Is DP 9.12 unusually unstable?

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Michael Canavan
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Re: Is DP 9.12 unusually unstable?

Post by Michael Canavan »

Gravity Jim wrote:Credit for what?

I see continual conversations here and elsewhere about getting your DAW's buffers down to ridiculously low numbers, and then plenty of speed-shop bragging about how low someone got theirs by endless screwing around.

I, too, am a guitar player, with a sense of time that's, in a word, perfect (ask my jazz piano teacher about it), and I have no trouble playing in time at 256, although I prefer 128 for tracking.

It just strikes me as a gas-milage-style argument, with buffer numbers as standing in for 10ths of a mile per gallon.

And I thought the first thing everybody did when having problem was dumb busy work like repairing disk permissions. Thankfully we can't do that anymore and it will fade from the board.

Finally, why do you take this a personal insult? I don't give two flips how anybody else runs DP. I'm just telling you my experience. Jesus, you kids are touchy anymore.
You seem to be conflating lower buffer settings with other bug issues, if I'm running at 128 or 256 etc. it will 100% be the first thing I check if the project is spiking. I don't think I've ever thought of repairing permissions to fix a CPU spiking type issue.
Funny, I had to read through this again just to figure out what you were replying to, I'm never really that impassioned in online discussions, it's not worth the emotional energy. I stand by my statement though, if someone is claiming problems with DP and claiming lower buffer settings, the first thing to check would be how the system ran at higher buffer settings. You often insinuate that regulars here have issues because they tweaked their system, and I would say that most regulars here would be at least raising their buffer settings if they have issues.
IMO most regulars that complain about DP being unstable are mostly doing so because they use features that have bugs, mute automation with snapshots etc. I've noticed a few bugs, but for the most part DP works as advertised. Ran into a shift bug while attempting to add an empty bar to the beginning of the sequence the other day, seemed like it might be due to various time signatures in the song, but DP also has an insert feature that I could use instead that wasn't seemingly affect by various time signatures etc. Bugs exist, regardless of your setup, sometimes you come across like all bugs are the fault of the end user, which simply isn't true.
I think like most things in life bugs and user issues don't exist in a black vs white reality. Some users are accessing parts of the program you or I don't use, hence bugs for them not us; others are not addressing the issue systematically and trying to isolate possible causes before they blame MOTU and claim DP is a buggy mess. The fun is when a user half asses trouble shooting and goes off on DP as a mess when they haven't truly done the work to make sure it isn't some other component of their system, that's when I agree with your assessment of uses tweaking etc. I have definitely had a new driver or update to commonly used plug in that got rid of a bug, no doubt.
M2 Studio Ultra, RME Babyface FS, Slate Raven Mti2, NI SL88 MKII, Linnstrument, MPC Live II, Launchpad MK3. Hundreds of plug ins.
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Shooshie
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Re: Is DP 9.12 unusually unstable?

Post by Shooshie »

The only difference I've noticed is that I need to restart my Mac before using DP. That keeps it perfect for one session. I no longer leave it open in the background for days.

Shooshie
|l| OS X 10.12.6 |l| DP 10.0 |l| 2.4 GHz 12-Core MacPro Mid-2012 |l| 40GB RAM |l| Mach5.3 |l| Waves 9.x |l| Altiverb |l| Ivory 2 New York Steinway |l| Wallander WIVI 2.30 Winds, Brass, Saxes |l| Garritan Aria |l| VSL 5.3.1 and VSL Pro 2.3.1 |l| Yamaha WX-5 MIDI Wind Controller |l| Roland FC-300 |l|
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mikehalloran
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Re: Is DP 9.12 unusually unstable?

Post by mikehalloran »

Shooshie wrote:The only difference I've noticed is that I need to restart my Mac before using DP. That keeps it perfect for one session. I no longer leave it open in the background for days.

Shooshie
I'm not sure if it's DP, certain plugins or what's going on but memory leaks are taxing the system more and more. Browser plugins and Java are certainly part of the problem.

I would have DP slow to a crawl, run a RAM check in TTP and find I had less than a gig free out of 24. Running sudo purge in Terminal would free up 6–8G but only a reboot gets it all the way down.

Maxing out my iMac to 32G and rebooting every day put an end to that.

I checked just now. I have only my browser up with 100 tabs on 3 screens (normal for my day gig). Dount a RAM check, I had 15G free out of 32—that I can live with. Running sudo purge in Terminal jumped it to a little over 22G. About normal
DP 11.31; 828mkII FW, micro lite, M4, MTP/AV USB Firmware 2.0.1
2023 Mac Studio M2 8TB, 192GB RAM, OS Sonoma 14.4, USB4 8TB external, M-Audio AIR 192|14, Mackie ProFxv3 6/10/12; 2012 MBPs Catalina, Mojave
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Shooshie
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Re: Is DP 9.12 unusually unstable?

Post by Shooshie »

That makes perfect sense, Mike. If I don't run any other apps — Safari, mainly — it stays pretty good all day. If I take breaks and peek into Safari I start getting spinning wheels as it shuffles RAM around, or does page swaps, or whatever the heck they do with it nowadays. The more Mail and Safari and Calendar and so forth, the more spinning wheels. So, I have to restart. Time was when I could leave DP open in the background for days, forget about it, then come back to it and pick up where I left off, as if nothing had happened. Really robust. Now... well... this!

I can't say for sure who is leaking, but I think it's Safari, mainly. DP will go all day if I don't touch anything else. Back in the 1990s, I had a work computer and other computer(s). DP ran on the work computer with its special Location settings. It was rock solid, all the time. I was more rigid about my routines then, using an exact sequence for startup, shut-down, and limits on what other things I could do — such as putting the computer to sleep. Some versions of DP didn't like sleep. OS X has completely spoiled me. I hardly pay attention to any of my old rules. But now it may be necessary to limit my DP computer to work. Which is fine. The iPad is well-suited for peeking into Safari.

Shooshie
|l| OS X 10.12.6 |l| DP 10.0 |l| 2.4 GHz 12-Core MacPro Mid-2012 |l| 40GB RAM |l| Mach5.3 |l| Waves 9.x |l| Altiverb |l| Ivory 2 New York Steinway |l| Wallander WIVI 2.30 Winds, Brass, Saxes |l| Garritan Aria |l| VSL 5.3.1 and VSL Pro 2.3.1 |l| Yamaha WX-5 MIDI Wind Controller |l| Roland FC-300 |l|
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