Audio drop out during DJ set!!!!!!

[hambone1]

I wouldn't trust playing live through an M-Audio interface. Not if your reputation depends on it.

What Sound Card would you recommend buddy!?!?! I'm being told RME or PreSonus but I'm not convinced this is the root cause. Thanks for the input. I'll push on here.

I was using a Yamaha 01V, and never had a problem with dropouts that weren't CPU-related or caused by my own incompetence!

The M-Audio Ozonic I had before the 01V was an unreliable piece of cheap plastic crap.

[90's child]

@hypr: a good audio-interface is the NI Audio Control 1. highly reommended. fantastic sound-quality and excellent d/a-converters.

in your case, i wouldn't work with the eq 3 on each track. eq 3 is crap. take the eq 8 or something similar. eq 3 colors the sound, i don't know why, but this eq isn't clean at all.

when you work with 8 tracks for example, you have to care about the volume on the master-channel. the problem is the summing. 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 9 = clippings on the master. so reduce the volume of each track or work with a sub-mix-bus with a level of -9db.

EQ 3 totally colours the sound and increases the volume on whatever track its put on. EQ8 over here all the way also!

[HYPR]

@HYPR + Patch

I don't think this is down to the CPU, Memory or even the sound card (tho I would ditch the M-Audio piece of crap)

The trouble is hard drive speed. Laptop HDD's tend to run at 5400 RPM, normal PC/MAC HDD 7200 RPM. The faster the disk speed the faster the seek time, and when you start cocking about MP3's and WAV's that spanks the HDD, that can lead to glitches in audio on 5400 HDD.

Yep, that's what I was reading about last night. What's your thoughts on the topic of accessing the sound files via an external fire wire hd if it were running @ 7200rpm vs. Sound files on the internal drive?? Cheers for the feedback. I do most of my arranging on my desktop pc and then save it as a self contained set and then load it on my Sony laptp. Prob should just get a new macbook pro and call it a day....

[MrTiddles]

@HYPR + Patch

I don't think this is down to the CPU, Memory or even the sound card (tho I would ditch the M-Audio piece of crap)

The trouble is hard drive speed. Laptop HDD's tend to run at 5400 RPM, normal PC/MAC HDD 7200 RPM. The faster the disk speed the faster the seek time, and when you start cocking about MP3's and WAV's that spanks the HDD, that can lead to glitches in audio on 5400 HDD.

Yep, that's what I was reading about last night. What's your thoughts on the topic of accessing the sound files via an external fire wire hd if it were running @ 7200rpm vs. Sound files on the internal drive?? Cheers for the feedback. I do most of my arranging on my desktop pc and then save it as a self contained set and then load it on my Sony laptp. Prob should just get a new macbook pro and call it a day....

I'm not sure about the drive speed in a MacBookPro, I use 17' iMac, have done for the past couple of years and it's never ever let me down. If I can give you a couple of suggestions...

1. Don't use MP3's, always use wavs or aiff, Ableton converts MP3's and caches them to you HDD so you may as well convert them before hand rather than Live doing it for you.
2. Use EQ8 instead of EQ3, doesn't take up as much processing power.
3. Minimise the amount of audio you have in your session view at any 1 time, try and get rid of the stuff you aren't playing. There's a post I did on mouseless djing that should help with that.