Should Hyperthreading be enabled or not - in Win 7 ( Cubase 8.0.0) ?
So many conflicting views on the issue in this forum and elsewhere.
No mention of Cubase 8 yet ( see below official article from Steinberg website - Knowledge base )
Can we have an official answer from Steinberg please ?
thx
mbr
"Hyper-Threading and ASIO Guard
Hyper-Threading has been introduced back in 2002 with Intel’s Xeon and Pentium 4 processors. Many of today’s Intel-based systems on both Windows and Mac OS X utilize Hyper-Threading to increase performance by a more efficient usage of CPU resources. Details on Hyper-Threading can be found in this Wikipedia article.
However, in the past we have found that having Hyper-Threading (Hyper-Threading) enabled can lead to performance issues and spikes in the VST performance meter. At very low latencies, even audio dropouts may occur. The reason for this is that other Hyper-Threading processes on the same physical CPU might interfere with real-time audio threads on which our software, unlike many other applications, is highly dependant.
We usually recommended to turn off Hyper-Threading whenever performance issues occur. If applicable, this recommendation is still valid for sequencer versions older than Cubase 7 or Nuendo 6 (most Windows systems offer this option in the BIOS or UEFI setup, whereas Hyper-Threading cannot be disabled under Mac OS X).
With Cubase 7 and Nuendo 6 we’ve introduced ASIO Guard. Depending on the project setup, this feature reduces the real-time audio processing load significantly and thus reduces the risk of audio dropouts caused by Hyper-Threading. For details on ASIO Guard, please refer to this article.
Enabling Hyper-Threading while ASIO Guard is active usually has a positive effect on the overall system performance and is the recommended combination. Only in rare cases - e.g. with projects using many “live” tracks - Hyper-Threading can still lead to performance issues. Again, please refer to the dedicated ASIO Guard article for details"
Yes, it should be enabled. The advice to disable it (which was still on the Steinberg site last time I looked) does not apply to modern CPU’s. That’s what I’ve been told by someone from Steinberg and from simple tests that I’ve done, it’s very obvious that using hyperthreading gives better performance.
It is my opinion, that hyperthreading is optional. They say that ASIO guard can help protect against potential dropouts that could be caused by hyperthreading.
I could be wrong, but I tend to think that if you are not running at extremely low latency, you might be better off not using ASIO guard at all, and turning hyperthreading off. In my case, I have experienced even lower CPU meters with things set up this way - in fact, that is how I have chosen to run my machine now. No hyperthreading, no ASIO guard, and Steinberg power scheme ON. My machine runs amazingly well.
I actually found the contrary when enabling the Steinberg Power scheme, and disabling hyper threading/ASIO guard. My system ran less efficiently. That was in Cubase 7.5, so I need to try it out again in Cubase 8. Also keeping Aero enabled helps improve performance if you have a modern computer with a good video card. YMMV.
I have recently upgraded to a Z97 motherboard and i7 4790K and I get random ASIO spikes that cause audio drop-outs, with or without ASIOGuard enabled. I have tried almost everything other than disabling hyper-threading.
Next up is a mains powered USB hub for everything other than my UR824. After this I will be disabling hyper-threading to see if this works. Kind of defeats the purpose of my upgrading to an i7 from an i5 though…
Why does it defeat the purpose? You’ll still be processing a lot faster with four REAL cores than the old i5 .
I have disabled the hyperthreading and noticed a vast improvement with the issues of the Asio meter spikes and can’t say ive noticed the difference in performance
Hyperthreading is working for me. I have fantastic performance from a new machine with the latest CPU with Asioguard engaged in the low setting. It is weird looking at 16 cores in Task Manager.
