Newby... Windows system issues

[Axis39]

So, I've got an AMD system (3500+ Athlon) with 1 Meg of Ram running WIndows XP Media Edition... Internal and external drives and a USB wireless network adapter.

No matter what input device I use (sound card line in form a Behringer Xenyix 1202FX mixer, Lexicon Lambda or Guitarport UX2) I get pops and crackles and very little volume on my signal.

Even with nothing attached I get pops and crackles and spikes.

I turned on the performance meter in Task Manager and with no apps loaded, I average between 10-20% CPU usage... closer to 10% most of the time.

The minute I load any recording software (Reaper, Cakewalk GuitarTracks Pro 3, The Line6 stuff) the CPU maxes out and CPU usage averages around 85-100%, usually in the 90's.

I went through turning everything off... and I do mean EVERYTHING. I went through the Tascam PDF bit and shut down every service I could, I turned off every effect, visual, audio, menu, cards, networking, etc.

And it's always the same thing. As soon as I open the Audio program, the CPU usage maxes out.


Will more RAM help me out? Or should I just go buy a Mac? I'm getting to that point now.

 

[disgruntled-inc]

1 Meg? I assume you mean 1 Gig.

What kind of soundcard are you using? If you're just using the one that came with your computer it probably doesn't really have the balls to do what you want it to.

 

[Axis39]

1 Meg? I assume you mean 1 Gig.

What kind of soundcard are you using? If you're just using the one that came with your computer it probably doesn't really have the balls to do what you want it to.

Uh... huh... uh... yeah 1 GB, not 1 MB....

Using a Diamond Extreme 5.1 card. Sound on the motherboard disabled. That was the first thing I changed!

 

[gecko zzed]

There's no obvious reasons for the problems. Have your tried without the USB wireless thingy?

 

[Jeff_D]

So, I've got an AMD system (3500+ Athlon) with 1 Meg of Ram running WIndows XP Media Edition... Internal and external drives and a USB wireless network adapter.

No matter what input device I use (sound card line in form a Behringer Xenyix 1202FX mixer, Lexicon Lambda or Guitarport UX2) I get pops and crackles and very little volume on my signal.

Even with nothing attached I get pops and crackles and spikes.

I turned on the performance meter in Task Manager and with no apps loaded, I average between 10-20% CPU usage... closer to 10% most of the time.

The minute I load any recording software (Reaper, Cakewalk GuitarTracks Pro 3, The Line6 stuff) the CPU maxes out and CPU usage averages around 85-100%, usually in the 90's.

I went through turning everything off... and I do mean EVERYTHING. I went through the Tascam PDF bit and shut down every service I could, I turned off every effect, visual, audio, menu, cards, networking, etc.

And it's always the same thing. As soon as I open the Audio program, the CPU usage maxes out.


Will more RAM help me out? Or should I just go buy a Mac? I'm getting to that point now.

I'm using a way older AMD system and I'm recording 12-14 tracks at once- I think its an AMD 2500 w/ a gig of ram. Why do you have so many different interfaces? Maybe driver conflicts or something? Also, if you go into the task manager, what else is running? How many processes are running? You might have some junk/spyware, etc.

 

[I Got Riffs]

If you're using the Line 6 UX2, then it should have it's own Asio driver. Make sure that you select this and check it every time you open your daw, because I've experience at least one that would reset itself every time for some reason.

 

[TeyshaBlue]

There's no obvious reasons for the problems. Have your tried without the USB wireless thingy?

+10. I've been battling a new Sonar 8.3 install....lots of pops, crackles, and distortion. Unplugged the wireless USB mouse...bingo. Problem solved.
Weird.

 

[Axis39]

I'm using a way older AMD system and I'm recording 12-14 tracks at once- I think its an AMD 2500 w/ a gig of ram. Why do you have so many different interfaces? Maybe driver conflicts or something? Also, if you go into the task manager, what else is running? How many processes are running? You might have some junk/spyware, etc.

I don't have all of the interfaces plugged in at once! LOL I've tried each one separately. I've rebooted with them plugged and unplugged. I've unloaded all my plugins. Most of the time I run without processing the signal at all within the software... just trying to get a good recording.

Checked all the drivers, I went into Task manager and started shutting down processes until my system was unstable and it was still ticking away. I run Ad Aware and Spybot pretty regularly to make sure stuff is clean.

I do have Norton 360 running, but this problem occurred prior to Norton being installed.

I've never gotten a good recording out of this system. And I've been trying for a year maybe...

If you're using the Line 6 UX2, then it should have it's own Asio driver. Make sure that you select this and check it every time you open your daw, because I've experience at least one that would reset itself every time for some reason.

Checked, double checked...

Interestingly, while playing with the TonePort, I've been able to listen to stuff I'm playing, with very little or no latency. But the minute I arma track to record, it get's ugly.

+10. I've been battling a new Sonar 8.3 install....lots of pops, crackles, and distortion. Unplugged the wireless USB mouse...bingo. Problem solved.
Weird.

No wireless items other than the wireless network interface... and I tried it in and out of the system. I had this issue before I picked up the wireless interface (I just moved a couple of months ago and finally got around to trying to record something again this last weekend) I used to use the board mounted NIC.

Maybe I need to just unplug all my stuff and add them back one at a time?



I did order some RAM today. It should be here tomorrow. I'll throw it in and see what happens as well.

 

[Kingofpain678]

if i were in your shoes i would just reformat my HDD and just start over clean...

 

[Chili]

Not sure if this will help, but every little bit does. Plus, this is a good document just for reference sake.

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/ts/detail.php?Index=30058

 

[Axis39]

Okay, so I popped in two more Gig of ram... and Reaper still maxes out the CPU. But then I tried Cakewalk Guitar Tracks and it worked perfectly!

There must be something in my Reaper setup/environment that's taking too much CPU power.

While I'm very happy with the quality I'm getting from Cakewalk, I was getting used to the Reaper interface... and I'm stubborn and curious. I wanna know why it ain't working correctly.

So, I'll play around with some optimization, but I truly believe it is some setting within Reaper that's messing with my world!

 

[Jeff_D]

Okay, so I popped in two more Gig of ram... and Reaper still maxes out the CPU. But then I tried Cakewalk Guitar Tracks and it worked perfectly!

There must be something in my Reaper setup/environment that's taking too much CPU power.

While I'm very happy with the quality I'm getting from Cakewalk, I was getting used to the Reaper interface... and I'm stubborn and curious. I wanna know why it ain't working correctly.

So, I'll play around with some optimization, but I truly believe it is some setting within Reaper that's messing with my world!

That sucks. If you really think Reaper is creating a problem, stop by the forum over there and see if anyone else reports any similar issues. Those guys all seem really helpful over there.

I've been using Reaper for almost two years now, and I've been happy with it from the start... and it just keeps getting better.

Anyway, glad you got it to work with something. Someone above suggested doing a fresh install of Windows... when is the last time you installed Windows? A fresh install would probably rule out driver conflicts or operating system issues. I know thats a pain in the ass.

 

[Doowah]

Not sure if this will help, but every little bit does. Plus, this is a good document just for reference sake.

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/ts/detail.php?Index=30058

Thanks for posting this link. I found it to be extremely informational and have bookmarked it for reference when I set up my new XP DAW machine. Priceless info...

 

[Bristol Posse]

A lot of audio gearand software specifically states it's not supported with XP Media edition. It just doesn't play nice because of the additional coding media center has I guess

 

[Axis39]

A lot of audio gearand software specifically states it's not supported with XP Media edition. It just doesn't play nice because of the additional coding media center has I guess

That doesn't surprise me much... I mean I've been working with Windows a long time and usually when they try to do something for you like build a media platform, it usually backfires and you end up trying to get rid of all that 'stuff'.

I am wondering if it's the sound card now. I did some searching over at the Reaper forum and couldn't find any reference to my sound card, A Diamond Extreme... in fact I couldn't find any reference to any Diamond sound card... I guess it probably couldn't hurt for me to track down a decent audio card as well.

Now to go search on audio cards... Thanks everyone for the suggestions. AS things change, I'll let you know what I find.

 

[legionserial]

Try increasing your buffer size.

 

[Jeff_D]

I am wondering if it's the sound card now.

Thats easy enough to check. Take the card out. BTW, if you have an interface like that Lambda you dont technically *need* a sound card too. In fact, in the *olden days* drive conflicts were common if you had more than one sound device. If your computer has an onboard soundcard, I'd go into the BIOS and disable that too.

 

[legionserial]

Just a thought....are you using SATA or IDE hard drives?