Cubase 10.5: Real Time spikes only when MIDI track(s) armed

Cubase
1

Hi everyone,

I’m getting continuous real time spikes ONLY when a MIDI track is in
record and/or monitor mode.
With the occasional crackle or drop outs.
No matter if it’s a complex or empty project or high/low plugin count.
Having a MIDI device (keyboard via USB) connected or not won’t make
any difference.
If neither MIDI record or monitor buttons are activated, real time performance meter is low
and all is well.

Weird: Audio tracks won’t cause any real time spikes when in record or monitor state.
The spikes when MIDI tracks are armed do get worse when buffer size is decreased, though.

I tried all possible Cubase audio settings and variations to no avail.

Audio Interface is an AUDIENT id14 Mk2 connected via USB C or A directly into
the notebook. (latest driver/firmware installed.)
Which is a HP Omen X Notebook, i7 CPU, 32GB ram, 3TB ssd, 1080 GeForce GPU
running Windows 10, very latest updates installed.

General audio performance of that machine is not exactly super according to latencymon etc.
but audio operations are trouble free nonetheless, without glitches.

It’s only when MIDI tracks are armed… realtime spikes.
Has anyone a clue what that might be? I’m at loss here.

Thank you all sincerely for your time and attention,

Falko

2

Hi,

If there is Monitor or Record enabled on the track, the track is processed in real-time. So it needs higher CPU load. Other tracks are using the Delay Compensation system and the ASIO-Guard (for the Audio Buses).

But honestly, I don’t see a reason, why MIDI Track, routed to a hardware synth should affect the CPU load.

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3

Thanks Martin,

I’m kinda narrowing the problem down to the USB Audio Interface and it’s drivers.
(Audient ID14 Mk2).
It seems to keep my CPU unusually busy.
Using generic ASIO drivers, the MIDI real time spikes are low and not maxing out.
My former audio interface (via firewire 400>thunderbolt) didn’t produce such peaks neither.

4

Hi,

This might also be an USB issue, then. Because the generic ASIO is not using USB, same as you former driver didn’t use it.

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