dreaded asio spikes ..ram or other system issue?

sunshrined · Member Joined: 15 Nov 2005 Posts: 526

Hello All

i have an arrangement project i am working on my laptop and i am encountering the dreaded asio spikes and nothing seems to help with the following project's cpu spikes and i am wondering whether this is a ram issue (as i only have 2 gb on this machine) or is there some other system / hardware issue here?

1) The project details ( i have run more intensive projects on this machine which is the reason for my post)

1 instance of halion 3 with one active program (very basic drum kit- kik sn hats) Frozen
13 instances of zebra 2.5 ( of which 10 are Frozen)
1 zebralette (frozen)
1 Albino (latest version demo copy)

1 isotope trash
2 midi gate plugs
1 api 2500 waves 6.05

0 audio tracks
24 midi tracks never more than 8 active at any given time

2) i get constant spikes with asio set to 2048 samples, switching settings multi processor on or off has no change, audio priority is normal ( i get this with multiple interfaces - rme fface, zoom h2 or built in audio).

3) when i check the mac activity monitor i have 400 mb ram available, the cpu activity hovers between 75 - 80 % is idle when the project is playing with 255 threads and 55 processes; and shows cubase cpu (in the upper window ) is around 20.

4) i have done a bout of maintenance - permissions repair and run onyx cleaning and maintenance operations.

Which brings me to my question - does this seem normal given the system specs (as i mentioned i have run larger projects on this config) or could this be a symptom of another hardware or maintenance issue i am unaware of/overlooked? i ask as it seems like my laptop has been running a little hot as of late and the fans are a bit noisier than i seem to remember.

TIA

s
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macbook pro 2.5, 2 gig ram, osx 10.5.8 - mac pro 2.8 octoxeon/ 10 gig ram, 10.5.8, ati radeon 2600 dual monitor, c4.5.2, sx3.1, fireface 800, mtp av,fs1r,ex5, zebra 2.3/2.5, waves SCC 6.05, altiverb 6.35, peak pro 6.1.1, usb trigger finger

sunshrined · Member Joined: 15 Nov 2005 Posts: 526

BTW

when i freeze the tracks i have selected unload instrument when frozen option and i have selected freeze instrument and channels on the 2 tracks using the midi gate and freeze instruments on the remainder of the frozen tracks.

lastly the project is on the separate partition of the internal 7200 rpm drive.
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macbook pro 2.5, 2 gig ram, osx 10.5.8 - mac pro 2.8 octoxeon/ 10 gig ram, 10.5.8, ati radeon 2600 dual monitor, c4.5.2, sx3.1, fireface 800, mtp av,fs1r,ex5, zebra 2.3/2.5, waves SCC 6.05, altiverb 6.35, peak pro 6.1.1, usb trigger finger

sunshrined · Member Joined: 15 Nov 2005 Posts: 526

problem solved ... the current albino 3 demo latest version was really hitting my system hard - dont know if its a bug with the current version or whether i had a bad install.

but installing and earlier version of the demo sorted me out (3.02 )
Embarassed

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macbook pro 2.5, 2 gig ram, osx 10.5.8 - mac pro 2.8 octoxeon/ 10 gig ram, 10.5.8, ati radeon 2600 dual monitor, c4.5.2, sx3.1, fireface 800, mtp av,fs1r,ex5, zebra 2.3/2.5, waves SCC 6.05, altiverb 6.35, peak pro 6.1.1, usb trigger finger

sunshrined · Member Joined: 15 Nov 2005 Posts: 526