Cubase 11 Pro, Windows 11, Intel 12th Gen - Dissapointed

Hi,
I just upgraded my PC to a brand new SCAN 3XS PC with Intel 12th Gen (i5 12600K) running on a Z690 MB, fast memory, M.2 SSD drives etc etc. Also running Windows 11 (fully patched up to date with Intel drivers etc). I write music and edit audio for podcasts, radio etc - so typical set up of plugins, audio and UAD.

2 Issues/questions - if anybody can comment/help?

  1. I was hoping that audio export time would be significantly decreased (vs my 8 year old PC). It still seems to take an age to export. I’m dissapointed - is this a coding problem that Cubase isn’t taking advantage of newer chip architectures??

  2. When I first load a project and hit play - I get stutters in the audio - almost like it’s loading the audio and pausing whilst it does so. After I have played through, it stops and is rock solid? Never had this problem on the same files with my 10 yr old PC running Cubase 11.5, but on Windows 10??

Apart form those issues it’s rock solid and I can run my Focusrite Scarlett at super low latency with loads of plug-ins :slight_smile:

Not using your UAD may speed up your bounces?

1 Like

And… increasing your audio interface’s buffer to the max will greatly increase your rendering speed.

Chewy

Did I miss a new update to Cubase?

2 Likes

Ha - no - just my Covid addled brain upgrading my software

1 Like

Tried going up from 128 to 1024 - made negligible difference to export time?

Hmmm…not sure how that would work given that I’m using UAD plug-ins for mix busses and mastering?

Thanks for the comments

I think the main thing I’m getting at is my new CPU is at least double the performance vs my old CPU/PC on the main CPU intensive benchmarks like 3D rendering - so I would have thought audio export would be similarly impacted? Instead I’m getting pretty much the same performance as an 8 year old CPU?
(my old CPU was Core i7-4770K - my new CPU is Core i5 12600K)

Is the conclusion that UAD is the limiting factor? - i.e. no matter how fast my CPU, RAM and SSDs are going they won’t impact the UAD throughput? (BTW I have a UAD Quad and a UAD Duo installed - so 6 cores)

UAD may be the cause. Just bounce a test project without UAD stuff and see if it is fast(er). Not that it will help, but at least you know the culprit.
Also, some plug-ins have a real-time and a render mode. Render mode is slower but maybe better sounding. See if that’s on somewhere.
Logic is quite a bit faster in this regard(bouncing), on my i9 9900k setup(with UAD)

Hey there,

Hmmm, I think i5 , although maybe better than your older set up, is still not as fast as say an i7 or i9 processor.

Still, I think I have read in this forum that Cubase doesn’t take advantage of multi-threading.

I have seen a significant improvement in exporting times. It takes 1/3 of the time it used to take, and especially, single exports are extremely fast, if short, it can take under a second. That’s with an 18 core i9 processor.

Although fast (as I am working on heavy projects) I inquired on what to do to improve and apparently memory cards running as the main HD can increase speeds up to half of what I am using now. Maybe might be an idea to check these out? I have to research this and give you a link.

Have you checked the power management on your Audio settings? They play a pretty huge role in the performance of your machine when using Cubase.

The I5 12600K is a brand new 12th Gen Intel CPU - if you google the performance it rocks!
My old i7 was good back in the day - but tech has moved on.

This new i5 12600 should be giving me significant performance increases.

I know this is sacrelage - but I do play games on my PC - and suffice to say It runs MS FlightSim in Ultra settings at 4K no problem, Cyberpunk 2077 also at ultra settings - my old PC was stuck on Medium settings.

If it can do that for a game why not for audio processing?

Ha ha, no sacrilege, if it can take it, why not??

That’s really strange though, still, plugins can cause issues, depending on how heavy your projects are.

I still think that Cubase has some processes that are still cumbersome…they have improved though.

I had to install Cubase 8 today, because of an old plugin I needed to use and I was shocked with the load up time of the program. Cubase 11 is lightning fast in comparison. So things improve, but there is still room for improvement.

I am not some super tech guy, but I heard that M.2 cards are very fast, if you can install one of these and run it as the main hard Drive, I have been told that speeds increase significantly.

Here is a link to these cards:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=m2+ssd+for+pc&adgrpid=131425607278&gclid=Cj0KCQiA_8OPBhDtARIsAKQu0gYzzM6JhyjILAXi1KjVZb0WBUDeYEObjkNMjnFCTdqR_p-yM9ZgtQwaAuleEALw_wcB&hvadid=566219676643&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=1006793&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=9257684951612940763&hvtargid=kwd-674270490410&hydadcr=18859_1755730&tag=googhydr-21&ref=pd_sl_58s9nz79um_ehttps://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=m2+ssd+for+pc&adgrpid=131425607278&gclid=Cj0KCQiA_8OPBhDtARIsAKQu0gYzzM6JhyjILAXi1KjVZb0WBUDeYEObjkNMjnFCTdqR_p-yM9ZgtQwaAuleEALw_wcB&hvadid=566219676643&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=1006793&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=9257684951612940763&hvtargid=kwd-674270490410&hydadcr=18859_1755730&tag=googhydr-21&ref=pd_sl_58s9nz79um_e

There’s another thread here - by the look of it, the problem could well be the UAD hitting a maximum speed

This thread is from a few years ago, so I would have though that maybe the code had evolved to reflect the advances in PC CPU architectures?

Thanks Mate - yeah - It’s a brand new PC - so I got 2 M.2 SSD drives one for OS/apps and one for data/samples/working files.

I just checked on Performance Monitor doing an export and my CPU is only hitting 21% and going across all 16 cores - the SSD is barely hitting 10% - my RAM is only 50% for this project 7GB out 16GB.

So I guess could well be the UAD as the only limiting factor.

1 Like

Hmmm, sounds like it buddy.

It sounds like a great machine btw!

I think a fellow user mentioned to export with other plugins and see what happens.

I hope you resolve this!

1 Like

The UAD stuff really does jam up the works… you might try doing a high buffer export with the built-in plugins. I can typically get exports at around twice the speed at my FireFace’s highest buffer. Much slower with my UADs, but still noticeably faster than at low buffers.

Chewy

1 Like

So I tried exporting a Podcast which is 50mins long,

It has UAD SSL Bus compressor and UAD Ampex Tape plugins on the Master Out

Without UAD Plug-ins - 1 minute
With UAD Plug-ins - 13 minutes!!

2 Likes

I know, right. It messes with your head.

So - the idea of UAD when it first came out was it provided additional DSP firepower to enable you to do things that your PC simply coudln’t handle.

And now it is acting as a performance brake?

Maybe it’s time I just binned my UAD cards and just use regular VST plug-in versions?

No. Rendering doesn’t rely on buffer