6.02 - first thoughts

[Gabe S.]

But 64-bit still doesn't address the long load times whereas using Bidule does. With libs loaded in Bidule instead of DP, you could easily switch between projects without any need to reload the libs. Have you seen the video on Bidule templates with DP.

Seems like a great way to work to me. If you don't think so, I'd like to hear why.

Hi Greg.

Well, I have to say, this morning I began looking into Bidule. After watching Mike's very excellent videos, I decided to buy it and try it. I've been messing with it all day, slowly working it into my existing template. From what I can tell so far, I think this is a very viable solution. (Looking at the release notes from March 13th, I think this just became more of a reality just in the last few days when they added 8 core support. I think this would have been very limited working on 1 or 2 cores.)

Anyway, it's been stable all day, it can load quite a bit of samples, and it can play a lot of notes, so I've started looking at how to alter my workflow to accommodate it.

It's gonna take me awhile to fully switch over because today's integration was totally experimental and sloppy and I'm gonna have to start over, but I'm excited to do it.

If it works well, on Mac, I could see looking to Bidule as a solution for the pcs too as time goes on.

Cheers.
-gabe

[Gabe S.]

What VIs are you using? Are you streaming? if yes, are your sample libraries apread over multiple physical drives? I routinely run 3 instance of Kontakt 3, Stylus RMX, Ivory, Omnisphere, and Mach 5 on my Mac Pro

Hi Frank.

I have many VIs---I own Komplete 5, K2Player with many libs, all Spectrasonics VI's, Vanguard, Ivory, Ueberschall, Play, Mach 5v2, Pianoteq3.....hehe it's a mess. In my 3.0gHz 8-core Mac Pro, I have 4 drives: an OS/app drive, a project drive for sessions/audio track recordings and (2) 300GB Raptor drives for streaming samples. And i have 9GB RAM. And I always work at a 512 buffer. The computer along with DP5 handles complex situations very well. It's the fact that DP 6 can't load as much into RAM as DP5 that's been an issue for me.

As I mentioned in my previous post, just today, I started experimenting with Bidule and I'm really impressed with what I've seen so far.

Over the next week, I plan on doing a full transition over to it to see if it's viable for me on day-to-day tasks.

Cheers.
-gabe

[James Steele]

Keep in mind that you will need to offset your MIDI tracks slightly. This may not affect someone who doesn't use any quantization, etc. but I found with a drum part I had to use the Time Shift MIDI plug to make a part play 65 ticks earlier to make up for latency. This is a constant offset, but I'm guessing it will vary with DP's buffer size and the sequence tempo?

Also, you won't have the ability to use DP's "pre-render" mode with VI's. This may not be that big a deal to some, but preliminarily I found that I have lower CPU usage if I'm only running a few VIs by running them as plugs with the pre-rendering on. This of course isn't always possible, and having them run in realtime is nice for when you're still tweaking and adjusting volume of MIDI tracks for example, but once a VI part is locked in, it's nice to turn pre-render on and save some CPU.

[Gabe S.]

Keep in mind that you will need to offset your MIDI tracks slightly. This may not affect someone who doesn't use any quantization, etc. but I found with a drum part I had to use the Time Shift MIDI plug to make a part play 65 ticks earlier to make up for latency. This is a constant offset, but I'm guessing it will vary with DP's buffer size and the sequence tempo?

Also, you won't have the ability to use DP's "pre-render" mode with VI's. This may not be that big a deal to some, but preliminarily I found that I have lower CPU usage if I'm only running a few VIs by running them as plugs with the pre-rendering on. This of course isn't always possible, and having them run in realtime is nice for when you're still tweaking and adjusting volume of MIDI tracks for example, but once a VI part is locked in, it's nice to turn pre-render on and save some CPU.

Hi James.

Yes, it varies with buffers, song tempo and then it's even made more complex if you use high latency plugins like a Waves L3, depending on where the L3 was placed in a complex setup----even if delay compensation is on. It can get downright confusing. (I'm familiar with these kinds of issues since I use outside pcs for orchestral stuff and deal with these offsets all the time.)

In case anyone is wondering, I posted a question on the Bidule forum about which MIDI ports to use in Bidule. Bidule has two kinds of MIDI ports:

1. It has it's own built in Virtual MIDI ports for non-ReWire use
2. ReWire MIDI ports that become available in ReWire mode

So the question is which ones should you normally use? The admin at the Plogue forum seems to lean towards the ReWire outputs. Although the naming scheme for the ReWire MIDI ports is Loooooooog and can't be changed. With the Bidule virtual ports, you can name the MIDI ports to whatever you want so they're nice and pretty in DP.

Here's the reply: http://www.plogue.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3961

In Mike's videos, it looks like he's using the built-in Virtual Ports in Bidule, not the ReWire ports.

Cheers.
-gabe

[James Steele]

Hmmm... I just came from the thead that the Plogue forum. I'll have to look again. I don't know if the offset will be less. Once I did use the Time Shift plug on the MIDI track the timing felt reasonably solid.

[retrograde]

I'm sure this is the best place to post this but -

I used Tiger with DP 5 with no crashes for two years (Mac Pro 4 core). Recently upgraded to Leopard and DP 6 and have been having periodic crashes of DP (not the computer). Lost 2 hours of a recording session today. I'm honestly thinking about going back to Tiger and DP5. This is truly f____ked.

Geoff

[James Steele]

I'm sure this is the best place to post this but -

I used Tiger with DP 5 with no crashes for two years (Mac Pro 4 core). Recently upgraded to Leopard and DP 6 and have been having periodic crashes of DP (not the computer). Lost 2 hours of a recording session today. I'm honestly thinking about going back to Tiger and DP5. This is truly f____ked.

Geoff

No Geoff... this is the best place to post it. In fact, this is so popular a post I'm thinking of starting an entire new board where people make posts like this. If you feel like it... list some of your plugs and some of the symptoms and maybe we can try and find out what your issues are before we launch into "Truly f___kedville." Many people are having pretty good experienes with DP6.02.

Also, you might wish to avail yourself of the posting template I created here:

http://www.motunation.com/forum/viewtop ... 8&p=288639

[retrograde]

DP 6.01 and 6.02 simply crash randomly when playing back only a modest number of audio tracks (10 or less) with only EZ Drummer as an open instrument and no sends or inserts used. Mostly occurs while jumping back to start point and restarting quickly. Could be an EZ Drummer disconnect. There seems to be less coordination of EZ Drummer with DP 6 than with DP5. I don't know. Crash reports show kernalling [sp?] issue. This is truly new to me. I never had to do interim saves in DP5/Tiger. It was completely stable.

Geoff

[James Steele]

Sounds like there are multiple variables at work. Looks like the combination of EZ Drummer/Leopard/DP 6.02. Change out any of those things and problem may not happen right? I don't use EZ Drummer all that much these days, but I can't remember problems, but then I'm on a dual G5 and I'm using Tiger not Leopard with DP 6.02. Maybe there's a Toontrack fix that's necessary. I'm not sure blanketly writing off DP6 + Leopard as the source of all woes. Might even be tied to how EZ Drummer is handling pre-rendering. Opening the menu in the upper right of the EZ Drummer plug-window (in DP6's interface) and checking the box to run the plug in real-time if you haven't already. That might cure what ails you.

[zed]

Sorry to hear about your lost work retrograde!

I never had to do interim saves in DP5/Tiger. It was completely stable.

Just for some perspective, I always did interim saves in DP5/Tiger, since I experienced enough crashes and other odd behaviors with that set up that I realized the need for extra backup protection (although this was on a dual G5 and not a MacPro). My point is, that even *that* setup which was solid for you, was less stable for others depending on the details of their setup. I suspect DP6 is pretty much the same affair.

I have just upgraded from Tiger on a Dual G5 to Leopard on an 8-core MacPro, but it is still too early for me to be giving any perspective on the changes. After A LOT of going back and forth, and wanting to make the best decision for my productivity over the coming months, I decided to install DP 5.13 instead of DP 6. Since my new computer now has the "grunt" that James mentioned in another thread, I figured that I could forgo pre-rendering and a few other useful new features until the next update comes around... although I probably *will* test DP 6.02 on a separate partition once I have gotten used to DP 5.13 on the new machine. I want to have a feel for each of them on the new computer.

[scooter]

Great report Gabe.

I've been using 6.0.2 for about a month now. I couldn't agree with you more about the mini-menus being moved to the right side of the windows. Wow, I'm still trying to get used to that!!

scooter