I just started with BIAB 2019 yesterday. I don't know if this is the correct place to post technical issues (if not please tell me where to do so). I'm using a realstyle with 4 instruments for an original samba of mine, and when I play it back I get a weird static-like distortion. Any idea of why this is happening? It doesn't seem to happen on slower or medium tempo tunes I've put in so far.
Please tell us exactly which style you are using, and what is the exact tempo of the song.
If the song tempo is too far removed from the recorded tempo for those RealTracks, you may be getting artifacts from the stretching algorithm. This is just a thought, but we need a little more information first.
P.S. This is an ideal location for your question.
BIAB & RB2024 Win.(Audiophile), Sonar Platinum, Cakewalk by Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M Monitors, Pioneer Active Monitors, AKG K271 Studio H'phones
Additionally, since you said you wrote a samba, I have a clarifying comment. I write a lot of samba songs. In BIAB, the samba backing tracks are constructed as if the samba is played in a fast 4/4, at a tempo of quarter note = 190 or so. If you had set the tempo to 100 or thereabouts, you would probably have trouble. It's not impossible, though. Tell us more and we can get into some of the finer points.
BIAB 2024 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 6.5 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6; Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Roland Integra-7, Presonus Studio 192, Presonus Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors
Please tell us exactly which style you are using, and what is the exact tempo of the song.
If the song tempo is too far removed from the recorded tempo for those RealTracks, you may be getting artifacts from the stretching algorithm. This is just a thought, but we need a little more information first.
P.S. This is an ideal location for your question.
Thanks VideoTrack. The style I'm using is _SHSAMBA.STY with bass, piano, guitar, and drums. The tempo I'm using is 200.
I may have (unfortunately) figured out the problem though. My CPU processor is only 1.4Ghz, which although within system requirements is below the recommended level. It hadn't occurred to me before this post to check that, and when I went into task manager I could see it bottoming out a few times. So it looks like a new laptop is in my future.
If you do have any other thoughts or ideas for possible tweaks I can do to minimize that I'd welcome them. I've done quite a bit on the laptop already to eliminate background programs, increase page swap size, etc.
It may be that your system is trying to generate the tracks at the same time it is playing them back (a feature in BiaB that may tax some systems).
Fortunately there is a setting to tell it to generate before playing.
Unfortunately I don't recall that exact setting, but it's in the Options/Prefs area and I *think* it references fast playback or such, and hopefully this post is enough to jar someone else into recalling the exact setting!
Edit: it may be the generation speed option in the image below
Last edited by rharv; 10/14/1912:47 PM.
Make your sound your own! .. I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
3. enable "This song has playback problems... disable fast generation".
4. generate the song
Does it play better?
Explanation regarding the above setting
Normally BIAB starts generating the musical backing and the song starts playing before generation is complete. BIAB then continues to generate the backing in the background while the song is playing. This can strain slower CPUs. By enabling the above option, BIAB is being told to generate the backing fully before starting playback. This means that it will take a little longer for the song to start playing but it should play error free if the problem is CPU related.
Hope this helps, Noel
EDIT: I see rharv beat me... and with a graphic too!
Wow, you guys are amazing, thank you for all the help!
Okay, so here are the results.
1. I disabled the 'speed up generation of realtracks' in Options > Preferences > RealTracks. Closed BIAB, restarted my computer, opened the samba and waited for what seemed 5 or more minutes for the tracks to generate. Unfortunately as far as I could tell there was no appreciable difference in the amount of distortion during playback.
2. I took Noel's suggestion of right-clicking the songsheet & chose "This song has playback problems... disable fast generation" in song settings, hit play (waited another 5 minutes or so), and that actually did eliminate *most* of the static-distortion. I let the song play continously for about 15 minutes and monitored it. Some slight distortion still crept in a little here and there, but mostly it played back cleanly.
In the end it seems obvious my best solution is to get a newer laptop with a much more beefy CPU & RAM than the older slower one I put this on. I've only been using BIAB for 2 days & I know I'll be wanting to do more ambitious projects, so, time to pony up some $$.
Thanks again for your help. What a cool community! I really appreciate you taking the time to help out a clueless newbie with a tech issue.
If you are in a position to be able to afford it, getting a new computer sounds like the way to go.
When you start using a combination of BIAB and DAWs to create songs, you will definitely be pleased with more power.
In 2006, I tentatively bought an entry level BIAB not quite sure what to expect. Ever since then I've been hooked. I love writing and producing songs. Not a day goes by where I don't use BIAB. It becomes addictive!
If you are using an ASIO sound card driver, you may have your buffer settings too low. Try increasing the buffer size to see if the static goes away. I generally use 256 samples when recording MIDI (to avoid latency), and then set it to 512 for playback. But on a slower processor, you may need to see it a little higher. Just a thought.
John
Laptop-HP Omen I7 Win11Pro 32GB 2x2TB, 1x4TB SSD Desktop-ASUS-I7 Win10Pro 32GB 2x1.5TB, 2x2TB, 1x4TB SATA
jford's suggestion is worth looking at, regardless of whether you are using ASIO. The fact that it seems to have improved but not gone away warrants investigating the buffer settings he mentioned. That said, a newer computer may eliminate the need for this solution also, since it is just another way to compensate for a system resource issue.
Another tip (if possible) is to use a separate hard drive for the music than is being used for the operating system, as sometimes even drive speed can cause these type of issues. If your hard drive is trying to stream multitrack audio and the OS is interrupting it, it's yet another possible cause. More RAM or larger buffer sizes can help help alleviate this problem, but so can a new computer. <grin>
Yet another possible cause is a bitrate mismatch (the software being set to 16/44 and the interface set to 24/48 for example). But that usually only happens when a new piece of equipment or software is introduced into the system. I recently added a Focusrite 18i20 interface into one system and it took a fair amount of testing/adjusting to get everything playing nice afterwards since the Focusrite is 24 bit only.
Last edited by rharv; 10/15/1905:29 AM.
Make your sound your own! .. I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
If you do buy a new computer, there are some characteristics that are more important for good performance with BIAB:
1) the fastest CPU you can afford; this speeds the regeneration of songs 2) get an SSD as your drive; it makes loading the program and RealTracks much faster
The graphics capability of the computer is NOT important for BIAB.
BIAB 2024 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 6.5 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6; Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Roland Integra-7, Presonus Studio 192, Presonus Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors
If you are using an ASIO sound card driver, you may have your buffer settings too low. Try increasing the buffer size to see if the static goes away. I generally use 256 samples when recording MIDI (to avoid latency), and then set it to 512 for playback. But on a slower processor, you may need to see it a little higher. Just a thought.
Good suggestion, thanks, looks like the laptop uses a RealTek chip, couldn't find any reference to ASIO on it anywhere.
Some people seem to get results with the internal RealTek card, but a highly recommended upgrade no matter what your computer, is to buy a dedicated external audio interface. These can be very modestly priced such as a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 or similar.
BIAB 2024 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 6.5 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6; Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Roland Integra-7, Presonus Studio 192, Presonus Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors
jford's suggestion is worth looking at, regardless of whether you are using ASIO. The fact that it seems to have improved but not gone away warrants investigating the buffer settings he mentioned. That said, a newer computer may eliminate the need for this solution also, since it is just another way to compensate for a system resource issue.
Thanks rharv for your suggestions.
I couldn't find any way on the laptop to change the RealTek soundchip buffer size. Tried a Google search for it too, not finding anything there. I'm guessing it's not available. However, as it turns out I wasn't on the latest driver for the RealTek, so I'm updating it right now. Hoping that *might* help.
Quote:
Another tip (if possible) is to use a separate hard drive for the music than is being used for the operating system, as sometimes even drive speed can cause these type of issues. If your hard drive is trying to stream multitrack audio and the OS is interrupting it, it's yet another possible cause. More RAM or larger buffer sizes can help help alleviate this problem, but so can a new computer. <grin>
Great idea! I do have an external hard drive I haven't used for awhile which I could try. How would that work exactly? Would I move the RealTracks and RealStyles folders to the external HD, then reconfigure BIAB to stream them from that drive? Or....?
Quote:
Yet another possible cause is a bitrate mismatch (the software being set to 16/44 and the interface set to 24/48 for example). But that usually only happens when a new piece of equipment or software is introduced into the system. I recently added a Focusrite 18i20 interface into one system and it took a fair amount of testing/adjusting to get everything playing nice afterwards since the Focusrite is 24 bit only.
The only thing I could find in Win 10 related to this was under Speaker Properties > Advanced. It says 24 bit 48000 HZ to be used when running in shared mode (not sure what that is). I wasn't able to find bitrate in BIAB. Looking that up now.
If you are in a position to be able to afford it, getting a new computer sounds like the way to go.
When you start using a combination of BIAB and DAWs to create songs, you will definitely be pleased with more power.
In 2006, I tentatively bought an entry level BIAB not quite sure what to expect. Ever since then I've been hooked. I love writing and producing songs. Not a day goes by where I don't use BIAB. It becomes addictive!
All the best, Noel
I certainly understand the addiction Just in these few days of putting in my originals & hearing the quality and realism of the realtracks, well, it's a game changer.
I am looking at more powerful laptops, still trying a few things on the old one just to see what happens...
Some people seem to get results with the internal RealTek card, but a highly recommended upgrade no matter what your computer, is to buy a dedicated external audio interface. These can be very modestly priced such as a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 or similar.
Thanks, I do plan to get an interface at some point. When I get a better laptop I want to run a DAW on it as well, so a decent interface would be a must.
In BIAB, under "Audio" on the uppermost menu, select "Audio Drivers/Settings".
On the top right of the Audio Drivers' window, there's an option called "Audio Driver Type". This is probably set to WAS or ASIO (WAS is BIAB's default setting). Click on this option and change it to MME. That might make a difference to playback.
Regards, Noel
P.S. A 5 minute wait is a long time. I have a pretty powerful PC and I usually have playback starting in less than 10 seconds (for full-song generation of a song around 70 bars in length).
Try changing your sound card to 44100 instead of 48000 and see if that helps. If not, try changing from 24 bit to 16 bit (at 44100).
Also, I've had good luck running one of my computers with a Realtek using the free ASIO4ALL driver (you can Google it). That will give you low latency for MIDI input recording.
Just a few things to try.
John
Laptop-HP Omen I7 Win11Pro 32GB 2x2TB, 1x4TB SSD Desktop-ASUS-I7 Win10Pro 32GB 2x1.5TB, 2x2TB, 1x4TB SATA
Try changing your sound card to 44100 instead of 48000 and see if that helps. If not, try changing from 24 bit to 16 bit (at 44100).
Also, I've had good luck running one of my computers with a Realtek using the free ASIO4ALL driver (you can Google it). That will give you low latency for MIDI input recording.
Just a few things to try.
Hi Jford, thanks for your suggestions. I did try changing those soundcard settings as you suggested, but unfortunately it didn't seem to help playback, and then after rebooting my computer Windows changed them back again.
I probably won't be using Midi input into this old laptop, but I will on my new one, so I will give ASIO4ALL a look.
In BIAB, under "Audio" on the uppermost menu, select "Audio Drivers/Settings".
On the top right of the Audio Drivers' window, there's an option called "Audio Driver Type". This is probably set to WAS or ASIO (WAS is BIAB's default setting). Click on this option and change it to MME. That might make a difference to playback.
Regards, Noel
P.S. A 5 minute wait is a long time. I have a pretty powerful PC and I usually have playback starting in less than 10 seconds (for full-song generation of a song around 70 bars in length).
Thanks Noel, I will try that. Ultimately this isn't the computer that I'm going to run this on long term, but I do want to tweak it as much as possible and use it as a backup.
One peculiar thing I've noticed, the cursor on the chord screen is way behind where the music is, like by about 8 bars. Has that ever happened to you?
One peculiar thing I've noticed, the cursor on the chord screen is way behind where the music is, like by about 8 bars. Has that ever happened to you?
Zac, I've certainly never witnessed that before. What does your CPU and Memory usage peak at when you're playing a song?
Well the good news is it doesn't seem to be happening at all today (but the day is still young). At the moment the CPU is varying between about 62-70% during playback, memory is 61%. All of the suggestions & tweaks seem to be paying off though, I'm hearing no distortion (unless I start moving the mouse around, which makes it distort immediately).
Last night when I had the disparity of the music being ahead of the chord screen cursor the CPU was going up into the 80-99% range and was giving me a lot of distortion, speed slow downs, etc. I did notice at one point an annoying windows updater process randomly kicked in, which pretty much killed BIAB performance. I've been trying to eliminate as much of those sorts of things as possible. Today though it seems to be working a lot better than it was. I think the most dramatic improvement was going into Song Settings & choosing the "This song has playback problems, disable Fast Generation" checkbox (the downside of course is having to wait longer for the tracks to generate, but I can put up with that for now until the new comp arrives).
...................................I did notice at one point an annoying windows updater process randomly kicked in, which pretty much killed BIAB performance. I've been trying to eliminate as much of those sorts of things as possible. ....................
I have a relatively fast computer system but things running in the background can mess things up when recording and playbacks. I always turn off all anti-virus and anti-malware programs. I also disable the Ethernet card. When I do those things I never have a problem. YMMV
Me, it's not about how many times you fail, it's about how many times you get back up. Cop, that's not how field sobriety tests work.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
One other thought that just occurred to me and I don't think that it's already been mentioned.... make sure that the \bb and \Realband folders are excluded from checking by your antivirus software.
Antivirus checking every time BIAB makes a new temp file can slow things, too.
One other thought that just occurred to me and I don't think that it's already been mentioned.... make sure that the \bb and \Realband folders are excluded from checking by your antivirus software.
Antivirus checking every time BIAB makes a new temp file can slow things, too.
Welcome to the forum and to Band-in-a-Box. It seems like you're enjoying it so far.
Two file management suggestions: Create a new folder labeled with the name of your song or music project as the folder title. Frequently use the "save as" file command to save a new version of your work in progress. For example create a folder called MySong and save versions as MySong01, MySong02, etc.
Frequently saving can be really helpful if a project file is corrupted (it happens).
Welcome to the forum and to Band-in-a-Box. It seems like you're enjoying it so far.
Two file management suggestions: Create a new folder labeled with the name of your song or music project as the folder title. Frequently use the "save as" file command to save a new version of your work in progress. For example create a folder called MySong and save versions as MySong01, MySong02, etc.
Frequently saving can be really helpful if a project file is corrupted (it happens).
At the moment the CPU is varying between about 62-70% during playback, memory is 61%. All of the suggestions & tweaks seem to be paying off though, I'm hearing no distortion (unless I start moving the mouse around, which makes it distort immediately).
If the CPU is running 70%, consider it as being "maxed-out" for the purpose of anything requiring real-time processing. Clearly, there's not enough spare capacity to move the mouse
I really think that replacing that laptop with a more powerful unit is going to be the direction you will ultimately need to take. I feel you also agree.
BIAB & RB2024 Win.(Audiophile), Sonar Platinum, Cakewalk by Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M Monitors, Pioneer Active Monitors, AKG K271 Studio H'phones
You mentioned no midi. Midi styles will play in just a few seconds even with a slow system. Try it. As for sound quality that is based on your synth. Midi can sound awesome with a good synth.
Zacworld, some really good comments here. I remember when I was first getting into all of this.
The 2 biggest things I did, after upgrading my computer and memory, were to setup my AV so it didn't scan my BIAB and RB folders and got a wired rather than wireless mouse. Those helped but didn't completely get me to where I wanted to be.
I started playing around with 2 latency monitors (DPC Latency Checker and LatencyMon...both available free...just Google). Note LatencyMon will not give exact accurate readings on Win10 but will show relative areas of concern.
What these two showed me was that leaving BlueTooth on was causing a problem for my system i.e. it was constantly scanning for available devices. Shutting this off using the Win10 Control Panel helped a bunch.
You mentioned no midi. Midi styles will play in just a few seconds even with a slow system. Try it. As for sound quality that is based on your synth. Midi can sound awesome with a good synth.
Bob
Thanks Bob, I know MIDI sounds will work, I just really prefer the RealTracks. When I get my new laptop with the SSD drive this won't be an issue any more. Take care!
Zacworld, some really good comments here. I remember when I was first getting into all of this.
The 2 biggest things I did, after upgrading my computer and memory, were to setup my AV so it didn't scan my BIAB and RB folders and got a wired rather than wireless mouse. Those helped but didn't completely get me to where I wanted to be.
I started playing around with 2 latency monitors (DPC Latency Checker and LatencyMon...both available free...just Google). Note LatencyMon will not give exact accurate readings on Win10 but will show relative areas of concern.
What these two showed me was that leaving BlueTooth on was causing a problem for my system i.e. it was constantly scanning for available devices. Shutting this off using the Win10 Control Panel helped a bunch.
YMMV
Jeff
Hi Jeff, thanks, I might check out those latency checkers. What I've been doing is running BIAB while looking at task manager to see the CPU and RAM usage. Thanks to all the great suggestions here & some tweaks I found by Google searches the problem is not nearly as bad as it was.
One thing that messed me up a couple days ago was, after removing many things which were unnecessary, Windows detected them being gone & forced an update on me. After doing the update I was back to square one, the update added a ton of background processes I didn't need, so I had to go through it all over again. I found a way to delay Windows updating for 35 days, but I hope to find a way to eliminate it completely. Another user suggested the AV scanning idea you mentioned, so I did that too. This is an old laptop (no bluetooth on it) so I really want to keep it the way it is without Windows constantly trying to update it.
At the moment the CPU is varying between about 62-70% during playback, memory is 61%. All of the suggestions & tweaks seem to be paying off though, I'm hearing no distortion (unless I start moving the mouse around, which makes it distort immediately).
If the CPU is running 70%, consider it as being "maxed-out" for the purpose of anything requiring real-time processing. Clearly, there's not enough spare capacity to move the mouse
I really think that replacing that laptop with a more powerful unit is going to be the direction you will ultimately need to take. I feel you also agree.
Is it just one style or anything you play back? Could be many things, your computer vol is up too high, sound card issues. I would start with the cheapest things like cables.
Military musician for 20 years playing sax, oboe, and clarinet. Used to gig 6 nights a week traded that in for a day job and gigging on the weekend. I like composing WWQ music. My equipment: i7 16gb laptop. I use BIAB, Reaper, Pro Tools, and Sibelius.
Thanks, I think the primary cause is a slow processor (1.4) that just can't handle any uptempo styles that use 4 or more realtracks. I've done a ton of tweaking on it the last 4 or 5 days and it's helped, but didn't fix the problem completely. Now waiting on my new bigger laptop to arrive.
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Handy flash drive tip: Always try plugging in a USB device the wrong way first? If your flash drive (or other USB plug) doesn't have a symbol to indicate which way is up, look for the side with a seam on the metal connector (it only has a line across one side) - that's the side that either faces down or to the left, depending on your port placement.
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The style I'm using is _SHSAMBA.STY with bass, piano, guitar, and drums. The tempo I'm using is 200. 
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