ACID Pro 7 very choppy...

[mtlullaby]

ok. here's my problem. i've been using ACID for over 10 years now and haven't come across a problem like this before. i notice that, since upgrading to version 7, whenever i use too many effects on songs, the song plays back very very choppy, as if it was losing memory. i know it's not a memory problem as i'm running 4GB of RAM on 2 quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz.
if anyone else has this problem and knows how to fix it, please help.

 

[Runaway]

IMO there are only two possibilities - cpu or disk I/O.

If you can monitor your cpu usage and I'll bet its probably reasonably acceptable - assuming your not using some cpu intensive reverbs

That leaves hard disk speed - a 10k rpm Raptor drive will give you an immediate 35%+ boost in I/O performance.

Just a thought...

 

[mtlullaby]

Thanks Runaway.
I'm guessing it's probably the disk speed as I've been monitoring the CPU and it seems fine. I used to add the track's effects on SoundForge but just recently began adding effects directly on ACID - and that's when I started noticing the 'choppy' effect.
Kind of annoying when you're editing a song.

Thanks again for the response!

 

[mattr]

Unless your drive is horribly fragmented, even a reasonable 7200rpm drive should be good for anything but the most demanding projects (I've had mine running 120 tracks @ 24bit 44.1khz with not even a blip registering on Sonar's disk I/O meters), and if this were the case the playback would be affected regardless of whether plugins were enabled or not.


I suspect a third possibility, which I'm really surprised Runaway didn't mention (considering its one of the top causes for stuttery/interrupted playback)... your soundcard.

You haven't mentioned what soundcard / interface you are using...?

Are you using the latest drivers? ASIO drivers? What are your buffers set like?

More info please!

 

[mtlullaby]

Hi Mattr,

Thanks for that.
To answer your questions, I am running two separate hard drives - each 500GB. One is for music only (i.e. DAW's, editing, soft synths, recorded files, etc.) and the other for everyday PC work (MSOffice, Photoshop, etc.). I've had the computer about a year now and, to be honest, haven't really even thought of defragmenting (color me stupid!).
Mind you, my last computer was defragmented twice in 10 years!
So, yeah, that might be a problem...

I'm using Creative SB X-FI Audio w/ Optical In/Out on Vista Home Premium. Latest drivers were downloaded about 2 months ago, and I'm using ASIO drivers as well.
My track buffering is set at 0.25, and is enabled - which may be causing some problems, too. Playback buffering is set at 0.019 - and playback is where I'm running into this problem.

Ever since I've started using DAW's, it's basically been trial and error for me, but I've never encountered this problem. My last computer was running Win98SE with a SB Live! card and I never had a problem like this.

Thanks in advance for taking the time to answer, guys. Really appreciate it.

 

[leove sierra]

maybe

Hi Mattr,

Thanks for that.
To answer your questions, I am running two separate hard drives - each 500GB. One is for music only (i.e. DAW's, editing, soft synths, recorded files, etc.) and the other for everyday PC work (MSOffice, Photoshop, etc.). I've had the computer about a year now and, to be honest, haven't really even thought of defragmenting (color me stupid!).
Mind you, my last computer was defragmented twice in 10 years!
So, yeah, that might be a problem...

I'm using Creative SB X-FI Audio w/ Optical In/Out on Vista Home Premium. Latest drivers were downloaded about 2 months ago, and I'm using ASIO drivers as well.
My track buffering is set at 0.25, and is enabled - which may be causing some problems, too. Playback buffering is set at 0.019 - and playback is where I'm running into this problem.

Ever since I've started using DAW's, it's basically been trial and error for me, but I've never encountered this problem. My last computer was running Win98SE with a SB Live! card and I never had a problem like this.

Thanks in advance for taking the time to answer, guys. Really appreciate it.

Creative SounBlaster soundcards aren't that fit for recording. You need to have a soundcard made for home recording like the cheap Behringer UCA stuff or the M-Audio brands. Aside from that maybe you should try to degfrag your pc, clean out stuff once in a while that'll help.