VST Performance - is this normal?

Nuendo
1

Looking at my profile and the data below do you think something is wrong with my system?

I’m getting performance overloads and clicks with both settings.

N6 seems to handle things better than N5.5, but it is still not really usable. In N5.5 in particular I often get overloads, clicks and stutters when just clicking on a track or opening a plugin in the project window.

The Project contains just 1 vocal track, 6 or so guitar tracks and a few midi tracks. Very few plugins.

In both cases the VST Audio System in N6 is set as follows:

Multi-processing ON
ASIO-Guard ON
Activate Steinberg Audio Power Scheme ON
6 seconds Disk Preload
Adjust for Record Latency ON

Setting 1:

Buffer size: 2048 samples (to try to minimize clicks, for mixing)
Project Sample Rate: 48000 hz
Input Latency: 43.229 ms
Output Latency: 44.083 ms
ASIO-Gard Latency: 85.333 ms

VST Performance:

With the project NOT running:

Average Load: permanently about 75%
Real-time Peak: permanently about 60%

With the project running:

Average Load: permanently about 80%
Real-time Peak: permanently about 60%

Setting 2:

Buffer size: 128 samples (for tracking, but still not low enough for near-latency-free recording)
Project Sample Rate: 48000 hz
Input Latency: 3.229 ms
Output Latency: 4.083 ms
ASIO-Gard Latency: 10.66 ms

VST Performance:

With the project NOT running:

Average Load: permanently about 90 - 95%
Real-time Peak: permanently about 80 - 90%%

With the project running:

Average Load: permanently 95 - 100% !
Real-time Peak: permanently 95 - 100% !

This makes me yearn for the old days of analog desks and tape :slight_smile:

2

I don’t think what you are experiencing is normal. I tend to leave my buffer at the highest setting since I use hardware for monitoring and latency is not an issue. I have some massive projects with well over a hundred audio tracks running and 300 channels in the mixer with lots of plugins. I have two UAD quads but there is plenty of native load as well. The only problem I tend to run into is with the hard drive not being fast enough. I have 12 gigs of ram with a cpu about the same as yours on windows 7.

I can only guess that it may be a sound card issue or some other driver issue. It is possible that it is a plugin. With the minimal plugins you have in your project that should be easy to eliminate.

Good luck

Dean

3

+1

Check your VST audio system driver under Devices, and make sure your audio interface’s main ASIO driver is selected. It might have changed without you knowing it. You might also like to change your RME card’s connection (and perhaps driver) from FireWire to USB or vice versa.

Turn them off one by one and then both and see what happens.

Good Luck

4

+1
ASIO Guard has never worked as intended IMO. I have always turned it off, for a more stable result.
And I don’t trust Steinberg’s Audio Power Scheme (make your own, inc turning off all C-states modes).

Definitively not normal , what you got there.

5

Thanks for your replies.

The correct audio driver is being used - RME Fireface UFX using USB.

Turning off ASIO-Guard and Activate Steinberg Audio Power Scheme makes no difference.

Turning off all of the plugins (mostly UAD-2) makes no difference.

Soloing a single audio track makes no difference.

In the above situations both Average Load and Real-time Peak remain at very high levels.

However, one of the main culprits appears to be Omnisphere. This was loaded into one of the VST Instrument slots, although it was not actually being used in the project. After turning this off, both Average Load and Real-time Peak readings were reduced by about half - down to about 40% and 27% respectively, which may be acceptable.

Strangely, Trilian (also from Spectrasonics) which is being used in the project does not cause a similar problem - it makes no difference whether it is on or off.

Could Omnisphere be too resource-hungry to be used effectively as a plugin?

6

I have had similar issues with some medium sized projects. Unusually high ASIO meters. Long story short, I figured out that I had some 32bit plugins that I forgot to remove after 64bit versions came out and Nuendo was still “bridging” them. This was causing very high loads. I have removed them not only from the project, but from the plugin list also. So Nuendo 64bit does see ANY 32bit plugs. I have not had these problems since.

7

Yes, I had this too.

Also, today I remembered the Freeze VST Instrument feature! - This makes a huge difference - I’m now running with a 96 sample ASIO buffer.

8

Sounds like you have a bad hard drive. What RPM is your harddrive?

9

Re-start after dis-abling ASIO guard.

10

I have three - they are all SATA 7200rpm

I have found that Freezing the VST Instruments appears to be the best solution, so far.


Do you know whether or not SSD drives would give a performance improvement (aside from being quieter) ?

11

I’ve tried that (with and without rebooting) and it makes the situation worse.

It is definitely much better to have ASIO-Guard ON (it reduces the Average Load and Real-time Peak readings dramatically), although it is not enough to just turn ASIO-Guard On - ASIO-Guard needs to be activated for each plugin on the Plugin Information screen (N6 does not always do it automatically).

I have found that Freezing the VST Instruments appears to be the best solution, so far.