Hyperthreading - can it cause glitching?

[AudioAstronomer]

Billy,

FWIW, I just turned hyperthreading off in the BIOS and haven't had a problem (that I know of) related to having done so. Might be worth it to at least try it out.

Ditto.. Ive installed windows before with HT on accident and then just disabled it with no problems.

In fact, my current daw setup happened like that.

[Bob L]

Good Luck with that... I would recommend using the boot.ini method... but each to his own.

Also... just using the Force Single CPU in SAWStudio is not the same as a single overall cpu.

This option just tells SAWStudio to act as there is one cpu.

Drivers and all of Windows will still think there are multiple cpus and use different libraries and code routines... which can cause grief and problems if not handled correctly.

I have found all kinds of dual cpu problems within firewire and audio drivers... as well as much more complexity involved in handling display data and device contexts.

Bob L

[BillyK]

Ok here is the latest... maybe this clue will help someone to identify what is causing my problem.
I had thought the glitch was random because as I was playing back a song it always occured in different spots in the song. What I have now determined is that the glitch occurs in exact 2 minute cycles. It does not matter whether I am playing 25 tracks with a 25% load or 1 track with 0% load or even if I am playing it back from the SoundFile view. I strung a couple songs back to back in the multitrack so that I would have a long enough duration of music and got 3 glitches all exactly 2 minutes apart. I know Bob said that SawPro operated totally differently.. but just for kicks I performed the same tests with SawPro and did not get any glitches whatsoever. (Just thought I would throw that out in case that is any sort of clue). In SAWStudio it does not matter what audio driver profile I select, nor does it matter if I change the buffers. Always 2 minutes!


I disabled the hyperthreading in the BIOS but that didnt solve the problem.

I also had a concern about a hardware monitoring program which came with the Intel motherboard that watches temps and that sort of thing. I followed the instructions in the mobo manual for disabling the Hardware Monitor from starting automatically which is done by deleting a file in the REGEDIT mode. I believe that program is now correctly disabled.

This Intel mobo has advanced 7.1 surround sound as part of the onboard audio circuitry but I have not yet disabled the onboard audio because I havent found the correct way to do that yet.

Does anyone have any thoughts now that I have identified this 2 minute glitch cycle? This problem has my studio shut down until I can correct the situation so I am crossing my fingers eyes and toes that someone might provide some help.

Thanks,
Bill

[BillyK]

Adding a little more to the post directly above...
I have now disabled the onboard audio in BIOS. I am still getting the same glitch in 2 minute cycles.

Is it possible this could be a defective ram issue? My limited knowledge tells me that it would be a long shot for a bad ram chip to hit a snag exactly every two minutes.. but I thought I would throw that out there. It seems more likely something is just grabbing the Pentium 4's attention on a regular cycle but I just dont know what else to do now.

Bill

[Mountain Media]

..........
Does anyone have any thoughts now that I have identified this 2 minute glitch cycle? This problem has my studio shut down until I can correct the situation so I am crossing my fingers eyes and toes that someone might provide some help.

Thanks,
Bill

Bill, since, I think, earlier you mentioned you went through Bob's tweaks, you probably have no anti-virus program or additional security 'things' running? At exactly, or very close to 2 minute intervals, it sounds like the glitch may be something on a timer firing off within the OS, like a background app that uses a two-minute timer to activate and check 'something'? With such a long time between glitches, and so regular, I'd guess it wasn't buffering in SS or plugs.

I didn't go back and re-read this thread, but can you see the glitch in SoundFile View, or MT waveform? In other words, is it really in the recorded data, or is it happening in the hardware/software path on playback? Expanding on this - the test you did with Pro - were you using the SAME wav files? In other words, if you played back the SAME wav files that glitched in SS and the didn't glitch in Pro, then the glitching isn't in the recorded file?

[kent]

Hey there. Do ya got Network card(s) enabled? Onboard or PCI? I had a similar problem with a wireless Linksys NIC card. If you didn't yet, try dissabling these in the hardware manager.
Hope this helps
Kent
(edit 1)P.S. also, did you try different sampling rates (or check clock syncs with outboard gear? adat, MIDI, wordclock, etc.) More stupid pet tricks from brainstromville. . . .
(edit 2) FWIW, I've been running hyperthreading for months without a single glitch. XPpro, 2.8Intel, ASUS P4P800, 1G Infineon, Frontier Design Dakota/Montana sound, blah, blah. . . . .

[BillyK]

Kent: I just went back into Bios Perephrials and disabled the Onboard Lan as you suggested. But that did not help. As stated earlier I already disabled the onboard audio. In that section of Bios the only things enabled are "1394" and "ASF Support". I dont know what either of those items are so I left them enabled. As far as "timing" with outboard gear... I dont have any outboard gear plugged into the machine. (I have a USB midiport but am not even gonna try plugging that in until I solve this issue). Let me backtrack and say agian that this is a brand spankin new system so this bug is something from the start.. not something that popped up on a working system. The LynxTWO audio card I am using was in this systems predecessor and I didnt have this problem.

I seem to be the first one to be trying a mobo with the Intel 925X chipset.. I hope thats not an issue. The RAM I am using is DDR2.


To Media Adventures:
I have not loaded any anti-virus program or additional security.. this machine is intended only as a recording workhorse and no internet access will be used on this machine. I agree that the 2 minute intervals seems like something is checking something on a regular basis.. but I have no idea what it could be or how to figure that out.

The glitch in occurs in both SoundFile View and MT (even with just one file loaded on the MT the same thing happens)
I used the exact same files in SAWPro to test when I did not have the glitch occur in that platform. I should also say that the files I have been using were recorded on the last system. I have not even been able to attempt to record anything with this new system yet because I cant get past this playback problem.

[kent]

more brainstorming. . . .
Did you install a Service Pack update for your Windows XP pro? i.e. SP1 or SP2? Subjectively, I like to run SP1, and have had ongoing succuss with it so far. I tried SP2 and things happened that I didn't like, (wasn't used to) so I stear clear of that one for now.
I re-read Bobs tweaks for XP and was reminded of the Auto CD insert tweak and the Auto-update tweak. I know you've prepared your box in accordance with these tweaks, but just to be sure, you might want to re-check to see if they took hold. . .
Good Golly, I hope ya can get to the bottom of this one soon. . .
Kent

[SoundSuite]

Billy,

Is your Audio HardDrive over 120GB in size?

[BillyK]

SoundSuite: My slave (data) drive is a 300gb and I am aware of the potential problem with drives over 120 but my C drive is 120gb and I tried playing a file off the C Drive and got the same resulting 2 minute glitch. Also.. from what I have been told, the typical problem when using a drive over 120GB is a much more rapid glitching than once every 2 minutes.

Kent: I believe that Service Pack 2 was loaded on this machine. I spec'd the parts and the place I bought it from assembled everything and installed Windows. I am sure there is an easy way to tell if SP2 is loaded.. but I dont know how to do it.

I wrote an email to Intel asking them if they can think of anything running at a 2 minute cycle. I am yet to hear anything back. I am going to try and contact ATI (the maker of my video card) and ask them the same thing.
I hope I can get this figured out soon.. I am holding some clients off and am going to lose them if I dont get this thing up and running very soon.