Request for help: investigating slow VST scanning

Dorico
62

I know what the problem is - @Ulf the OneDrive command has the wrong quotation marks. There are the double quotes that are straight and the double quotes that are curly. The curly double quotes won’t work as they are a different character, so Windows incorrectly thinks that the the curly quote characters are part of the actual path or filename. The two forms of double quotation marks look similar so it is easy to miss the problem.

Discord seems to automatically convert all instances of double quotes that aren’t in preformatted text blocks from the regular double quotes to the curly double quotes. I think when you copy and pasted the OneDrive version from @claude_g_lapalme 's post it wound up turning his regular double quotes into curly ones because he didn’t post the command as preformatted text.

2 Likes
63

…or it is simply my fault! …

64

So, here goes:
AMD Ryzen 7 5700G, 64GB RAM, Gigabyte X570s Aero G motherboard, WD Black SN850X C Drive, Windows 11, built 2023.
Dorico 5:
44" EC, 0" FC, 0" FC, 0" FC
45" EC, 0" FC, 0" FC, 0" FC

Cubase 13:
41" EC, 0" FC, 0" FC, 0" FC
39" EC, 0" FC, 0" FC, 0" FC

vst3plugins (Dorico 5).xml (75.3 KB)
vst3plugins (Cubase 13).xml (74.6 KB)

1 Like
65

I think it’s just something that happens during the copy and paste process, and it’s hard to spot because the quotes look so similar in many fonts (like the regular text font used on the forum).

It is easier to see that the quotes don’t match in Ulf’s original post at the top, since the preformatted text font being used has a very different look between the two types of quotes (which in the normal forum font are hard to tell apart).

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66

Dorico 5.1.70

14.85" EC
.84" FC
.82" FC
3.85" EC
M4 Pro MacMini, 64 GB Ram
77 plugins

1 Like
67

Hi @Ulf,
Thanks for your Help. Here’s my measurements.

Mac Book Pro (15-inch, 2017)
CPU - 3,1 GHz Intel Core i7 quad-core
RAM- 16GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3
macOS Monterey 12.7.6

Dorico 5

EC: 01:26.50

FC: 00:04.33
FC: 00:03.77

EC: 00:18.83
FC: 00:03.33
FC: 00:03.36

Cubase 13

EC: 00:19.22
FC: 00:03.52
FC: 00:03.52

EC: 00:18.36
FC: 00:03:50
FC: 00:03.50

47 Plug-ins

vst3plugins.xml (55,7 KB)

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68

Hi @mducharme , you are quite right. I’ve corrected that now in my first posting. Thanks a lot for pointing that out.

1 Like
69

Hello @Ulf,
as you requested, I did again the testing starting with the cubase one.

vst3plugins.xml (55,7 KB)

Cubase 13

EC: 01:35.08
FC: 00:02.04
FC: Instantaneous

EC: 00:18.88
FC: 00:01.51
FC: 00:01.51

** Dorico 5**

EC: 00:16.97
FC: 00:01.41
FC: 00:01.26

EC: 00:16.75
FC: 00:01.28
FC: 00:01.18

70

Hi @AndreLorenzatti , thank you so much! That is very interesting and useful.

71

Using derAbgang’s time function on a 2023 M3 MacBook Pro, 36GB RAM, 9 plugins:

Dorico 5.1.7
Run 1
0.98s user 0.49s system 15% cpu 9.339 total

Run 2
0.01s user 0.01s system 77% cpu 0.030 total

Run 3
0.01s user 0.01s system 77% cpu 0.031 total

empty the cache, then do it again:
Run 1
0.94s user 0.36s system 45% cpu 2.845 total

Run 2
0.01s user 0.01s system 78% cpu 0.031 total

Run 3
0.01s user 0.01s system 80% cpu 0.029 total

Cubase 14
Run 1
0.90s user 0.36s system 44% cpu 2.814 total

Run 2
0.02s user 0.02s system 34% cpu 0.137 total

Run 3
0.03s user 0.02s system 34% cpu 0.141 total

1 Like
72

Hey @Ulf

Thanks for all the effort on this issue!

Here are my results:

first run - Full Cache

4 min, 58 sec.
23 sec
23 sec
23 sec

Second run -Empty Cache

2 min. 2 sec
27 sec
24 sec
23 sec.

System spec:

iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2019)
3 GHz 6-Core Intel Core i5
128 GB 2667 MHz DDR4

Current version of Dorico

P.S.

Dorico has always given me the warning for the audio engine “waiting for audio engine” . but has gotten progressively slower from 10 to 20 seconds wait time. recently that warning won’t go away and I have to click on “continue to wait”. otherwise it will simply stay on the warning box.

This most recent development I believe occurred around the same time I updated to the newest Komplete version (perhaps that has nothing to do with it)

All said and done when I get past the warning the program responds as it should.

Please find attatched the vst xml.

thanks again

Patt.

vst3plugins.xml (340.5 KB)

73

Hi @Patt_Shore , thanks also for your data. You have around 330 plug-ins, which is not record but it’s quite a lot and explains the long scanning times with you. So just click on ‘continue to wait’ until Dorico finally appears.

1 Like
74

Hi Ulf, sorry I am a bit late, but just in case that they might still be useful, here are my results:

A)
36:21 s EC,
0:73 s FC 1
0:51 s FC 2
0:30 s FC 3

B)
36:21 s EC,
0:73 s FC 1,
0:51 s FC 2,
0:30 s FC 3.

C)
21:97 s EC,
0:63 s FC 1,
0:54 s FC 2,
0:60 s FC 3.

D)
19:24 s EC,
0:61 s FC 1,
0:48 s FC 2,
0:51 s FC 3.

Plugins = 110
Dorico 5.1.60.2187

After update to Dorico 5.1.70.2200:
(These are more accurate because this time I applied the MacOS „time“ function.)

A)
21:794 s EC,
0:329 s FC 1,
0:319 s FC 2,
0:329 s FC 3.

B)
19:224 s EC,
0:326 s FC 1,
0:321 s FC 2,
0:327 s FC 3.

C)

20:571 s EC,
0:330 s FC 1,
0:323 s FC 2,
0:331 s FC 3.

D)
19:136 s EC,
0:330 s FC 1,
0:307 s FC 2,
0:324 s FC 3.

My machine:
MacBook Pro 14“,
Nov. 2023
Chip: Apple M3 Max
RAM: 96 GB
Sonoma 14.7.1

Unfortunately, the command string didn’t work for my poor Cubase version LE AI Elements 13.0.50.318. I tried to adapt it several times, but failed miserably :face_with_raised_eyebrow: it kept claiming „no such file or directory“.

75

Hello to everyone and @Sarawii.
Thank you so much for your efforts and providing all the data, it’s really highly appreciated.
And we have actually enough now to see, there is no general problem. But still we are now working on little improvements, especially better logging so we can identify “troublemaker” plug-ins.

Thanks again

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76

Excellent, and thanks again @Ulf for your help and support on this forum. You’re awesome!!!

Patt

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77

Thanks for your comment, really appreciated :smiley:

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78

Hey @Ulf :

I’m possibly going over previously covered ground, if so I apologize for being redundant.

Is there a way to limit the plugins Dorico scans? Exlude them somehow? not sure if others are the same as me but I rarely use nothing other than Noteperformer with Dorico, I do all my mastering and audio treatment in a DAW with the stems.

Patt.

1 Like
79

Hi @Patt_Shore, actually yes, you do, but no need to apologize.
That indeed is an often asked request and we will address it during the upcoming remake of the vstscanner and master. Just a bit more patience, please.

9 Likes
80

Thanks!!

81

Hello @Ulf . First of all thanks for the dedication in attempting to solve this problem and several others throughout the forums. However, running the risk of seeming ungrateful, I must say I get worried when I see you saying that the data doesn’t point to a general problem. For my part, I have Dórico in two Macs and starting it up after a reboot always takes ages - I’m talking several minutes - in both machines. A second start is always faster. However, after a new reboot, even without new plugins installed, starting Dorico takes a long time again, which doesn’t seem to make sense.

I know I haven’t provided the startup data you requested in this thread because I didn’t find the time to do it yet, but I will soon.

Once again, I don’t wish to be disrespectful but a few answers behind you say that a bad plugin hangs during scan and then people blame it on Dorico. Well, I’m sorry but yes, I will blame it on Dorico, or on Pro Tools or whatever piece of software that requires plugin scans. Like it or not, your application is a plugin host and that carries a certain set of responsibilities, namely gracefully handling misbehaving plugins during scans.

No matter how much we circle the subject there’s an undeniable reality for me and for many other users if we check the threads on this subject throughout the forum, which is all of us have several other apps, specifically DAW’s which are also plugin hosts and that require scanning plugins on every start that don’t exhibit Dorico’s behaviour. Namely, if there aren’t any new plugins installed they start reasonably fast. Both Studio One and Reaper start in tens of seconds in my machines, the plug-in scan just flies by because there’s nothing new to scan. I apologise but this is not happening in Dorico on both my machines. Why? I expect the same behaviour for every app in this regard.

The lack of a progress display is also very frustrating. The same for Cubase, by the way. Why can’t I see the name of the plugin being scanned so that I know which one is hanging the process? Why the extremely annoying pop up window asking to continue the scan every 30 seconds or so? At least show the pop up but keep scanning! I’m sorry but all these choices are hard to understand specially when Steinberg’s apps seem to be the only ones working this way.

Once again, apologies if I seem to be throwing gasoline in the fire because that’s not my intention, but I surely hope you don’t mark this subject as solved because I don’t think it is. For sure in my case it isn’t and reading all the apparently similar cases it doesn’t seem to be solved for a bunch of users.

1 Like