Wondering if my System lacks the >>oomph<< and what I need for BiaB and RB - 11/23/17 02:49 AM
Uh-oh, I think I've posted this to the wrong sub-forum. I meant for it to go into the Recording, Mixing, Performance, etc. subforum. Moderator, if you think this should be moved, have at it.
Original Post follows:
======================
Well, the title sort of sez it all. The subject machine is my DAW. Right now my system is too easily sent into a frenzy of pops, clicks and crackles in my audio playback, and it's making it very difficult for me to generate decent quality audio files. I've even gone so far as making sure that no other program besides BiaB or RB is resident and that even unnecessary processes have been terminated (I use the Task Manager for this). Doing so helps some but not as much as I would have liked. All it takes is one click to ruin a recording. And I seldom get through an entire piece of music on this machine without at least one click being heard. So I'm kinda dead in the water right now if I want to use RB or BiaB going forward.
You know how RB has that little CPU Usage screen up in the top right corner. While a song is playing, the RB amount typically fluctuates between 17 and 20 %, while the Total number is usually only a couple of points higher. A similar readout in Cakewalk's Sonar delivers even lower numbers than these. I dunno about you, but to me these are quite low numbers and they seem to be indicating that my system still has plenty of reserve horsepower for this sort of work. So why all the noise? And why am I having such a noise problem with BiaB and RB when I don't with other DAW software like Sonar and Studio One 3?
My audio interface is an M-Audio Delta 66 PCI card, 24/96 capable, comes with an OMNI I/O unit that amounts to a compact mixer. It is a very quiet card. I'm running the M-Audio ASIO drivers. I've tried the MME drivers and they fare no better but the latency is worse. For MIDI, I'm using various synths for now, including Coyote and Sforzando.
My system is about five or six years old now. I don't recall exactly when I bought the MoBo and processor, but I do know that the MoBo is a really good one. As old as it is, it still supports recent processor technology. It is an AsRock 890 GX Pro 3 and takes AMD AM3 and AM3+ socket processors. Currently in the machine is an AM3 socket quad core AMD Phenom II X4 840 that's running at 3.44 GHz. So I'm thinking about upgrading to an AM3+ processor. The AsRock MoBo supports eight core processors, so whatever processor I do buy for it, it'll be an eight core. Prices range widely, from almost $300 to less than $100. I've got some homework to do before I make a decision.
Memory-wise, it's running 8 gigs of DDR3 SDRAM, and it has open slots for two more memory sticks. When I first upgraded my system to 8 gigs I thought that it would be a loooong time before I'd need more memory than that. Well, now, I'm not so sure anymore. I'm curious about what you folks think is adequate RAM for a DAW these days.
I just ran Geek Bench on it. I know some of you like to see these numbers, but I have no idea which numbers it is you like (although I'd like to), so how about them all? Here ya go:
Single-Core Performance
Single-Core Score 1879
Crypto Score 116
Integer Score 2218
Floating Point Score 1633
Memory Score 1928
AES 116
89.6 MB/sec
LZMA 2331
3.64 MB/sec
JPEG 2853
23.0 Mpixels/sec
Canny 1977
27.4 Mpixels/sec
Lua 2221
2.28 MB/sec
Dijkstra 2356
1.59 MTE/sec
SQLite 2262
62.7 Krows/sec
HTML5 Parse 2488
11.3 MB/sec
HTML5 DOM 952
862.7 KElements/sec
Histogram Equalization 1947
60.8 Mpixels/sec
PDF Rendering 2066
54.9 Mpixels/sec
LLVM 3586
246.6 functions/sec
Camera 2674
7.42 images/sec
SGEMM 558
11.8 Gflops
SFFT 1503
3.75 Gflops
N-Body Physics 1643
1.23 Mpairs/sec
Ray Tracing 1760
257.1 Kpixels/sec
Rigid Body Physics 2141
6267.9 FPS
HDR 2933
10.6 Mpixels/sec
Gaussian Blur 2048
35.9 Mpixels/sec
Speech Recognition 1493
12.8 Words/sec
Face Detection 1777
519.1 Ksubwindows/sec
Memory Copy 1105
3.06 GB/sec
Memory Latency 5828
74.3 ns
Memory Bandwidth 1113
5.95 GB/sec
Multi-Core Performance
Multi-Core Score 3192
Crypto Score 240
Integer Score 3995
Floating Point Score 3057
Memory Score 2324
AES 240
185.3 MB/sec
LZMA 4848
7.57 MB/sec
JPEG 4364
35.1 Mpixels/sec
Canny 3646
50.6 Mpixels/sec
Lua 3601
3.70 MB/sec
Dijkstra 4345
2.94 MTE/sec
SQLite 4301
119.3 Krows/sec
HTML5 Parse 4847
22.0 MB/sec
HTML5 DOM 2001
1.81 MElements/sec
Histogram Equalization 3726
116.4 Mpixels/sec
PDF Rendering 3338
88.7 Mpixels/sec
LLVM 6284
432.1 functions/sec
Camera 4207
11.7 images/sec
SGEMM 872
18.4 Gflops
SFFT 2343
5.84 Gflops
N-Body Physics 3325
2.48 Mpairs/sec
Ray Tracing 3179
464.3 Kpixels/sec
Rigid Body Physics 4485
13129.9 FPS
HDR 4892
17.7 Mpixels/sec
Gaussian Blur 4251
74.5 Mpixels/sec
Speech Recognition 2774
23.7 Words/sec
Face Detection 4176
1.22 Msubwindows/sec
Memory Copy 1514
4.20 GB/sec
Memory Latency 5495
78.8 ns
Memory Bandwidth 1510
8.07 GB/sec
Original Post follows:
======================
Well, the title sort of sez it all. The subject machine is my DAW. Right now my system is too easily sent into a frenzy of pops, clicks and crackles in my audio playback, and it's making it very difficult for me to generate decent quality audio files. I've even gone so far as making sure that no other program besides BiaB or RB is resident and that even unnecessary processes have been terminated (I use the Task Manager for this). Doing so helps some but not as much as I would have liked. All it takes is one click to ruin a recording. And I seldom get through an entire piece of music on this machine without at least one click being heard. So I'm kinda dead in the water right now if I want to use RB or BiaB going forward.
You know how RB has that little CPU Usage screen up in the top right corner. While a song is playing, the RB amount typically fluctuates between 17 and 20 %, while the Total number is usually only a couple of points higher. A similar readout in Cakewalk's Sonar delivers even lower numbers than these. I dunno about you, but to me these are quite low numbers and they seem to be indicating that my system still has plenty of reserve horsepower for this sort of work. So why all the noise? And why am I having such a noise problem with BiaB and RB when I don't with other DAW software like Sonar and Studio One 3?
My audio interface is an M-Audio Delta 66 PCI card, 24/96 capable, comes with an OMNI I/O unit that amounts to a compact mixer. It is a very quiet card. I'm running the M-Audio ASIO drivers. I've tried the MME drivers and they fare no better but the latency is worse. For MIDI, I'm using various synths for now, including Coyote and Sforzando.
My system is about five or six years old now. I don't recall exactly when I bought the MoBo and processor, but I do know that the MoBo is a really good one. As old as it is, it still supports recent processor technology. It is an AsRock 890 GX Pro 3 and takes AMD AM3 and AM3+ socket processors. Currently in the machine is an AM3 socket quad core AMD Phenom II X4 840 that's running at 3.44 GHz. So I'm thinking about upgrading to an AM3+ processor. The AsRock MoBo supports eight core processors, so whatever processor I do buy for it, it'll be an eight core. Prices range widely, from almost $300 to less than $100. I've got some homework to do before I make a decision.
Memory-wise, it's running 8 gigs of DDR3 SDRAM, and it has open slots for two more memory sticks. When I first upgraded my system to 8 gigs I thought that it would be a loooong time before I'd need more memory than that. Well, now, I'm not so sure anymore. I'm curious about what you folks think is adequate RAM for a DAW these days.
I just ran Geek Bench on it. I know some of you like to see these numbers, but I have no idea which numbers it is you like (although I'd like to), so how about them all? Here ya go:
Single-Core Performance
Single-Core Score 1879
Crypto Score 116
Integer Score 2218
Floating Point Score 1633
Memory Score 1928
AES 116
89.6 MB/sec
LZMA 2331
3.64 MB/sec
JPEG 2853
23.0 Mpixels/sec
Canny 1977
27.4 Mpixels/sec
Lua 2221
2.28 MB/sec
Dijkstra 2356
1.59 MTE/sec
SQLite 2262
62.7 Krows/sec
HTML5 Parse 2488
11.3 MB/sec
HTML5 DOM 952
862.7 KElements/sec
Histogram Equalization 1947
60.8 Mpixels/sec
PDF Rendering 2066
54.9 Mpixels/sec
LLVM 3586
246.6 functions/sec
Camera 2674
7.42 images/sec
SGEMM 558
11.8 Gflops
SFFT 1503
3.75 Gflops
N-Body Physics 1643
1.23 Mpairs/sec
Ray Tracing 1760
257.1 Kpixels/sec
Rigid Body Physics 2141
6267.9 FPS
HDR 2933
10.6 Mpixels/sec
Gaussian Blur 2048
35.9 Mpixels/sec
Speech Recognition 1493
12.8 Words/sec
Face Detection 1777
519.1 Ksubwindows/sec
Memory Copy 1105
3.06 GB/sec
Memory Latency 5828
74.3 ns
Memory Bandwidth 1113
5.95 GB/sec
Multi-Core Performance
Multi-Core Score 3192
Crypto Score 240
Integer Score 3995
Floating Point Score 3057
Memory Score 2324
AES 240
185.3 MB/sec
LZMA 4848
7.57 MB/sec
JPEG 4364
35.1 Mpixels/sec
Canny 3646
50.6 Mpixels/sec
Lua 3601
3.70 MB/sec
Dijkstra 4345
2.94 MTE/sec
SQLite 4301
119.3 Krows/sec
HTML5 Parse 4847
22.0 MB/sec
HTML5 DOM 2001
1.81 MElements/sec
Histogram Equalization 3726
116.4 Mpixels/sec
PDF Rendering 3338
88.7 Mpixels/sec
LLVM 6284
432.1 functions/sec
Camera 4207
11.7 images/sec
SGEMM 872
18.4 Gflops
SFFT 2343
5.84 Gflops
N-Body Physics 3325
2.48 Mpairs/sec
Ray Tracing 3179
464.3 Kpixels/sec
Rigid Body Physics 4485
13129.9 FPS
HDR 4892
17.7 Mpixels/sec
Gaussian Blur 4251
74.5 Mpixels/sec
Speech Recognition 2774
23.7 Words/sec
Face Detection 4176
1.22 Msubwindows/sec
Memory Copy 1514
4.20 GB/sec
Memory Latency 5495
78.8 ns
Memory Bandwidth 1510
8.07 GB/sec