Computer help -- working with VST's and CPU

The Lounge Other Gear
#1

I’ve been digging more into VST’s and Max4Live lately and I’m running into issues with CPU limitations. For example, just playing with a Madrano Labs VST puts Ableton at 60% CPU usage and starts to glitch out.

I’m using a MacBook Pro mid-2014, 3GHz Intel Core i7, 16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3, with 500GB SSD.

This should be powerful enough, right? I don’t believe adding more RAM will solve the solution, right?

Ugh. Any help or guidance is appreciated. I’m a fairly tech-savvy person, but not much of a computer hardware person. Thanks much.

#2

I’m not familiar with that particular vst but spec wise your laptop should be plenty powerful enough for music. Have you checked if the cpu is hit so hard when you’re plugged in to PSU for power? Dunno about macbooks but couple of windows laptops I’ve bought I had to mess with the power saving config. Performance was night and day when on battery vs PSU.

#3

I definitely don’t think its computer specs. Could come down to the individual VST itself causing issues. I have a 2011 Macbook Pro that still handles just about anything I throw at it music wise.

#4

Performance is generally governed by the sample rate you are running at e.g, 44.1, 48, 96khz and also the buffer you are running within your DAW e.g. 64, 128, 256 samples.
What are your settings for these 2 parameters?
To gain performance lower the sample rate (can go as low as 44.1khz) and raise the buffer up (256 is a good start).
Doing these both will introduce a little latency but hardly noticeable.
Play with the buffer size to find a nice balance between CPU use and latency.

#5

also 60% isn’t the worst thing. I have some projects that are fucking heavily with m4l, reaktor, neturon, ozone and soundtoys (think instances of ALL of them across multiple tracks) and things usually hover around 50%.

this is all on a brand new, can’t be upgraded anymore, lenovo p50. You might want to check on how many background applications are running, and perform some system maintenance just to rule out anything on that end. I know awhile back I was having M4L issues quite often and simply performing registry maintenance (which is windows specific) reduced them quite a bit. I think in your case you are going to want to verify the disk.

Outside of that check your ableton settings like 64 vs 32 bit, buffer size and multicore support.

#6

your MBP is fine.

however, you should be aware the Madrona Labs VSTs are generally CPU intensive, partly due to the way they always run the oscillators even when voices are not used.
also, ML were having some problems with specific MBP due to the GPU used - so you are best to chase this up on the madrona labs forum @ http://madronalabs.com

1 Like
#7

Great point.

More info on my set-up

I’m running 64-bit Ableton.

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#8

64-bit and multicore support is enabled.

The problem is that when I’ve got a Max4Live audio effect running and I’ll, for example, play NI Massive VST, the CPU will skyrocket and prevent smooth playback. I’m really surprised I’m hitting such performance issues.

#9

Get that sample rate to 44100 and see what happens.

#10

Well you will gain massive CPU performance if you lower the sample rate from 88.2 to 44.1. I won’t go into the debate about whether you will notice a difference audio wise but test for yourself

#11

Thanks everyone. I just tested at 44.1 and Ableton is registering 44% CPU usage when playing some VSTs with M4L effects on them. The audio is continually breaking up.

#12

Any external audio card?

#13

CoreAudio driver (my only option).

Tried it with and without my Saffire Pro40 set up as output/input devices. Same issue both ways.

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#14

Also, I’m plugged into PSU, not running off the battery

#15

256 samples is probably too high actually.

A good part of audio troubleshooting comes down to raising this buffer size on PC. However on my Mac, I dropped this very very small and gained performance. Bounce around with it. Test what works best.

#16

Do you have the latest drivers installed for the Saphire?
You are running coreaudio but just looked on site and Saphire Pro 40 has its own driver to use
Go to focusrite site and download latest driver if you haven’t

1 Like
#17

hmm, sounds high cpu load still…
I usually use something like 48k SR and either 64 or 128 buffer, on a similar machine

but the devil is in the detail, which VST?, which M4L device? (some are pretty cpu intensive)
… is this only some vsts, some m4l devices, or everything? what about built in instruments?

given your getting audio breakup at 44%, that sounds like your using the effects on the main track.
this wont make use of multiple cores, (many vsts and m4l devices are not multi threaded)

try putting the M4L effect on a return track, this will mean it utilises a separate core to the VST, this is always a good bet, if your using heavy cpu vsts, and/or m4l devices.

also, id advise you check if you have background processes running, some will given you cpu spikes. also if possible don’t have wifi turn on.

your MBP has plenty of resources, but your going to have to manage how they are used to get the best from them - this is true of any computer setup(macos, windows or Linux :wink: )

1 Like
#18

Good sounding VST have a downside… CPU eating. Like UHE DIVA… etc… But there’s workaround for years now it’s Gel and Bouncing (of course keep your midi tracks with your VST and deactivate it, so you can come back to it at any time)

Each time I watch people making music around me they don’t even manage their session performance.
Use and Abuse of Send Return each time it make sense… Sometimes I see people using 20/30 Reverbs the session crackle every 15 seconds and they continu to make music like this !!!

Sometimes I would like to see smoke coming from the Laptop… And see the guy face change :stuck_out_tongue:

You can have the most powerful computer you always have to manage your session… Sound Design in HD when you happy from your sound come back to ECO mode a lot of synth nowadays gives some quality mode. Same with Ableton Live everything have quality mode… We all have to deal/jump with those parameters and set them according to step in the process… You don’t need hi-quality when arranging a track. just at sound design stage, mixing stage (here normally you bounce everything in Hi Quality), then Hi Quality for bouncing the master.

There’s tutorial also to make a laptop more ready for audio. It can help with performance… like killing a lot of background system process or reducing it. (only for the moment you use it for an audio session, you can make an automator script for that…)

RAM is only nice for Sampler like Kontakt because all is loaded in RAM. Plus to get those battery running for hours you can’t go over 16GO for now on Apple device.

1 Like
#19

Nothing wrong with your hardware specs.
Maybe it’s just the Madrano VST that isn’t optimised. Is it the latest version?
I use similar setup Live / max4live, can have 40 channels, multiple VSTs and effects on every channel and my CPU is under 30%.
Is it just this particular plugin causing the problem?

#20

That plugin has caused me the most pain. I’ve also experienced this while sending MIDI out to two devices, running M4L convolution reverb (i know) on effects sends, and syncing Rytm with USB