SAC CPU Usage

[Steve L]

Using 2 RME 9652 and (5) ADA 8000's on an AMD 2.8 G system would there be any problem running at 72 - 80 % CPU usage. Will it remain stable?

Steve L.
Audio-Video Electronics
Mountain VIew Recording

[Bob L]

Only real world testing can answer that... I have run torture tests here at 98% and left them run for hours with no problems... but each setup is unique and different.

Test it well before using it in a live show.

Bob L

[Steve L]

That was my suggestion also. I tried it here with 2 of the 5 ADA's hooked up and set it for 40 i/o and loaded it up with 24 compressors/EQ's auxes etc and it was hitting 76 to 80 %. If adding the other ADA's doesn't increase the load then he should be fine.

Steve L.
Audio-Video Electronics
Mountain View Recording

[Bob L]

Let it run at that load for a few hours and then check to see if it slipped any buffers by left-clicking the load percentage readout in SAC.

Bob L

[Fat Cat Music]

Hello,
I have been using a Dell c840 (2 gigs of RAM) running at 2.8 ghz with all 48 channels on six ada8000's through two RME Digiface cardbus with no problems. 5 rehearsals and 2 concerts with no glitches.
I don't use a lot of plugs - SAW native only - so the load is always manageable and consistent.
DRBurroughs

[Steve L]

Customer reported problems so I will be re-doing some things.
With 24 channels running previously (1 RME card)he said there were no problems but with 40 running (2 RME's)@ 76-80% there is distortion? and while EQ seems to be working, the comps and gates are not.....strange problem that I will have to delve in to. Meanwhile they are going back to their 40 channel Mackie that barely fits on my bench to repair a couple of channels. I am going to build a system (Intel based ) and see if this will give them better performance. They have an AMD 4000+ (2.8G)
I am not real familiar with the RME Totalmix, could it be causing a problem?
Normally I use M'Audio stuff but we couldn't get 40 channels with anything M'Audio has.

Steve L.
Audio-Video Electronics
Mountain View Recording

[DominicPerry]

Steve - if you do a test where a single input is muxed to multiple channels, then the output bus can overload - just drop the output master fader, a lot, to check.
Otherwise, I guess it may just be a buffer issue.
FWIW, I can run 40 channels (as a test - muxed as above) on my 1.7 GHz single core laptop, with EQ, gate and comp on every channel. So I think a bit of investigation is warranted before building a whole new machine.

Dominic

[DominicPerry]

TotalMix could also be causing the problem by adding the input signal to the SAC output signal. Again, you need to check for silence from Mic to Output (ie, that total Mix is doing nothing) before engaging SAC.

Dominic

[Iain Westland]

id loose total mix and stay just in sac.

[DominicPerry]

id loose total mix and stay just in sac.

You can't lose TotalMix, it's there.

Dominic

[UpTilDawn]

I'm also running 40 channels with eq, dynamics and some aux with no distortion.... on a fiver year old p4/2g with rme dsp pci cards.

DanT

[Iain Westland]

You can't lose TotalMix, it's there.

Dominic

could he not roll back to standard drivers or do these cards only run with totalmix?

[ambler]

could he not roll back to standard drivers or do these cards only run with totalmix?

Totalmix is in the hardware, not the driver.

Mark

[Iain Westland]

that will be me not upgrading then

Iain

[Bob L]

You can run all 72 channels at just under clipping and not come close to clipping the internal mix bus... so simply drop the master output fader if you are mixing many hot channels together and bring the signal back into reason.

But... the distortion he heard could also be buffers slipping in that his system may not be capable of the 40 channels at 80% without glitching the driver... try upping the buffer size or count.

Bob L

[Fat Cat Music]

Hello,

I have read a number of complaints logged in this forum about the RME Totalmix software, however, it has also been my observation that the people complaining seem to have never bothered to learn how to use this VERY useful piece of software.

Prior to Bob's introduction of SAC I used Totalmix as my primary live mix while using SAW for location recording. If a person actually learns how to use the software it is a very transparent adjunct to any SAW system.

I am still using Totalmix along with SAC and SAW with no problems what so ever.

By the way, headroom issues are ALWAYS operator error.

DRBurroughs

[Steve L]

Yes I have confirmed the "distortion/headroom" problem was operator error.
All of my systems use M'Audio products which I am reasonably familiar with.
Since MB Productions needed 40 channels they had to go with the RME solution and I didn't have time to learn TotalMix. This was installed and done
in a "while you wait" scenario as they didn't want to make 2 trips because of gas prices. I hate to do things that way but I try to accomodate the customer! Usually when I have some time to spend with a product I will learn it. The computer I just built....Intel mobo with onboard FW and a 2.53 Core Duo and 2 G DDR2/800 Ram is sitting here running SAC for 22 hours with Profire 2626 and 2 ADA8000's (24 ch) with 18 EQ's/15 Comps/3 reverbs and 1 Aux reverb on 12 channels & 2 mon mixes at 12% and 0 slipped buffers.
When a customer brings in a computer they built I sometimes have to work with what I have.

Steve L.
Audio-Video Electronics
Mountain View Recording
859-623-4406

[Fat Cat Music]

:eek:
ah yes
:D
the - I could have called two weeks ago but now I need it yesterday do it while I wait impatiently as though my negligence is is your fault scenario
;)

[Steve L]

I really want to get this up and running for these guys. I hope I can tweak their system or build them one that will satisfy their needs. If I get the Mobo
and CPU in today I should have a 3.0 G Core Duo system up and running by
Monday. I need to get their RME cards to test the system but I am hoping this will get 40 channels stable for them.
Steve L.
Audio-Video Electronics
Mountain View Recording

[Bob L]

I have a very stable micro atx P4 3 ghz system that does 48 chans all day long.

So... its not just about the speed of the machine... its about the Windows cleanup and driver setup.

Bob L

[Steve L]

Still waiting on the RME cards....but in the meantime a quick question. How can you do a live crossfade for DJ style work in SAC. You know like the DJ mixers that have 2 CD players and while the DJ is talking he crossfades from one CD to the next...
Steve L.

[Bob L]

There is an auto crossfade option coming and the scenes will also allow fade times... for now, you can use one of the midi controllers with 8 faders.

Bob L

[Steve L]

OK finally got the RME cards and set it up on the system I built for MB Productions. 3.0G Core 2 Duo / 2 G DDR2/800 RAM / 250 G HD / ECS motherboard w/2 PCI slots. 40 channel setup w/5 ADA800's running 32 active EQ's / 14 gates / 26 compressors / 11 channels to Aux 1 reverb / 9 channels to Aux 2 reverb / FOH / Mon 1 / Mon 2 / 9 seperate effects such as EQ / Delays / reverbs and it running at 30% for 8 hours with no slipped buffers. They will be VERY happy now! Too bad I can't keep this setup around to show off SAC....everyone that has seen it is blown away.

Steve L.
Mountain View Recording
Audio-Video Electronics
Richmond, KY

[Bob L]

Good job Steve... it is exciting to see it fly when a stable system is setup.

Bob L

[mako]

Thanks for the update Steve - nice to know you got it all happening.

cheers

mako

[Steve L]

One quick question MB Productions called about. When copying a setup from say Mon 1 to Mon 2 the attenuator settings do not copy or am I missing something? They need to do just that and I could not find it.
Steve L.
Audio-Video Electronics
Mountain View Recording

[Bob L]

The duplicate mix settings on the monitor menu only duplicate what the option states... faders and pans... eq... etc... they are used for a quick start on setting up a new monitor mix.

If you want to duplicate an entire mix template from one monitor console to the next, you can use the store/recall features... read the helpfile on how they work... you can select as many channels as you want and store those complete chan settings to chan template files and then recall them all at once on a new monitor mixer.

Bob L