GAP in audio when playing a clip for the 1st time

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Thu Apr 06, 2006 6:55 pm

When I launch a clip for the 1st time in a big set the audio is off for a split second.
I have about 400 clips for my DJ sets and it's impossible for me to run them all before playing...

I used to think it was because of my slow internal hard drive and internal sound card.
I bought a fast external HD and a fast track pro and it's the same !!!

What are the reason and the cure for that annoying behaviour ? urgent, thx

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 8:32 am

anybody else experiencing this ?

Amaury · Post by **Amaury** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 9:04 am

Hi Chris,

That could be caused by a number of different things. But one thing comes into my mind right now: If you look at the Task Manager in Windows, what does it says in terms of RAM usage, once your set is loaded ? I saw you have 512 Mo and given that XP already needs quite a lot, I wouldn't be surprised if your problem would be caused by some swaping.

Kind regards,

Amaury

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 9:26 am

Thanks Amaury,
I'm going to check that and let you know.

(regarding the pitch curve being different in recent versions, I'll send you some clips, it's just hectic for me now, sorry...)

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 10:16 am

Checked and compared with the same set my desktop PC which has 1Gb Ram, and the numbers are roughly the same, except there's less free space on the laptop of course but I don't think it's using the exchange file.

when Live is not running I have 388Mb free space, Live and the set use 300Mb so I have like 80Mb free.

Amaury · Post by **Amaury** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 10:50 am

Hi again,

Well, 80 Mb is not a lot of free memory and I don't know exactly were Windows starts to be thinking it needs more.
How does the set behave on your desktop ? Do you get the same behaviour ?

Best,

Amaury

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 11:11 am

No I don't, only on the laptop. Well new memory then

thanks a lot

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 5:17 pm

Still I have to point that this set was done in live 4, uses no VST and used to work without any glitch on the very same laptop with Live 4.
So how come it's not working well with live 5 ?

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Fri Apr 07, 2006 5:43 pm

...(double post)

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Sat Apr 08, 2006 4:44 pm

I'm now running task manager to monitor things and I notice that when I load my set it takes 300Mb, then I load the same set again it takes 400Mb and again 500Mb. It's like I have to quit Live to reset the RAM, normal ?

Nod · Post by **Nod** » Sat Apr 08, 2006 5:31 pm

Chris J wrote:I'm now running task manager to monitor things and I notice that when I load my set it takes 300Mb, then I load the same set again it takes 400Mb and again 500Mb. It's like I have to quit Live to reset the RAM, normal ?

Chris - afraid that nothing is 'normal' as regards Live's RAM usage - suprising given that the program is so dependant on it for smooth performance!

Been posting on this subject since 5 came out - not many folks seem to appreciate that running out of RAM/any swap file activity seriously impacts performance. This obviously ain't Cubase where you can run 100 odd tracks from disk but even just adding empty tracks in Live increases the RAM usage. Loading your default template, then loading a heavy .als, then loading your default template again can result in LESS RAM usage than what was originally measured upon boot-up with the default - like WTF?

In other words - there is no rhyme or reason to this - it pretty much worked in 4 but has seemingly been fucked since first 5.x release, and to the best of my slim knowledge, never been addressed despite being, IMHO, the single major cause of most people's problems and frustrations.

http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... highlight=
http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... highlight=
http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... highlight=
http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic. ... highlight=

It's also notable that once your into swap file territory, regardless of how the program and it's user got there, switching scenes in session/corresponding points in arrangement results in the infamous heavy CPU spikes/gaps - and this is still there in 5.2 unfortunately. Obviously the only sensible suggestion I can offer is to purchase more RAM - alongside a hope that Abe's stress the point , in promoting Live, of just how RAM dependant it is whilst trying to standardise it's behaviour in line with other applications.

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Sat Apr 08, 2006 6:36 pm

Waow, yeah I remembered reading this but of course it didn't matter too much for me as I didn't suffer from it, now's different.
Thanks Nod for pointing to these links, definitely some problem here.
Luckily I'm allright with studio stuff, for live I think I'll go back to 4.
Again : If they only had released a version 4 with sizable tracks ! (OK, and the complex mode

)

Nod · Post by **Nod** » Sun Apr 09, 2006 1:49 am

Chris J wrote:Waow, yeah I remembered reading this but of course it didn't matter too much for me as I didn't suffer from it, now's different.
Thanks Nod for pointing to these links, definitely some problem here.
Luckily I'm allright with studio stuff, for live I think I'll go back to 4.
Again : If they only had released a version 4 with sizable tracks ! (OK, and the complex mode )

Actually Chris, seeing as the tone of my previous post might have been taken as unneccesarily harsh on my favourite software, which versions of 5.x have you used? I was recently able to complete a major production job with 5.03, hadn't even attempted it with .0, .01 or .02, and despite a few workarounds/insane glitching it did generally go alright. 48 tracks in arrangement with plugs on pretty much every channel...

Your main problem may be that, with 400 clips in session, that's a huge amount of buffering to be done in advance. I don't know whether it's a valid suggestion, and perhaps someone at Abe HQ would be kind enough to answer, but in addition to the RAM is there anything to be gained from setting aside an large, empty and fast drive to set the decoding cache to in such cases as Chris has?

Chris J · Post by **Chris J** » Sun Apr 09, 2006 9:37 am

Nod wrote:is there anything to be gained from setting aside an large, empty and fast drive to set the decoding cache to in such cases as Chris has?

thanks for your time Nod,
you mean setting the decoding cache on the external drive where all my files are rather than the internal drive ?
But isn't the decoding cahe for compressed files only (as said in the manual ?) I'm not using any compressed files

Nod · Post by **Nod** » Mon Apr 10, 2006 1:34 am

Chris J wrote: thanks for your time Nod,

not at all man - no probs...as I said I've got kinda a related issue and want to be seeing Live get better & better. When I was working on .03 for that job recently each time you loaded the .als for the first time you'd get these huge spikes at the locate point where I'd switched scene when committing to arrangement. Just had to make sure the client wasn't around when I was doing it each morning...

Chris J wrote: you mean setting the decoding cache on the external drive where all my files are rather than the internal drive ? But isn't the decoding cahe for compressed files only (as said in the manual ?) I'm not using any compressed files

...another great theory shot down in flames

Anyone else got a solution other than upping the RAM?