Optimal PC config

[Omega_Void]

In addition to the processor speed, the FSB (front-side bus) is important. This is part of the CPU, and determies how fast data gets in and out of the CPU.
I'm told the P4 denormalises more readily than an AMD when dealing with floating-point calculations, leading to more processing spikes.
Dual processors are useful only if your audio host supports this.
And the more RAM the better. I get by with 512 Mb, but the emphasis here is on get by.
Google search for as many tips as you can get before committing your cash.
And - are you sure you can't afford a Mac?
Good luck!

 

[daemon097]

30 plugins at once..I would say a P4 3g processor with 2gigs of ram ought to be enough. I'm currently using a P4 2G processor with a gig of memory, and am starting to see some slowdown with about 30 or so plugins on 24 tracks.

I currently have 2 controller cards in my machine - one that is scsi-wide and connects to an 80G 10,000 RPM Seagate, and another that serial ATA, which connects to a 120G, 7200RPM maxtor.

I got the 120G maxtor because...well, I was running out of space. However, if I were you, I would purchase a serial ATA controller that supports RAID, and just buy some of these cheaper, high RPM, serial ATA drives. I think Raid 3 would probably be the best when it comes to redundancy and working with large files....

Other than the slowdown with the large number of plugins, I've had absolutely no problems.. although, being that my band is getting ready to record, an upgrade is definitely in the near future....

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

You have to understand that not all plugins take the same amount of CPU power. Some will eat like 2 or 3%, while others will eat 15% or even more... So, concerning the number of plugins you'll be using, all in all, it also depends on the plugins themselves.

 

[zenx]

You have to understand that not all plugins take the same amount of CPU power. Some will eat like 2 or 3%, while others will eat 15% or even more... So, concerning the number of plugins you'll be using, all in all, it also depends on the plugins themselves.

of course. I was just trying to generalize.

actually I was not looking at 30 plugins, but around 20-30 tracks with 2-3 plugins each, so that's 40-90 plugins running at once


anyway, it looks like, there is not enough processing power yet to just go and use all your plugins on all the tracks that you wish (well, for big projects at least). so how do you guys solve this? (Mac, haha)

do you bounce down almost-finished tracks and unload the plugs?
or use something like vst-freeze? how's cubase sx3's freeze feature?

-> I don't really like bouncing the tracks, cause you cant go back to edit settings later
-> vst-freeze was a bit of a hassle for me, you always have to play through the part which you want to freeze, It's not implemented well enough I think
-> haven't tried sx3 yet

share your tips :Spin:

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

do you bounce down almost-finished tracks and unload the plugs?

Yep that's what I do, but only on guitars and bass tracks.

I don't really like bouncing the tracks, cause you cant go back to edit settings later

Yes you can, but you have to reactivate the plugins (you don't unload them from the insert slots, just deactivate them), tweak, and then bounce again. So you should only bounce when you're almost certain you're ok with one particular track.

vst-freeze was a bit of a hassle for me, you always have to play through the part which you want to freeze, It's not implemented well enough I think

Don't like it either...

One trick I do is that I run a few plugins on my master bus when mixing (eq, limiter) but I keep the final mastering for later, after I got a stereo mixdown of the song I'm working on (with a fairly low level, you don't want to reach the 0db here), because linear phase eq, compressing, and multiband limiting are pretty heavy on CPU...

 

[Hopkins-WitchfinderGeneral]

lol

I'm afraid you won't be able to use as many plugins as you'd want to... Actually I can't, and this is a real pain... Until I can buy a powercore I have to deal with it, or link two computers and use one as a plugin farm. But my advice would be : get the best machine you can, but not the very latest one, or most powerful one, because you'd pay a lot more for a very little difference.

Simple answer: don't use ten plugins on every track!!!

 

[zenx]

Yes you can, but you have to reactivate the plugins (you don't unload them from the insert slots, just deactivate them), tweak, and then bounce again. So you should only bounce when you're almost certain you're ok with one particular track.

So you just add the bounced channel under the original, and mute the original channel? And when you go back just delete the bounced, and unmute the channel? Hmmm just trying to figure out how this could be most effective...

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

Yep... I wish their could be a way to bounce multiple tracks to multiple files though (with Cubase SX, I don't know if this can be done with any other software), cause this can be long, so multiplied by a certain amount of tracks, it sucks...

 

[zenx]

by the way, how do you do this: "or link two computers and use one as a plugin farm"?

sx - vst system link?
have you tried this before?

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

by the way, how do you do this: "or link two computers and use one as a plugin farm"?

sx - vst system link?
have you tried this before?

Yep it works but with one s/pdif i/o you can only send a stereo track, usefull maybe for a send channel or something, but you can't use many plugins on different tracks... For this you need to link two ADAT interfaces, like 2 MOTU 24I/O for example (though it's quite not in my budget for the moment), then you'd have 24 channels.

 

[Hammer Bart]

Yep... I wish their could be a way to bounce multiple tracks to multiple files though (with Cubase SX, I don't know if this can be done with any other software), cause this can be long, so multiplied by a certain amount of tracks, it sucks...

I don't know what version of SX you're using, but SX2 has 'VTSi freeze' and SX3 supposedly even has VST (instead of VSTi) freeze.

First, let me make clear that I use SX 1, so all of the following is hearsay and readup:
From what I understand, 'freezing' does an 'in place' render of either an audio track complete with sends/inserts, or a VST instrument midi track.
So, you adjust plugins on one track to your initial likings, freeze it (so now the cpu is no longer dealing with the real time processing of that track's inserts), do the second track's plugins, freeze that etc etc etc. Now you can listen to a LOT of tracks loaded with tons of plugins (as long as they're frozen) and cpu power is not really an issue. Since in practise you only work on one track at a time, just 'melt' (as opposed to freeze) that track and change the settings while you listen to the full mix with all the inserts.

I guess a temporary wave file is written when you use freeze, so it's basically a way of working around the clumsy individual bounce and import method. Cubase does it for you and, I magine, much quicker too.

Look into the SX2 and SX3 product info or reviews for details. I hope this helps Brett.

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

Well actually I use SX 2, and the VSTi freeze doesn't interest me that much... Moreover, even if I were working with SX 3, I'm not sure if I would use the freeze function... Some of the reasons being that I don't like when a software does something without being very clear about it, I've already lost precious datas because of such "workovers" and I'm not willing to do it again. Also, I use a lot the busses and group channels, and I'm not sure if this kind of auto-freezings works on these tracks...

Anyway, this is not a good solution to do like I do, but I have to stick with it until I get enough money to buy some dedicated hardware and/or a plugin farm computer. But thanks for the hint tho !