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Subject:One-Shot in RAM?
Posted by: jasonnorth
Date:8/16/2001 10:39:34 PM
I have a dual 600 with 512 MB Ram with Delta 10/10. I am working on a song with about 30 tracks, 20 of which are loops and 10 of which are long vocal and acoustic guitar disk-based tracks. I noticed last night in the lower right, that I am only using 40/512 memory?! Is there a way to FORCE one-shot tracks (vocals, guitar, etc..) to be loaded into RAM to eliminate the horrible audio skipping I am suddenly having? OR some better solution? I've tried all the knowledge base solutions. North |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: LanceL
Date:8/17/2001 8:58:22 AM
We typically recommend that users only go for three to five disk-based tracks, or else there will be some skipping and other performance issues. Your mileage may vary, of course. I've heard of people getting a good number of tracks out of wicked fast systems. You could always try changing one or two (or more) of the one-shots to loops, but I'm not sure that this would work any better for you. Best bet is to optimize your system (no background apps), get newest drivers for your cards, and adjust the playback buffer in ACID (as well as your sound card, if it has one). |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jasonnorth
Date:8/21/2001 1:33:35 PM
Ok, so now I am running into the sample problem when running FX on only 4 tracks. What is the best way to increase performance? I have 512Megs RAM and it say I am only using 30/512 in the lower right? Can't I dump all the audio into RAM to avoid these performance problems? I appreciate the response. I love Acid! Jason |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: pwppch
Date:8/21/2001 3:53:21 PM
>Can't I dump all the audio into RAM to avoid these >performance problems? No. What FX are you running on the tracks? How many disk based tracks, loop tracks, one shot tracks are in the project. Also, change your buffering to .350 to .500 to see if this improves things. Peter |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/22/2001 2:57:43 AM
SF--Do you recommend Cool Edit LE as a midi-router synced multi-track with Acid to get around these hideous limitations? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: pwppch
Date:8/22/2001 2:14:33 PM
What are hideous limitations? Peter |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jasonnorth
Date:8/22/2001 8:52:16 PM
Hmmm.. I've tried your suggestions, but audio skipping persists. I still don't quite understand why I am experiencing performance problems.. or more importantly, WHY AM I HAVING PERFORMANCE PROBLEMS with ONLY 30/512 RAM being used?! If there is no way to force (30 second or more) one-shot tracks into RAM then how can anyone expect to use ACID PRO 3.0 in any sort of professional enviroment? Please advise. I remember being told the only limitation to how many tracks I can run is my processor speed (dual 600s) and amount of memory (512MB), which it obviously isn't even taking advantage of. I must be doing something wrong. Jason |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/23/2001 12:13:50 AM
The previously-mentioned hideous limitations of Acid in supporting a tiny number of one-shot audio tracks per project of course. Listed as a feature, on the box, in ads, is "record audio directly into a project." Technically, that's true, but the state-of-the-art industry standard in PC audio multi-tracking software recorders is track volume limited largely by drive space. Imagine Cakewalk or Steinberg telling its users in a forum, "You can get 3-5 tracks going usually, maybe more!" Now we all know Acid is loop-based, but many, many users have been suckered into looking at this audio record feature as a true multitrack capablilty, which it is not. SF should be much straighter and upfront about the extreme limitations of this "feature". Anyway, you didn't answer my question, to wit: Do you recommend Cool Edit Pro synced via the included Midi router to remedy this hideous shortcoming of the product? America needs to know! |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: LanceL
Date:8/23/2001 10:04:17 AM
Actually, no version of ACID has ever been marketed or presented by us as a multi-track recording solution. Every time I get a call or mail regarding whether this is possible, I mention the limitations, as well as the fact that ACID is intended to be a loop-based composition tool; not a multi-tracker. For multi-track recording and editing, we offer Vegas Audio/Video. The amount of tracks that we mention for ACID is a conservative, safe estimate. Other users are able to get more on wicked fast machines. But we don't make a secret of ACID not being a multi-track application. It's not optimized for that kind of performance. Vegas is. Cubase and Emagic would sound pretty silly if they told you that you could only get three to five tracks out of their apps... those ARE multi-track solutions. :) |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: spesimen
Date:8/23/2001 12:09:28 PM
i thought one-shots were specifically meant to be samples in ram, and disk-based (now, beatmapped) were the ones that stream? sonic folks, are you saying that one-shots are now also disk-based, and only loops actually get loaded into ram? either way, it sounds like something might be amiss with that system, i regularly use 3.0 as a multitracker and hardly ever have performance issues. i also regularly compose beats and stuff using one-shots of single drums, and it plays fine, even with a dozen tracks like that with multiple hits for each one. strange. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jasonnorth
Date:8/23/2001 1:26:44 PM
The difference between your use and mine is that I am currently using ACID to produce a hiphop track with 3 one-shot 60 second verses and five 15 second one-shots over the chorus (vocal harmonies). I never had this problem looping techno where I would pull in 20 tracks of short loops, but with five+ 30-60 second one-shots I'm hurtin' over here. THOUGH the ram meter only says 30/512 which seems negligent to me. I don't get it. Jason Insignificant.com |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/24/2001 12:55:01 AM
Specimen--What're you runnin', a dual cpu 2gig machine??? That's some awesome one-shot performance! Now I will ask this question for a third time and hope for an answer: Does SF recommend Cool Edit Pro synced to Acid via the midi router as a possible solution to the VERY limited overdub/multitracking capabilities inherent in Acid? It seems like a simple question, but this is like asking Gary Condit if he was doing Chandra--do I have to go through Abbey Lowell to get an answer here??? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: SonicCaleb
Date:8/27/2001 12:03:25 PM
I wouldn't *recommend* any kind of app to app syncing when audio in both places is involved. Your best bet is to render out the ACID tracks and bring them into CoolEdit to do your overdubs, etc. This will be far less painful than trying to get the two to behave with each other. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/27/2001 1:20:35 PM
Caleb--Yeah, that sounds pretty rational, though it takes away all Acid track mixing components in the final mix within Cool Edit or Vegas Audio LE. In the Acid/Cool Edit LE thread another of your SF brethren suggests that syncing Vegas Audio LE to Acid would work fine, but perhaps they mean only if Acid is 100% loops, no audio. I suspect the combo of dual-audio could result in mega-sync problems, eh? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:8/27/2001 3:17:08 PM
well damn i'm really pissed off, i just wrote a big message but the username was incorrect and this goddamn thing erased it. anyway -- acid 2 allowed you to load stuff into ram, so why doesn't acid 3? that's what we're calling bullshit on. acid 2 _was_ a multitrack environment because i have 640mb of ram which is more than enough for me to load in plenty of live takes. i would get 20 or 30 live takes going at a time just because of my ram. now with acid 3 i can't get shit to play. the default goddamn song in acid skips hideously when i scroll up and down. i have a fast computer. so i call bullshit. acid 2 works fine, 3 won't even play a single song that i've written in acid 2. what a mistake. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:8/27/2001 3:21:22 PM
to respond to jason north -- acid 2 let you select "one shot" which loaded samples into ram. in acid 3 only the loops are loaded into ram, its impossible to load non loops into ram. this is the stupidest thing in the world, there was no reason to do this unless i'm missing something. is SF trying to push some other product that will allow us to multitrack? maybe vegas but that's a joke, wouldn't be used in a professional studio environment thats for sure. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/28/2001 12:36:02 AM
jonah--I thought SF was adamant that loops in any version of Acid did NOT play out of RAM, but always came straight off the hard drive--hence the need for a fast drive. RAM is supposed to be used for buffering and all kinds of other tasks, but not playback. All multi-track apps stream off the HD too, so why does Acid choke after only a few lousy one-shot tracks? "It was never designed to be a multi-track application." Yeah, we know. Well...why wasn't it??? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:8/28/2001 12:54:10 PM
no way dude, i have 640mb of RAM and i'm using acid 2 now, and most of my songs use about 500mb of that RAM. anything that i have as one shot or looping will be in RAM. i can set a 50mb take to one shot and it will jump into my RAM, and fast too! acid 3 just refuses to load anything into RAM except loops .. these same songs are now using 30 or 50mb of RAM. btw i also tested acid 3 on my friend's pentium4 1.5ghz and another friend's athlon t-bird 1.2ghz .. the default song skipped horribly when i scrolled up and down on both computers unless i set buffer to 1 second or more. that's the default freaking song ladies and gentlemen. this software is too buggy to be on the market. lets only hope acid 4 comes out by january, hehe. -jonah |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Iacobus
Date:8/28/2001 1:08:22 PM
One-shots will only play from the hard drive **if** they are longer than 3 seconds. If shorter than that, they'll load into RAM. Iacobus |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: spesimen
Date:8/28/2001 2:12:05 PM
that skipping with scrolling is a bug in build 189 that goes away with the new build, btw. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/28/2001 2:54:44 PM
189 is which rev, 3.0b? "New build" is 3.0b or the next-to-come rev? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:8/29/2001 11:52:50 AM
i have newest version 3.0b and it still skips horribly when scrolling around on my 600mhz athlon. i think the reason is because i have oh, 15 or 20 oneshot takes. of course the same song plays perfect in acid 2 beacuse these are loaded into ram (about 500mb actually!) but in acid 3 not a single one of my songs will play. so, i think the skipping problem you refer to has _not_ been fixed, it won't be until they reinstate RAM-based playback. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:8/29/2001 11:54:00 AM
ok so is there a crack out there that will trick acid into thinking sound files are less than 3 seconds? maybe i could set the riff header to 3 seconds but somehow still retain the actual data. if anybody comes up with a crack for this please let me know. -jonah |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: spesimen
Date:8/29/2001 11:59:27 AM
the skipping problem i was talkign about was actually unrelated to any tracks -it happened in all songs for me and just seemed to be an issue with screen redraws. but then, i'm not having any problems playing like 20-30 trakcs so maybe i got just got a lucky system. :) i guess i still don't really understand why you can't just use beatmapped tracks to accomplish what you're trying to do... one-shots seem to work best for one-shots for me like drum sounds..i pretty much use the beatmapped ones for all other full takes, just making sure that they aren't doing their pitchshift stuff. (checkbox in the properties switches that). |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/29/2001 1:43:44 PM
Thanks for the education, guys! Can SF confirm this, to wit: Does 3.0 load ALL loops into RAM and ALL one-shots longer than 3 seconds are ALWAYS played directly off the hard drive??? Is this, in fact, the cause of all these problems vs. 2.0??? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: DJ_BerndtSKI
Date:8/30/2001 12:38:59 AM
i have 448 mb/ram and athlon t-bird and have used approx 40 tracks (disk-based) without skipping, i also have a SB live SC, just make sure your computer is set up for maximum multimedia performance, sounds like u have a phat system anyways |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:8/30/2001 1:47:08 AM
DJ--How long are these audio tracks--the whole song, or just little chunks? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:9/5/2001 6:58:05 PM
uh, sorry but that makes no sense at all! beatmapped doesnt even load sounds into ram! plus there is serious sound quality degradation. no offense but you would never be allowed to do that in any professional environment. to intentionally run a solo instrument (like say a saxaphone or guitar) through acid 3's beatmapper when it is already perfectly in synch will kill the sound quality! -jonah |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: jonah303
Date:9/5/2001 7:00:27 PM
i don't believe anyone who says they can get 40+ oneshot tracks running simultaneously in acid 3. i could do this easily on my athlon 600 in acid 2 by loading them into ram, but in acid 3 i have tried and tried on my computer and also on a p4 1.5 ghz and a t-bird 1.4 ghz, and have had no luck. max 5 or 6 tracks simultaneously and then i get major skips just by scrolling around the track or clicking on things, and sometimes skips when i'm not even doing that! -jonah |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Maruuk
Date:9/6/2001 1:08:43 AM
Your analysis is consistent with SF's "3-5" tracks limit. And they emphatically don't recommend attempting sync to a multitrack. What's a boy to do? I'd rather switch than fight. Looks like they fixed a beatmapped track dropout and glitch problem in 3.0c, but it's deck chairs on the Titanic at this point in time... |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Rockitglider
Date:9/6/2001 8:17:00 AM
Hello, Just wondering, Why would you want 40+ tracks in a song? And could someone post a song that has that many tracks or near it so I could hear it? Ijust don't understand why you would need that many. Thanks, Rockit |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: xgenei
Date:1/7/2002 3:55:17 PM
This thread sounded about as cohesive as a bee's nest. Ya'll got so many issues running that you'll never figure it out. You got issues with versions, builds, bugs, design flaws, bottlenecks with processors, memory, configuration, work methods, and about a dozen other items that are only scratched. Ya'll just want to blame the version change but you h'ain't narrowed it down to it. Why don't you deal with it rationally, and take one at a time and get some detail? I'd start with the way the program handles one-shots, which is to say it uses a general buffer, loads short samples into it first, and apparently a lot of you aren't anywhere near maxing out your buffer. That's one bottleneck. The next bottleneck is obviously going to be drive throughput then. There is where we get into configuration issues big-time. See my thread here for how that works. A lot of you guys don't realize you're trying to drag race with the family station wagon. MESSAGE Anyway I don't want to run a one-person tutorial but here's a bulleted list that about fills out that vehicle: *Work methods are like rubber on the road *Product segmentation is the power transmission. *Tweaks are the suspension *Your underlying system hardware is the engine *Your configuration is the frame & body (heavy-light, strong-weak, and all the connections) *Software = gasoline *Problems = noises, knocks, poor performance. Obviously you don't blame the gasoline for failing to get you middle 9's in the quarter! Not if you pack the family in the same vehicle and pull your boat to the lake! The answer ain't plugging up the system with words, but determining squat from shinola. It's not my particular concern but the user reports are only clues... Now I do have one sure-fire solution for ya'll. It's like nitro and O2. And ya'll email me a little contribution if it works -- cause I need the lunch money. Get yourself a couple of space racks and move things around so that you got your system drive in a removable tray. BUY TWO OR MORE TRAYS cause you need two drives. NO EXCUSES. Then you buy yourself a brand new #1 system drive -- and we're up to $200 tops -- and you load NOTHING ON IT but Windows XP (okay then whatever ya got), plus your performance software. Don't do email, norton, GoBack, nothin. Don't get on the internet with it. Nothin, nothin, nothin but your Sound Foundry list and what-not. Now you shut your old computer off, pull out your old hard drive, and stick this one in there JUST TO DO YOUR CAPTURE & EDITING. I GUARANTEE YOU for half of you you're going to be amazed. And you guys -- no whining about having to get your email. (Je-sus salt and Peter!) . . .Let me know. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Iacobus
Date:1/7/2002 6:10:57 PM
Nicely said, genei. What disappoints me the most is when I make a sensible suggestion and the original poster responds if it worked for them or not. (Like bouncing down to just one disk-based track instead of having several when skipping occurs.) Kinda rude but what can you do? (*shrug*) Iacobus |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: xgenei
Date:1/11/2002 12:35:06 AM
Correcto mD. I want to see a couple of these guys get off their butt and try a clean configuration cause that will just cut right to the chase and eliminate about 80% of it -- imagine being able to concentrate on the 20% that matters -- like getting to the remaining tweaks, and getting a little discipline in their method? Army of One . . . Scheech! |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: SonicBC
Date:1/11/2002 9:48:22 AM
Okay everybody, I'll try to answer some questions. In ACID 3.0, Loops are RAM based, one-shots longer that 3 seconds and Beatmapped tracks are Diskbased. However, If you go into the preferences and go to the audio tab, there is the option to open files as loops if between XX and XX seconds. You can set the maximum length of a file to be a loop at 300 seconds (5 minutes). As for the gapping playback when messing with the scrolbars, we got a fix in version 3.0c for this. But there are still some machines that experience it, but we haven't been able to find a common ground between them. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Styrerra
Date:1/12/2002 7:16:22 PM
So what you are saying is you can force loops to run off RAM for 300 seconds? |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: Iacobus
Date:1/14/2002 10:44:26 AM
Yep. Iacobus |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: johannbad
Date:1/14/2002 9:01:59 PM
i believe it really machine depedent, as the SF guys said... if you gotta a smokin machine, it'll handle more single shot trax. i can get 10 4min long one shot tracks to play without any problems on my machine in acid 3.0. i have a nice fast IBM drive, 1gig ram, dual 1.1ghz PIII... so maybe it'd work for me. i do wish i could load clips into ram as in acid 2.0 tho. |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: xgenei
Date:1/15/2002 2:43:29 PM
Thank you very much for that clear tweak. This kind of manual RAM allocation eliminates the ambiguities of Windows' disk-based caching, but again there are problems in this group that need a clean configuration (boot drive or at minimum a separate boot partition, which takes way more planning and care), and tweaks to Windows memory management. Otherwise -- "They'll be back . . ." Tweaks to Windows memory management: the basics are to use a fixed size Windows cache memory (in Control Panel / System / Performance / Virtual Memory), and a third party memory recovery & compression utility like RAMPAGE (which is freeware.) This I would do even for a dedicated hard drive or boot partition & configuration. Note: Win98 Guru here. Your mileage may vary. AND ANOTHER THING -- (save it for another thread) |
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Subject:RE: One-Shot in RAM?
Reply by: bastaad525
Date:1/22/2002 11:34:42 PM
Jonah303 had a point... I used to use Acid 2.0 exclusively and it had an option which allowed you to set the largest size file you would allow the software to open as a one shot and run it FROM THE RAM. I would leave this set pretty high, about 75MB which is longer than most any one shot would ever be. This way nearly ALL my tracks would run from RAM in Acid 2.0. I dont record 'loop based music' I do full regular songs and this new setup in Acid 3 makes it impossible to do them the way I want. I've had Acid 3 for about 3 mos. now and have hardly used it at all because of the limitation of running one shots from RAM. I also can't stand that it forces the tracks that exceed the 30 second 'loop limit' to be beatmapped tracks... this has played havoc on my songwriting... And now to boot for some reason NEITHER of my Acid programs will work properly during recording!!! GAH! Well thank god I bought the download version of Acid 3 Pro and am out only $99 |