Subject:Running a "Professional" studio off of "ACID"!

Posted by: BaRaq

Date:2/5/2002 2:56:51 PM

I want to run My studio off ACID! but can't seem to do such a thing because ACID still crashes on a regular basis. These crashes are bit irritating when I look at the fact that We are now at update 3.0e and 3.0 has been out for almost 1 year. Now, I believe that My system is strong enough to handle the weight.

Genuine Pentium III 800 Mhz 100 Mhz FSB
ASUS P3B-F Motherboard
512 MB PC 133 SDRAM
Visiontek 32 MB Video Card
Maxtor 20 GB ATA 100 Hard Drive (System) Partitioned into 2 10 GB partitions (98se & Win XP Professional) ACID is installed on both partitions.
Western Digital 40 GB ATA 100 Hard Drive (Audio)
Plextor 16x10x40 CD-RW
Floppy
External Zip
Cable Modem for posting music to ACID Planet
ECHO MIA 24/96

I have the following software on the 98se side which is used solely for making music. All my software is not compatable with XP as of yet.

Pro Tools Free
ACID 3.0e
Sound Forge 5.0
Vegas
Batch Converter
Siren Jukebox
Samplitude Producer 24/96
Waves Gold Bundle
All Sonic Timeworks Plug-Ins


Ok, Now here are My list of problems.

When I record Midi files and attempt to piece together the best parts using the chopper.............CRASH!

When I open a project and a file can't be found and I choose to ignore and leave the file off line..........CRASH or the system hangs. I click details and all I see is a bunch shit about stack dumps and the sort! Really irritating!

In a "LIVE" studio date recently at $85.00 an hour ACID kept CRASHING! Not Good!

I had a total of maybe 3 BEATMAPPed tracks running and the system was sluggish! Not Good!

I recorded a project at 24/96 with only 4 tracks..........system is sluggish and often crashes! Also Not Good! Can't go back to 3.0c because it's not available, OK.

For the record I use ACID as an MultiTrack Instrument because it has features that no one has and I am able to coin My sound which took over 10 years to develope. The chopper is the ultimate tool which makes editing a breeze. These edits use to take 2 weeks with a Reel to Teel tape deck and Razor Blade. I finish mixes in 2 hours. I am talking about serious "MONEY" potential here. ACID 10 years ago could have gone for 10 grand easily! So stop the maddness and help me out.

Please tell me how to configure this system so that it works flawlessly without the crashes! If I need a Pentium 4 2.2 GB system please say so! Based on the the Minimum requirements this program should work because I built this system from the ground up around ACID and the rest of Sonic Foundry products. Do I need to go SCSI?
Do I have to send to the shop for a "Professional" to hook it up right! But I forgot marjority of the computer geniuses in My area don't know shit about Har Disk Recording! Do I need Dual CPU's and by the way do ACID work with 2 CPU's. I never really agreed with the complaint's here in the forums but now I see a lot of complaints are valid because I was in practice mode where I never kept any song or project but now that I am now doing real world projects My wepon of choice isn't holding up to well. There isn't any replacement except phrazer but I would have to buy a MAC. And I don't have Mac money because I can't this thing to work long enough to make some money. Does Willie Wilcox ACID breakdown as much as mine do?

Give me the correct formula so that I can buy it! and get back to work!

Ok,

Subject:RE: Running a

Reply by: firstfry

Date:2/5/2002 6:17:19 PM

hello..i did the same as you and had problems...when i record at home i only use 2 inputs and 2 outputs...when i went to the studio,i had to assign more output busses...when i cliked play..it crashed...the problem was i had my multitrack outs set in windows still..once i turned them off in windows...crashes stopped..i hope this helps

Subject:RE: Running a

Reply by: Iacobus

Date:2/6/2002 10:58:52 PM

Some more tips:

Bounce down your Beatmapped tracks to just one. Solo each track you want to bounce together and then use CTRL+M to render to a new track. (Set the new track's volume to 0.0 dB to preserve the original volume of the original tracks before they were mixed.)

To be honest, ACID is not a true multitrack, nor should it be. Vegas Audio is much more suited to that task. The two together are quite powerful.

Never install anything other than what you intend to use as part of your studio setup. Never leave any background programs running.

Iacobus

Subject:RE: Running a

Reply by: spesimen

Date:2/7/2002 2:42:11 PM

those workarounds may help, but frankly you should never have to bounce tracks or do anything to your project to have the App not crash.

i still get crashes too - i can almost never run older files that use effects busses, so i never use those anymore, and i still get the program to bomb out every now and then. i have files that simply will crash the program on opening still - unfortunately i don't have time to go through and uninstall every dx plug i have to find out which one is the culprit. in fact, i'm pretty sure it was uninstalling some old ones i never used that caused that problem. just seems like the error handling isn't as bulletproof as it could be.

after a year i still can't do simple things like record and playback at the same time under win2k without it putting glitches in my recorded takes. this worked fine under win98, of course, and works fine in every other app i've tried, so i'm not convinced that there isn't a way to make it happen or that it's a hardware problem.

like you said though, it's embarassing to have stuff like this happen when you're trying to do projects with paying clients. it doesn't matter if it's supposed to be a multitrack or not, we're not trying to do anything that it shouldn't be able to do..

Subject:RE: Running a

Reply by: Woodsposse

Date:3/14/2002 3:56:30 PM

You are in luck. I have been recording professionally using Acid for some time now - AND I am an IT Professional. Maybe that is why I have not had the problems that you have mentioned. Actually, my set up is pretty basic:

Custom built 500 Mhz PIII
256 mb RAM
Generic Full Duplex Soundcard
Win2K (SP2)

The HD that I use for recording is 40 Gig. And I burn a lot of projects off to CD when they get close to finished (for safety sake, mostly).

There may be an issue with things like too many beatmapped tracks, too many effects, etc. But it really sounds like straight system resource issues to me. Don't think we can properly go into all the if's in this e-mail response - but I would make sure you are running the proper drivers, service packs, and direct X (everything should be latest and greatest).

Then, as mentioned in a different post, you should only have the applications you need running when you are recording.

Once last tip. What I do it....when I am recording - I do everything with as little effects running. I worry about mixing effects during the mixing session.

Only once I was working with a project that kept clipping when it got to about 3/4 done. But, I hadn't kept track of what I was recording and had a ton of tracks running at the same time. Upon re-evaluation, I could have easily bounced some of the tracks down to one event.

Lastly, Acid is not a multitracker...that would be Vegas Audio. But, so far Acid is giving me all I need to do what I do (so I'm fine with that). And, although I've said it already, I have been using Acid (2 and 3) with Win2K ever since Win2K came out - and I haven't had any major problems yet.

Hope this helps.
Fell free to e-mail me at: woodsposse@hotmail.com

Ciao for now