CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

Hi all,

Every few days I'm getting regular messages popping up in playback and recording with the below message:

'Protools ran out of CPU power. Try deactivating or removing native plugins (-9173).' I thought this wasn't supposed pt happen in 11. Or is this a problem with my computer? I'm running a Macbook Pro with 2.4 GHz, 8 GB of memory and two external G drives for audio and sample libraries, so I'm assuming this shouldn't be happening. All optimisations are in order.

Memory leak? It'll be fine for days then these messages pop up very regularly and cripple my session.

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

And one more thing. When it happens, the CPU % goes up to around 200% when the session is playing or recording.
Hmmm.......

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

What plugins in the session? I find if I have a few Kontact tracks with heavy stuff like Session Strings, I can hit the red on the cpu meter.

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

A lot of plugins and yes, a lot of Native Instrument. The funny thing is the problem persists even when I convert the NI tracks to audio. The CPU still seems spent.

I'm now suspecting the mini grand piano tracks killing it which I just find odd as I didn't think it was much of a CPU hog. Much prefer it to all the Kontakt piano sounds.

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

Scratch that. No idea what it is.

I know can't playback for longer than five seconds without a CPU error message.....

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

Any reverbs or Sansamp? It could be de normalization. If so adding a dither plugin before the reverb may help.

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

I use Sansamp on bass. I also use Avid's reverb one a lot.
I just opened a session this morning and snap. After about an hour this happened again. I was using Konktat Studio Drummer which seemed to be triggering it. Even when I disable the Kontakt tracks I'm still getting CPU error messages every 2 seconds or so in playback, so I'm at a complete standstill.

Correct me if I'm wrong (and I'm often wrong) but I thought the new 64 bit engine was supposed to eliminate the CPU error message/'you ran out of cpu power' type problems....

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

Once you record audio from the Kontact tracks, are you making the old tracks(with Kontact) inactive? If that's done, I would perform a little test. Open a troubled session while holding the SHIFT key down. That will open the session with all plugins inactive. Then, show the CPU meter and note 2 things; 1-the % shown as a number, and 2-is there a little bouncing line that is higher than the solid meter. Next, I would make the first row of plugins active by holding Alt and making any 1 plugin active(holding Alt will cause the entire row to activate). Now what happens to the cpu meter? If it jumps a lot(and I expect it will), then I would start making plugins inactive, one at a time and see which causes the biggest drop on the cpu meter.

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

Another update on this.

It's like something is triggering my Macbook pro that then causes it to completely run out CPU power and hit the wall. Since the error messages began popping up it's just fried. If I try opening a Protools 11 session it literally takes 10-15 minutes. The only way to stop it is to power my machine off and wait a bit, preferably a few hours before restarting.

Re: CPU Overload in PT11..?
 

The tests/use of printing VIs to tracks and then disabling the instrument track should help a lot.

When the CPU appears to be pegged use Activity Monitor to make sure nothing else is running. Grab a screenshot of it , sorted by % CPU and post here.

You have fully optimized your Mac -- following the instructions under the "Help us Help You - READ THIS Before Posting!" link above. Done every last thing?

Can you post specs here on your Mac, OS X version, CPU, Memory, disks (make/model/spec) etc. from the System Information utility. What drives are the VI sampels and audio sessions stored on.

Try deleting prefs and databases just to be paranoid.

For NI are you using the latest bits? Have you followed their optimization settings for Pro Tools, I can't recall if their AAX version has multiprocessor/memory support that wants to be disabled (or does so automagically?) when used with PT. (and neither do I use it so can't check).

if all that does not help have you carefully checked all plugins are up to date? Try to isolate if enabling/disabling a plugin in Pro Tools as described by Dave above. If you can't isolate plugin issues that way try moving all other plugins out their folder and just leave one or two other and try different plugins until you find what is causing a problem (yes plugins loaded but not beign used can cause problems, not usually exactly like this, but it can happen).



Darryl