I love DP but WHY ARE FADES SO SLOW????

cubehead · Post by **cubehead** » Sat May 10, 2008 7:01 pm

I am running DP 5.12 on a Dual g5 with 1.5 gig of ram and I am baffled by how slow fades are.. I just worked on my friends Pro Tools native rig and watched an entire session with thousands of drum edits and fades play on a mac book pro... I can't run nearly that on my G5.. Any suggestions..

thanks,
Chris

mongoose · Post by **mongoose** » Sat May 10, 2008 7:10 pm

Well, uh...just for starters:

1. You don't have much RAM. I have 2.5 GB in my G5 and think it's not quite enough. 1.5 is definitely short.

2. The MBP is going to be a lot faster than a G5, regardless of platform. I have both, and my MBP is way faster calculating fades in DP than my G5.

3. There's a lot of other variables (buffers, effects, prerendering, etc.) that can affect these kinds of calculations.

giles117 · Post by **giles117** » Sat May 10, 2008 7:40 pm

I'll Chime in...

I dumped my G5 because my Macbook 1.83Ghz Core Duo (Rev A)running DP 5.0 under Rosetta was faster...

Now I have a 3.0Ghz Quad. After a short fling with Logic 8, I came back and I am very very happy with the speed of DP under my 3.0

Average mix which would have crippled my 2x2Ghz G5 now runs using less than 25% of the CPU

I had a Quad 2.0 and I tell you, it doesn't even reasonably compare to my quad 3.0

Until I hear that the Zeon issues are resolved, I'll hold off on an 8-core

FMiguelez · Post by **FMiguelez** » Sat May 10, 2008 8:06 pm

giles117 wrote:
Until I hear that the Zeon issues are resolved, I'll hold off on an 8-core

Hi.

What issues would those be?

Tim · Post by **Tim** » Sun May 11, 2008 12:54 am

Ram shmam; fades are slow in DP.

jlaudon · Post by **jlaudon** » Sun May 11, 2008 1:00 am

Yup, fades in PT (including LE) have always been immediate, even on slow computers. Maybe in DP6.... (I say this a lot these days...)

OortNYC · Post by **OortNYC** » Sun May 11, 2008 5:43 am

That's one of the basic differences between PT and DP. In PT you can write fades and edge edit soundbites during playback without a glitch. If you tried to do that in DP you would be in for a world of hurt.

tomeaton · Post by **tomeaton** » Sun May 11, 2008 8:00 am

I wish Dave would comment on this. Is there a reason fades can't be done in real time in RAM (as in PT, Nuendo, etc.) rather than rendered as audio to disk?

-tom

kassonica · Post by **kassonica** » Sun May 11, 2008 8:07 am

tomeaton wrote:I wish Dave would comment on this. Is there a reason fades can't be done in real time in RAM (as in PT, Nuendo, etc.) rather than rendered as audio to disk?

-tom

Sounds to me like ancient code.

96khz · Post by **96khz** » Sun May 11, 2008 3:04 pm

We talked about this problem in this very recent thread:
http://www.unicornation.com/phpBB2/view ... highlight=

Magic Dave even commented about it. Here's the opinion I expressed on this matter:

96khz wrote:I guess the Fades audio files is something a little dated. I can understand the need to pre-render to a file the fade ins/outs in the first versions of DP, where computers didn't have much computational horse-power, but right now it is just completely unnecessary to do it.

If DP doesn't need to pre-render to a file:
- track level automation
- soundbite based automation
- virtual instruments, audio processing, etc...

then I guess it's just a case of implementation priorities and not wanting to update the Audio Fades functionality to make it run in realtime, as it should...
Technically, its just another layer of level attenuation... audio fades, soundbite level, channel level. In my opinion, Motu should have changed the audio fade's behaviour and make it realtime when they introduced the soundbite's level functionality.

chaim · Post by **chaim** » Sun May 11, 2008 7:37 pm

FMiguelez wrote:
giles117 wrote:
Until I hear that the Zeon issues are resolved, I'll hold off on an 8-core
Hi.

What issues would those be?

Interested too please.

sayatnova · Post by **sayatnova** » Mon May 12, 2008 11:10 am

giles117 wrote:I'll Chime in...

I dumped my G5 because my Macbook 1.83Ghz Core Duo (Rev A)running DP 5.0 under Rosetta was faster...

Now I have a 3.0Ghz Quad. After a short fling with Logic 8, I came back and I am very very happy with the speed of DP under my 3.0

Average mix which would have crippled my 2x2Ghz G5 now runs using less than 25% of the CPU

I had a Quad 2.0 and I tell you, it doesn't even reasonably compare to my quad 3.0

Until I hear that the Zeon issues are resolved, I'll hold off on an 8-core

Add me to the people whom now have asked about the "Zeon issues" but I don't know if Giles17 has checked back on this post...Anyone have any idea to what he was referring? I am literally days away from getting an 8 core mac and am more than a little curious about what he is alluding to. Any info would be appreciated...

I hope all is well,

~Shea

greatlovesongs · Post by **greatlovesongs** » Mon May 12, 2008 2:59 pm

Odd.....
Fades, although not immediate in DP, cruise quite quickly for me with my current set-up.
I mean they are certainly fast enough (complete within 2 seconds of initiating if not faster in most cases), that I would never see it as a speed issue within DP.
Perhaps it's just a feature in DP that can be "really" inconsistent depending on each individual peron's set-up (considering the bazillion combinations we all can have).

James

David Polich · Post by **David Polich** » Tue May 13, 2008 9:21 am

I've gotta ask another dumb question - I don't understand what "fades" are. Do you mean a fade at the end of the whole tune? Fading from a soundbite into another soundbite? Other than drawing in level automation, I'm not sure I understand what a "fade" is..

Just trying to get a handle on what this discussion is about..

chaim · Post by **chaim** » Tue May 13, 2008 9:29 am

The Fade in, Fade out in the Audio menu.