Never had this before. Tried with 2 keyboards. When I play a note on the keyboard there is a material lag before I hear it from the speakers. Makes it impossible to record
Hi Paul and welcome to the forums.
What you’re describing is commonly called latency and is dependent on your audio buffer setting. Latency is typically measured in milliseconds and buffer in number of samples. 64, 128, 256, 512 and 1024 are common buffer settings among all audio interfaces. The amount of delay these buffers produce depend on the set sample rate. A higher sample rate, e.g. 96kHz over 41.1kHz, results in a lower latency with the same buffer settings but will tax the computer harder.
Ideally you want an audio interface with a dedicated ASIO driver that is capable of reaching low buffer sizes. A latency of <10ms is desirable if monitoring is done through the DAW (as is the case when playing virtual instruments). I prefer a latency of <7ms personally.
How you change the buffer settings will depend on what audio interface you have. I recommend looking at the manufacturer’s website or documentation.
Thanks so much! I’m very non-technical. But I’m using a Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 (2nd Gen). The settings are currently: Sample Rate 44100, Buffer Size 192. The Sample rate is at its lowest. I can go up to 192000, The buffer size can go down to 16 or up to 1024. Any suggestions as to what I should try first? I’m also seeing this message: Round Trip Latency 22.0ms (968 samples) Does that help??
How low you are able to set the buffer size will depend on how well suited your computer is for audio tasks. Some of that includes the speed of your CPU and RAM as well as other hardware components, but it also requires the software side to be up to snuff. This would include, but not limited to, things like drivers (gfx drivers plays a big part of it) and OS settings.
Basically, lower the buffer size until the audio starts breaking up then bring it back up until you don’t hear any artifacts. If the latency after that is still too great, try again with a higher sample rate (96kHz for example). If there’s still an issue, you would have to start looking at what you can do to optimize your computer for audio work. There are plenty of threads in these forums that address this topic but you will also be able to find articles and guides all over the internet. You could start by searching Google for something like “optimize windows for DAW”.
Is the delay that you experience longer than 22ms? 22ms is rather short, like a slap-delay.
If it is longer the culprit could also be that you use a plugin somewhere that introduces this delay. Some plugins have more than 100ms delay (latency).
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Thanks for the support! I had a few other issues with my Focusrite. They seem sorted - for now. And maybe that’s why 22ms is now giving me an ok response from my keyboard? All very strange. But I’m back up and running!