Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

MusicFlow · Post by **MusicFlow** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 1:37 pm

Hey guys,

I recently upgraded to Windows 7 from XP. At first I noted that 7 took a bit more resources, nothing weird about that...

I had a lot of annoying crackles when using Live so I changed the latency from 256 (default setting and what I had on XP) to 512 samples on my MAudio Fast Track Pro. Things seemed to go well until I "really" used Live yesterday (meaning starting a project). Crackles were worst than before, so I decided to increase latency just to see what was going to happen... and guess what, crackles were even worst.

So I put latency to the minimum i.e. 128, and now everything is almost fine.

Can somebody explain to me why ?!

seattletruth · Post by **seattletruth** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 8:23 pm

Sometimes Live crackles for me after recording some, and its not related to the buffer size.

It gets fixed with restarting Live.

Don't know why either.

MusicFlow · Post by **MusicFlow** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 9:30 pm

In my case I don't think it comes from Live itself, and I can't get rid of the problem. When lowering the latency, there are less crackles when Live plays, but I've still got a lot when I'm recording. It's worse when I'm doing something else at the same time, for example using my webcam...

So yeah, like you say, it's not related to the buffer size after all.

Does anybody know a way to fix this, or do I have to get a new PC (mine is starting to become old and shows signs of weakness, even outside Live...) ?

Khazul · Post by **Khazul** » Sun Jan 16, 2011 11:13 pm

Its quite possible something else is interfering - webcams driver for eg are notorious for messing up asio audio drivers for some reason.

Also check what power mode you have windows 7 set to - try max performance and see if that helps.

Also worth running this tool and reading the associated web page and reporting back. http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

MusicFlow · Post by **MusicFlow** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 5:54 pm

Khazul wrote:Its quite possible something else is interfering - webcams driver for eg are notorious for messing up asio audio drivers for some reason.

Also check what power mode you have windows 7 set to - try max performance and see if that helps.

Also worth running this tool and reading the associated web page and reporting back. http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

I run the tool you were mentioning and got a max latency at 257us or so... no problem at all, even when using my webcam !!
So definitively not a latency problem...

Is it possible that Windows or other programs try to access my Fast Track while using Live, even if I disable my fast track as an output in the configuration panel ?
Could it be a sampling frequency problem ? (To avoid that, I have already muted all windows sounds)

Also you're talking about power mode... does it concern me even if my computer isn't a laptop ?

Khazul · Post by **Khazul** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 6:01 pm

257 is rather high TBH.
A really good machine will be between 5-25us, but I have never seen that acheived in Windows 7, only Windows XP. A decent Windows 7 machine should be under 125us or so.

I take you aint seeing any high spikes either?

MusicFlow · Post by **MusicFlow** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 6:46 pm

No, no spikes, that's why I thought it was low, because well under the limit :/

I never run the utility on XP, but I had no problem at all...

Do you think the problem is solvable, or will I have to get a new PC one day or another... ?

zigzag · Post by **zigzag** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 7:17 pm

MusicFlow wrote:No, no spikes, that's why I thought it was low, because well under the limit :/

I never run the utility on XP, but I had no problem at all...

Do you think the problem is solvable, or will I have to get a new PC one day or another... ?

I had similar behavior in Vista, after much digging i found the reason was the intel drivers shipped with the OS.
I wrote a note how to find the suspect drivers here http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=107364

If you really are bothered with 7 but want to keep it, take a look at the instructions there. It may help.

let us know if it helped.

MusicFlow · Post by **MusicFlow** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 9:17 pm

Wow, thank you so much !

I've used xperf and found out that my antivirus AVG took 30% (!!!) of CPU each 25sec... I've turned it off, started a recording in Live AND started my webcam and... not a single crackle !!!

That's great, now I just need to find a good antivirus, or disable it when I'm using Live, but that's a bit annoying :/

Thank you again !

Khazul · Post by **Khazul** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 11:51 pm

Ah never thought about AV as the one I use seems to have zero impact on audio work, but yes - alot of AV software kills DAWs.

I use this - http://www.eset.co.uk/Products/SmartSecurity
Been very low impact on XP and Win7 32 and 64 and seems very good at catching things.

Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency: problem solved, just trying to figure out why

Re: Latency: problem solved, just trying to figure out why

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording

Re: Latency (or sth else): crackles when playing/recording