I’d been having problems with audio dropping out using Dorico (NPPE/BBCSO or Kontakt instruments), both in playback and through my MIDI keyboard. I thought I’d post what the problem turned out to be.
I have a PC with reasonable CPU, 64Gb RAM and a separate beefy SSD for sound libraries. I reasoned that the problem couldn’t be the SSD because it couldn’t be anywhere near full, so I thought it was probably processor overload. So I tried various things. I created separate Kontakt instances for each instrument. I disabled malware scanning on my sound libraries. I increased the process priority of Dorico and the audio engine. I disabled other background processes. No luck.
Just for peace of mind, I checked the used fraction of the SSD. It was over 90%. How could that be? Turned out that I’d inadvertently allowed Steam to install MSFS 2020 on the SSD. I moved MSFS. Problem solved.
My lesson from this is that I should have checked the simple, obvious stuff first. I wonder if I’ll remember next time 