Topic: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

hey all,

was running xp 32bit without hitch for 2years, upgraded to w7 64bit running samplitude 10 and cubase 5 (both dwas are 32bit)
audio playback (movies/music) is fine, but unless my buffer is to to 512 or higher I cannot record in without
pops and cracks every 5 seconds or so. With it set to 1024 there are no pops or cracks but obviously latency is to high for me.

Is the likely to be driver related?

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

I should also advise that even though the 'pops and crackles' are evident when recording with lower latencies, once I increase the buffer they are no longer audible..........not sure if that narrows it down?

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

I'm having the same exact issue, Windows 7 64bit, would appreciate a fix.

4 (edited by Randyman... 2010-03-01 22:26:03)

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

Have you checked the obvious?  Check your DPC latencies to see if a driver is boogering up your system and causing audio interruptions:

http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml (fixed link)

cool

MADIface-XT+ARC / 3x HDSP MADI / ADI648
2x SSL Alphalink MADI AX
2x Multiface / 2x Digiface /2x ADI8

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

Randyman-

yeah I used the dsp latency checker, absolutely no spikes whatsoever. Is there a better way of checking? as far as I could tell the comuter is running fine.

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

What is the maximum DPC latency reported over a few minute time span?  And go ahead and open your DAW application to see if any spiking occurs under that condition.  I'm sure there are TONS of other factors to consider, but every PC I've built has performed well assuming the DPC's are in check (below 100us, and preferably around 10-20us steady).

Beyond that, Firewire adds to the complexity.  IIRC, I've read that using the legacy Firewire driver tends to work much better with RME gear than the newer W7 Firewire driver.  You also have the FW chipset itself to consider, but if it was working fine under XP, then the FW chipset itself shouldn?t be an issue.  I'm not much of a Firewire guy, so I'll let others speak on that...

FWIW ? I know iTunes 64 causes MASSIVE DPC spikes when downloading Podcasts ? just for your info :-)

cool

MADIface-XT+ARC / 3x HDSP MADI / ADI648
2x SSL Alphalink MADI AX
2x Multiface / 2x Digiface /2x ADI8

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

My experience is that anything below 300 us allows audio buffers down to the lowest settings under most circumstance and anything around 100 us is perfect enough for anything. So while on XP you could get 10-20 us it never made any difference compared to the 60-140 us I get on Vista/W7.

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

A bit off topic:

I haven't done much in-depth testing, but W7-32 with Nuendo3 would not scale as well as XP-32 SP3 with Nuendo3 on the same PC (dual boot) - same with Nuendo 4.  I could get quite a few more power-hungry plug-ins (like 3-4 more Amplitubes at full tilt - not a lightweight plugin by any means) running @ 32-Samples under XP w/o pops and clicks.  W7's DPC's were well beow 100us and more like 30-40us, but the XP install was more like 2-10us.  I'm sure DPC's aren't the only factor (as Timur stated above), so what else could be at play?  Both OS's were heavily optimized for offline DAW use.

Has anyone else experienced this from XP to W7-32 on the same PC (with a Dual Boot setup)?  Just curious...

Back on topic :-)

MADIface-XT+ARC / 3x HDSP MADI / ADI648
2x SSL Alphalink MADI AX
2x Multiface / 2x Digiface /2x ADI8

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

I've actually managed to get better performance out of cubase (32bit) under w7 64bit (maybe the extra ram?) compared with performance under xp 32bit.

I've solved my cracking/popping problem for now by simply selecting 'realtime priority' for cubase under the task manager

*cntrl + alt + shift to bring up the task manager, go to applications (make sure cubase is running) and right click on the cubase name, scroll down to priority and selected 'realtime priority'*

latency is at 2.0ms (48 buffer) with no audible pops or crackles.

Hopefully rme will come up with a better solution though, otherwise every time I use cubase I'll have to do this.

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

Will enabling MCSS in the RME driver have any effect in W7?  And do you have Cubase set to prioritize the audio (I think they now label it "Boost" or something) in the Device Setup pane?  These seemed to help in my case, but not much.

Interesting about your XP vs W7 (64-bit however) observations.  I was obviosuly using the 32-bit versions of both OS's, and I don't tend to use more than 1.75GB or so in my projects (no VSTi's, just a bunch of Wave files and VST's), but XP was definitely outperforming W7-32 at 32-samples by 10% or so.  Go figure.  I could NEVER get Vista working for low-latency ASIO on ANY of my 4 PC's - who knows? wink ...

cool

MADIface-XT+ARC / 3x HDSP MADI / ADI648
2x SSL Alphalink MADI AX
2x Multiface / 2x Digiface /2x ADI8

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

not sure what 'MCSS in the RME driver ' means exactly, sorry :-)

I don't need to set cubase audio priority to 'boost' as it seems to make little difference when you've selected 'realtime priority' under the task manager.

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

just opened a new project, and set the visuals to 'windows classic'
that also solves the issue for me, I confirmed it by going back to the standard w7 theme *pop/crackle central*

I imagine if I had a faster computer (mines only a 2.2ghz dualcore) I wouldn't even need to do that.


let me know if you have any luck (btw I've disabled all built in sound and selected the legacy driver)

running just as well as xp with lower buffer settings now, and handling more cpu intensive plugins (reverence etc) with higher buffer settings

13

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

So it comes down to a simple - my graphics card does not support Aero?

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

14 (edited by jamesboyd 2010-03-02 07:05:49)

Re: pops and cracks under windwos 7 64bit

yeah possibly ed:

At least I hope that's the reason, because I love windows 7 :-)

I wonder why buffer settings would change the performance though?

If it's graphics related surely it would be an issue all the time?