Need help (and maybe counseling) with my computer/ interface setup

[Danny_Danzi]

@Aef you’ve been given awesome advice throughout this thread. I won’t cover what’s already been said. I’d like to help you fix your current issue as I sincerely believe your current machine is good enough to do what you need to do.

Let’s try a few things that I haven’t seen mentioned. First off, I come to you as a builder of my own PC’s that also still has every working build from win 98 to present. I’ve only lost one PC to lightning but have all my others in perfect working order. So my point is, I’m not going to sit here and waste your time. I actually have a clue about system handling and resources.

First, I’d like you to bring up task manager. Though windows 7 through 10 have optimized the ability to run more tasks, more often than not, audio dropouts, clicks, stutters, pops and garbled audio can result from numerous running applications and resources that should not auto start upon a boot. Now keep in mind, some processes are system specific and may need to run based on hardware or software configurations. However, you can simply test one process at a time to see if it indeed needs to run. Well get to that in a second.

So, running processes. Anything in the 60+ should probably be looked at. This is one of the main reasons to build your own system. You say what gets installed/runs and what doesn’t. But, you can still do that now by simply shutting things down for both windows and running software that auto starts. I can give you so many different things that aren’t usually needed that will claim more power, it would make your head spin.

Stuff like audio driver control panels, NVIDIA driver helper, auto start behind the scenes programs, remote access, start up items placed in “start up”, windows scheduler, some virus protection, (which is another reason to build an audio box and never put it on the net) and anything else that can take away from the priority of audio recording.

I use msconfig as well as task manager to look up things that are runnimg. Type them in search bar online, and see if it is something that needs to auto run or can be manually run when needed. Audio apps like iTunes, Pandora etc can all wreak a little havoc on some systems. If you’d really like to dive in deep with this, you can always visit www.blackviper.com which is a complete tweak site for any OS. He walks you through everything. What it is, if it’s needed, how it works etc. It’s how I learned how to tweak all my machines, and why I think they all still work today.

So, out of all the above, see how many processes you have running for starters. You can really gain improvements this way. This is where I would start and I’ll tell you why.

I’m a beta tester for Bandlab Cakewalk, Celemony Melodyne, FXPansion/BFD Drums and Fractal Audio. I’ve done just about all my testing on a stock Dell Inspiron running an i3 and 4 gig of RAM. I am not even using an interface on that PC and it’s been flawless with everything I’ve thrown at it. I run Cakewalk Sonar and Reaper as my DAWs on that machine.

57 running processes, and I’m doing what another poster suggested (sorry on my phone and don’t have time to scroll through to see who it was) ASIO4ALL on a Realtek stock sound interface built into the mobo. I do this purposely to test using the least amount of power so that we can analyze things for limitation purposes.

On this PC using the above configuration, I am able to record and monitor at 64 and 128 buffers with no audio degradation (depending on tracks and processing already there) and simply raise back up to 2048 buffers for mixing. I would suggest trying this as the other poster mentioned. This will tell you if it’s your interface or drivers, which I don’t believe to be the case. Saffire pro’s are pretty darned decent. But you never know. Some interfaces just don’t get along with certain situations. I had a few like that, MAudio being one that was just terrible and an older RME. The RME 800 by the way, is pretty awesome. I have one of them as well in another machine. My weapons of choice have been my UAD Apollo, an old Echo Audio Layla 24/96 and my Midas M32, which is built into the console.

With that in mind, it is my belief that the number of resources/processes, the interface or a bit of both may be the culprits here.

One other thing. Not accusing or anything, but if you are using any cracked plugins, these can wreak absolute havoc on some systems. I had a friend who ran so many cracks, his box didn’t perform well at all. We reformatted and never put them back on and he’s been fine. Removing plugs you don’t use is also super helpful.

Last thing which you may be doing already. I have been an advocate of multiple drives and have been using them since Win 98SE. One for OS, plugs and programs, one for nothing but audio, one for nothing but samples. It’s worked flawless for me. I don’t have any SSD drives on my main recording boxes as I don’t feel the need with my good systems. 7200 rpm and loads of gig’s of space is more important to me than the speed that wasn’t super noticeable to me. (I do have a system that has one) That’s just my take as I process stuff in real time, run loads of synths, plugs, tracks and never get audio dropouts or issues. When a windows box is tweaked right, it will hang with and can exceed a mac. The issue there, is controlling the bloatware, which macs are starting to have now also. I won’t even get into the mac issues we’ve had just so we wouldn’t turn down business for those people that MUST use pro tools. Ugh!

Best of luck with everything. If you need me for anything, reply here or message me.

-Danny

[Aef]

The real secret is what chordwainer said – when you build it yourself, you skip gobs of ridiculous performance-killing bloatware. Any off the shelf computer these days is a disaster in terms of unnecessary stuff. Build something nice and clean with a plain OS load … it’ll work better.

Thanks Brutus. I tend to go in that direction too. I bought my current i7 computer second hand via a Dutch site comparable to Ebay. It was obviously self built and very much up to date at the time, but cheap, like 30 or 40 % below the new price (the processor was introduced to the market only about 6-8 months before). The guy said he was in a divorce and needed money fast. I chose to believe him. It did have some bloatware which I got rid of. Now here’s a thing: I’m always searching for the uninstall programme on Windows and I’m not sure I’m getting rid of everything, or if I bungled it up by getting rid of stuff that I needed to run my software.
Anyway, I bought both his story and his computer. In the beginning it worked fine but with updates of Windows and an ever growing library of plugins the performance dropped. Last year I had months on end when it didn’t work at all.

I’d like to help you fix your current issue as I sincerely believe your current machine is good enough to do what you need to do.

Well this is exactly what I was thinking at the time (this was around Christmas time last year). This computer has all the specs you need for a reasonably good audio machine.
So I asked a computer savvy acquaintance to help me clean it all up, install SSD drives next to my 1 Tb 7200 RPM drive and 2Tb external drive. And install Windows 10 for which he had a licence lying around. Lot of work reinstalling Reaper and all the plugins, but after a week or 2 it was running fine. Till Windows 10 decided it needed an update and I was up shit creek ever after. In such a case I try things, maybe something I found on the internet, maybe one of these programs that help you get rid of stuff, whatever. It only got worse. At some point I couldn’t even start the computer. It got stuck when it was looking for user settings I believe. Don’t ask me what I did to get it working, I just tried stuff, I can’t recall. But at some point the machine started up again, except it was a black screen. I could only open up the menu with a right mouse click. Right now most stuff is working more or less, although every update of whatever program changes things. The computer takes about 5 minutes to start up (even though Windows is on the SSD drive). I use the time to warm up, play a song or two.
Reaper is actually running OK right now, even the latency is acceptable if I turn off all the Fx of tracks I’m only monitoring. But the idea of playing through a real amp is not very convincing with latency you can hear. To be honest: I’d love to have a computer with really low latency, but more important is that the whole thing works, that I can install plugins that I own (had trouble installing Soft Tube plugins I have a licence for yesterday), and that an update of Reaper or Windows doesn’t throw out plugins and Reaper customisations.
So in principle Dan: I totally agree with you! This computer should be able to do what I need it for without much trouble. New i7 processors might have a higher channel count and a few other extra’s, they’re not any faster than what I already have so I should be fine. But it isn’t working. The question is why not. The guy who helped me really is a high level programmer, but I think you need other skills to understand why an audio computer is not doing what it’s supposed to do.

but if you are using any cracked plugins, these can wreak absolute havoc on some systems

Quite right to mention this Danny. When I just started out recording (around 2005 or so) my brother (who lived in Thailand at the time) gave me a DVD with a huge number of cracks to play with. I must admit that was fun, but on the other hand: at the time I really had no idea what I was doing so most of them were basically useless to me anyway. I had to learn the basics first. One or two remained for quite a while (like Addictive Drums 1, that became a favourite!). By now I have replaced the few plugins that were once cracked. However, it could well be that the illegal versions are still hanging around my computer somewhere. I also have a bad habit of collecting free plugins. Maybe some of these come with viruses or whatever.
But I have a nagging feeling that it’s the computer itself that is somehow the root of all the problems. Is that possible? Can I check this at a level that I can understand?
If I had good chance (like 80%) that a total, extremely critical re-install would solve my problems, I would do it. Maybe with a Windows version that was not just lying around, but 100% mine (I still think Windows is way overpriced, but that’s another story)? Maybe back to Windows 7?

By the way: let me say it again: I’m really impressed with all your heart felt and knowledgeable replies! It feels fantastic to have a community to fall back on who will spend time to give some really useful advice. All the way to writing half a manual on your smartphone Danny (no sore thumbs?)
I guess we all have such types of problems now and then. You can’t explain it to your partner or friends, unless you have friends that record music themselves. I don’t: I only have you lot So thanks a lot!