Processing meter keeps peaking

[bricker]

Often times the Processing meter in DP will start going nuts, for no apparent reason - even when DP is just idling. Is there any way to tell what is causing that? It causes playback to clip and stutter, and the only way I've found to fix it is to actually restart my computer, which is of course a huge hassle. The meter normally hovers around ~15% when idling.

Im using a mid-2010 iMac, OS X Lion, 16GB RAM, running DP 8.04 in 64-bit mode.

[interzone]

I'm suddenly having the same problem. Never happened before but opened a file last night and the processor peaks and playback stutters. Dumped prefs, verified and repaired permissions... can't think of anything else to do as of now.

DP 8.04
MacBook Pro
OS X 10.7.5
2.7 GHz Intel Core i7
4GB 1333 MHz DDR3

[Dan Worley]

Buffer settings?

[interzone]

I've tried 'em all though since nothing changed from the previous working session there should be no reason for it not to work with current settings.

As of now it's 512, 2, Medium.

Btw, the session runs just fine using built-in I/O so I'm starting to think it's a hardware problem with my 828 MKIII. Tried factory reset on that to no avail.

[Dan Worley]

I've tried 'em all though since nothing changed from the previous working session there should be no reason for it not to work with current settings.

As of now it's 512, 2, Medium.

Btw, the session runs just fine using built-in I/O so I'm starting to think it's a hardware problem with my 828 MKIII. Tried factory reset on that to no avail.

Have the new drivers?

[interzone]

Yep. Same thing happens with a different computer so it's not that... must be the interface. Been having problems with the display going out too so it's about to be replaced with a new unit anyway.

[ChrisByrd]

I've had the same problem over the last few days but so far it only seems to happen when I'm using HALion 4. With HALion 4, DP idles at 41% with the processing meter showing sudden sharp peaks. When I start playback the sound breaks up, the processing meter jumps all over the place, and an audio playback overload message appears (cpu usage jumps to 82%). DP has also quit unexpectedly several times when shutting down after this.

Everything works fine if I replace HALion 4 with Kontakt 5 or the Aria player. Idle is at about 6% cpu, playback at around 35% and there are no peaks. The project has seven tracks of orchestral instruments, buffer size is set to 512.

I have noticed though that on some projects with a mix of audio and instrument tracks the peak indicator on the processing meter lights briefly, usually when the project is first loaded or when starting playback - is this normal?