Just increased the export to audio speed by 400%

[legbiter]

Hi guys,

I have spent the last six months wondering whether it makes sense to upgrade my CPU. I had read so much crap about not getting much performance gain that I initially decided to keep my system as it was (AMD Quadcore FX4100 3.6 GHz and 8 GB RAM DDR 3 16000). You know what they say, "NEVER CHANGE A WINNING SYSTEM". Well, it's wrong in this case.

Today I received an 8 Core FX 8350 CPU @ 4.0 MHz, 16 GB of 18667 RAM. I have turbo-clocked it at 4.4 GHz on my ASUS MOBO.

I thought that the best way to test the additional cores would be to see how fast it computes a wave file out of a complex project with lots of NI plugins and equalizers and compressors etc. Before the upgrade, my projects were taking about 140 seconds to compile to a wave file. Now, that has decreased to just 25 seconds.


DAMN IT! I WON'T BE ABLE TO GET A COFFEE WHILE WAITING FOR A SONG TO COMPILE NOW.


I am over the moon and would like to let you know that saving nearly 2 minutes to compile a complex 24 bit project to a 16 bit wave file is a huge benefit. I intend to turn the 4K monitor back on tomorrow and see if the glitches in real time play have disappeared when using native 4K resolution.

BTW, I am using win7 at 64bit and a 32 bit version of live 9.5 Suite with NI Komplete Ultimate. With the old system I had run into problems loading too many instances of Kontakt 5 with loads of samples. That is now a problem which has been solved by using 16 GB RAM and 8 cores.

The total cost of the upgrade was under 300 EUROs and the time-saving will be about one hour a day, I won't have to keep freezing tracks.


Best regards
Legbiter

[bra10]

You have such a powerful PC and still use Live 32bit?

[Lojik]

12GB of your 16GB RAM is going to waste using Live in 32 bit, if you upgrade to 64bit you will see an even better performance boost.

Edit - to explain further, 32bit systems/software can only address a maximum of 4GB RAM, using Komplete Ultimate it will definately all be 64bit compatible so it doesn't make sense to not upgrade. Any plugin which doesn't have a 64bit version by now isn't worth having IMO.

[klangsulfat]

Today I received an 8 Core FX 8350 CPU @ 4.0 MHz, 16 GB of 18667 RAM. I have turbo-clocked it at 4.4 GHz on my ASUS MOBO.

Overclocked from 4.0 MHz to 4.4 GHz? Wow. I'm speechless

[legbiter]

Yeah! 64 Bit versus 32 Bit. You may laugh but I have tried it and I wasted about 3 days trying to get it to go faster than 32 bit (about 3 months ago) and I failed miserably. Even though it sounds theoritically logical to go to 64 Bit, it isn't reality but it will be as soon as my plugins are all available in 64 Bit. There are also issues with the database which I am keen to avoid.

All told, it's just not the right time for me to upgrade to 64 bit Ableton, the 32 bit system is fine how it is and going to 64 Bit would cause havoc.

BTW, I have switched to 4K resolution and Ableton is now working fine without sound glitches and latency problems. Before the CPU upgrade, it was impossible to go above 1920 x 1200, even though I have a really fast HI-Res NVidia graphics card. The problem was only Ableton, my other stuff Machine, Massive, komplete etc. all worked fine but Ableton is central to my workflow.

I believe that Ableton addresses all of the available physical memory which has been reported to the OS, which is 64 bit. Ableton shows 15.1 GB physical memory available. However, I am not totally sure how that memory is used or not used. I believe that each plugin also has it's own memory allocation which means that the overall system can cope with huge amounts of samples stored in RAM rather that on HD.

[legbiter]

Ok, I just did some reseach on the memory thing and loaded a project which uses plenty of resources. The project uses several instances of Reaktor, Massive, Kontakt, Ableton instruments and simpler drum racks as well reverbs, delays, eqs and compressors.

This is from the Ableton LOG:
After loading standard template: 27238 ms. MemoryUsage: V: 361.8 MB, R: 172.7 MB, P: 185.2 MB
after loading the project: 1729174 ms. MemoryUsage: V: 2.3 GB, R: 2 GB, P: 1.9 GB

As you can see, if I am interpreting the data properly, the total memory addressed by Ableton (on top of windows) after loading the project is 6.2 GB.

[legbiter]

Today I received an 8 Core FX 8350 CPU @ 4.0 MHz, 16 GB of 18667 RAM. I have turbo-clocked it at 4.4 GHz on my ASUS MOBO.

Overclocked from 4.0 MHz to 4.4 GHz? Wow. I'm speechless

Spot the mistake LOL!

[bra10]

Have a look:
https://www.ableton.com/en/help/article ... ths-facts/
that should clear out the 32 vs 64bit RAM thing.
I would definitely switch to Live 64bit.

[fishmonkey]

after loading the project: 1729174 ms. MemoryUsage: V: 2.3 GB, R: 2 GB, P: 1.9 GB

As you can see, if I am interpreting the data properly, the total memory addressed by Ableton (on top of windows) after loading the project is 6.2 GB.

nope, that's not what those numbers mean...

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/window ... e-monitor/

[legbiter]

after loading the project: 1729174 ms. MemoryUsage: V: 2.3 GB, R: 2 GB, P: 1.9 GB

As you can see, if I am interpreting the data properly, the total memory addressed by Ableton (on top of windows) after loading the project is 6.2 GB.

nope, that's not what those numbers mean...

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/window ... e-monitor/

My figures are from Ableton Debug not from windows resource monitor. Windows resource monitor has nothing at all to do with those figures. If you had used it before you would have recognised the format. But like I said, I am not an expert.

[legbiter]

I can't go to 64 bit until all my plugins work so what is the point trying to force it upon me? I don't get it. I will use the 32bit version until "all" of my plugins work. My system is more than fast enough. Jbridge slows down the system and creates instability in the system. I tried 64 bit a few months ago and because many of my projects use 32 bit plugins it just created havoc.

This what Ableton says in that document:

But a 64-bit version of Live has a better system integration and therefore performs better than a 32-bit version on my 64-bit operating system, right?

Not necessarily. There are no differences in the CPU handling between the 32-bit and the 64-bit version.


Can Ableton Live 64-bit load 32-bit plug-ins?

In short, no. A 64-bit host can only handle 64-bit plug-ins.


Does the 64-bit version sound better or different than the 32-bit version?

No. There's no difference in the resolution in Live's internal processing between the 32- and the 64-bit version.

[fishmonkey]

after loading the project: 1729174 ms. MemoryUsage: V: 2.3 GB, R: 2 GB, P: 1.9 GB

As you can see, if I am interpreting the data properly, the total memory addressed by Ableton (on top of windows) after loading the project is 6.2 GB.

nope, that's not what those numbers mean...

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/window ... e-monitor/

My figures are from Ableton Debug not from windows resource monitor. Windows resource monitor has nothing at all to do with those figures. If you had used it before you would have recognised the format. But like I said, I am not an expert.

i posted the link so you could read up on what the memory usage breakdowns mean. they are not 3 values that you can add together to determine total memory usage. why would the Windows memory usage stats not be related to what Live debug is reporting? that makes no sense.

the bottom line is that a 32-bit process running on Windows 7 64-bit cannot address more than 4 GB of RAM...

[Lojik]

Out of interest what plugins are you using which are not 64bit yet?

At the end of the day, enjoy your system, if you are happy with it as it is keep it that way and make some music! When you're ready to upgrade, go for it and enjoy the benefits of more RAM, it really doesn't matter