SONAR Sluggishness?

[mark4man]

People,

Lately, SONAR XL (2.2) is bogging down with one particular project.

The problem begins when I attempt to open it, which is unusually slow; & the progress bar stops at a few different points (40%, 63%, etc.) While opening the project in question, I kick on XP's System Monitor (with it's Performance Graph.) The CPU Processing Time; & Paging is spiked.

Once opened, I am running 18 to 20 24-Bit, 96 kHz tracks; & I always dropout almost immediately upon hitting Play. I have to hit the Reset & Play buttons a few times before the tracks will play successfully...

...& once they play, they seem to play fine!

I opened the XP System Monitor again during successful playback; & the CPU Processing Speed & Paging are both spiked, with Disk Usage running at about 40%...yet SONAR's meters indicate CPU = 10-15% & Disk = 7-12%...

...which is about normal for 18-20 24-Bit tracks, right?

My ASIO Buffer Size is set to 256 Samples, with ASIO 2.0 Direct Monitoring enabled. I have 2 Buffers in the Playback Que; & the Buffer Size/Mixing Latency is set to Fast, @ 2.7 ms.

My only XP audio performance tweaks are as follows:

Removed Windows Components:

X - Fax Services
X - Indexing Service
X - Management & Monitoring Tools
D - MSN Explorer
X - Other Network File & Print Services
X - Terminal Server
D - Windows Messenger (2)

X = Not activated w/ XP reinstall
D = Removed manually

----------------------------------
Disabled Registry Components:

Notification Area [Systray] Balloon Tips

------------------------------
Executed System Tweaks:

Disabled - Fast User Switching
Switched Off - Power Schemes
Switched Off - Hibernation
Activated - DMA on Hard Discs/CD ROMS
Disabled - Automatic Updates
Disabled - Remote Assistance
Disabled - Hide Inactive Icons
Disabled - Automatic Desktop Cleanup Wizard
Disabled - XP Built-In CD Burner
Stopped - Messenger Service

----------------------
Disabled Services:

None.
----------------------

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks very much,

mark4man

 

[James Argo]

I'm not sure, but I suspect you need to raise the buffer queue and mixing latency slightly higher. Running 18-20 tracks 24/96 gives your system (CPU & Disk) hard time initialy. The meter doesn't always necesary show it. Have you gone www.musicxp.net ? There's many hints on tweaking your machine propherly...


Jaymz

 

[dachay2tnr]

Sounds like it could be a waveform issue to me. The sluggishness could be coming from the system having to redraw waveforms upon opening the file. Once they are drawn, then it will behave OK.

Have you increased the size of your picture cache in the aud.ini file? If not, you might want to consider that.

 

[mark4man]

Jaymz & dachay,

Opened the project in "Safe Mode", selected "No To All" on the loading of the plug-ins...& it opened with blazing speed (&...the waveforms were displayed rapidly as well.)

Now that the problem with the opening of the project seems to be remedied; & going to play the tracks w/o the plugs to see how that fares; & then add the plugs & try your tweaks.

Thanks,

mark4man

 

[mark4man]

follow-up...

Well...here's an interesting development. Maybe this will help someone else (or...maybe you guys know this already...I don’t know):

ASIO Mode overrides the Buffer Size Slider in Mixing Latency.

So, what I did was (after the project continued with the dropout problem with no plug-ins loaded)...I increased the ASIO Buffer Size to 512 Samples. Of course, nothing happened when I slid the Slider...so I applied the changes & closed the dialog. When I reopened it, the Slider was still set to "Fast", but the Mixing Latency was now reading 5.3 ms.

This fixed the dropout problem (& I then went in & changed my picture cache, per dachay's recommendations.)

Now, the project opens quicker & plays fine.

Thanks Jaymz & dachay.

On a side note...in ASIO Mode, the Audio Interface's logo always appears in the ASIO Panel (regardless of mfg.)?

Thanks again,

mark4man

 

[tubedude]

People,

Lately, SONAR XL (2.2) is bogging down with one particular project.

The problem begins when I attempt to open it, which is unusually slow; & the progress bar stops at a few different points (40%, 63%, etc.) ,

mark4man

If its stopping at the same place every time, heres what causes it for me.
I'll be tracking drums, and there will be a messup, so we'l lstart it from where a break is coming up and have them flow back in at the right place. If I dont edit the overlayed parts (where the 2nd take is lying on top of the 1st take) i guess it in effect doubles the track count and bogs it down, killing it in the same place everytime. Make sense?
Peace
Paul