file which, on an SSD, should be pretty darn fast (though somewhat slower than system memory). Instead, the machine would just suffer a panic attack and freeze solid.
I immediately ordered more memory on-line (unfortunately, this particular machine will only accommodate up to 8 gig, but that should be enough for now) and expedited shipping so I'd have it for this weekend and not lose another couple of days. However, to my mind, this indicates either a poorly written program, a memory leak or something similar. I have no idea whether the problem is in Sonar, Addictive Drums, or one of the other five or six VSTs I have running for this project. Still, talk about annoying. I'm tempted to connect in my laptop, which is an Intel quad-core with 16-gig, but the physical setup is tight and I like things the way they are.
Word to the wise: watch your memory use in Sonar -- you don't ever want to drive it right up to the line with VSTs.