Upgrade to DP 9?

[Gate 13]

Hello,

I have a Mac Pro with 10.6.8 OS and I currently own DP7. For years my problem was I could not run simultaneouslya lot of virtual instruments (although I have a 13GB memory PLUS using Bidule). Is DP9 truly improved regarding this matter?
Also, do I have to upgrade my OS to Sierra or to a newer version than Snow Leopard?
Thank you!

[MIDI Life Crisis]

I think it is improved, however, if you are running big VI patches that have a lot of samples and are also heavily scripted, place the larger instruments in their OWN instance of the VI. SO you might have three or four or more instantiations of a VI running, but by keeping the large patches isolated in their own VI, it forces DP to use multi-core threading and takes the load off the CPU. Each VI will access a different core. IOW, You might have Kontakt 1 with just a grand piano, kontakt 2 with some strings, Kontakt 3 with percussion and maybe some lightweight instruments, etc. That should help.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

The easy way to remember that is if they have separate faders in the mixer, they will address different cores in your machine. An 6, 8, or 12-core machine will be able to handle an awful lot of VIs that way.

[mikehalloran]

DP 9 requires a 64bit OS as you know. You will want more RAM as 64bit apps can take advantage of the additional memory. I recommend a minimum of 32G.

[Robert Randolph]

There's a number of people that definitely do see a big improvement with 9.1 regarding VI performance. It depends on what you do and your system configuration if you will see a performance increase or regression...

That said, I definitely noticed an improvement moving to Sierra with DP9.

Your mileage may vary and all that.

[Gate 13]

Thank you all guys for your input.
I am scared to notice that your systems have up to 32 Gb memory. I think this is more important than a newer version of DP.
I think having 6 or 8 cores and much memory can always make things easier. But I agree with MIDI life crisis about how to handle the cores. It makes sense....
P.S. I had a very long period of inactivity (due to busy life) so I tried to visit bidule online and see we have to pay now to use Bidule as a plug in? Or I am missing something here?

[MIDI Life Crisis]

When I moved to my 8 core cheese grater and learned about threading in DP, I didn't need Bidule any more. I was a big fan, but it's a layer of complexity that need not exist if one is smart about allocating system resources. And PB is still worth the $$$ if you want the extras, of which there are MANY!

Then when I bought the Mac Pro trash can, I clearly didn't need 3rd party support to run my VIs. Admittedly, I don't run hundreds of tracks. I'm old school. If a client wants fully realistic, well performed and articulated music, they need to pay for good union musicians to play it. Non-union players can be fine as well and deserved to be paid at least union scale. Butt eye digress...

ALL THAT SAID... DP 9.02 is pretty rock solid on my Sierra system. All else aside, I would recommend updating.

Posted by a paid celebrity endorser... j/k