ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Hi there,
I have been mixing a band with more than 300 tracks by session among audio tracks (full orchestra, drums, percs, guitars, keyboards, etc...), auxiliars, Vcas, individual masters, busses, etc... I have been using PT 12.3-PT 12.6 so far, although I have already used the new ProTools Ultimate in the last two mixes, that did not solve my problem either.

In all the mixes, the CPU was placed at 50%-60% without being in Play. I even had to reset the whole system several times, because my computer was unable to play. This never happen in my life with my old Mac Pro. The CPU always was around 20% even in the case of the more busy mixes.

I'm using a complete updated High Sierra version, as well as a new Mac Pro 3,5 Ghz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5, with SSD hard disk, 64 GB 1866 Mhz DDR3, etc...

Any ideas about what is happening? Because it's crazy that my New amazing mac is close to exhaustion, when its power surpasses my old Mac a lot!

Thanks in advance!

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

That is a classic sign of a plugin(s) with a denormalization problem.... discussed many times on DUC. You should go looking for the plugin. Just going through the session disabling plugins in batches should help you find the problem plugins, and then you can remove them, reorder them, or stick a dither plugin in front of problem plugins if it is a denormalization problem... but rarer plugin bugs might require removing the plugin from the plugin folder and restarting Pro Tools... so a good quick test is to start by temp, moving all plugins out of the plugin folder, let Pro Tools automatically put back the standard ones and checking if the problem then goes away... if it does not there are still Pro Tools plugins that can suffer from denormalization... but at least then you have narrowed the number to look at.

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Not necessarily depending on what your old Mac was:
Mac Pro 6,1 (trashcan) 3.5 GHz x 6 core = Geekbench Multicore 20654
Mac Pro 5,1 (cheesegrater) 3.06 Ghz x 12 core = Geekbench Multicore 26146

The older Mac Pro could have had more power than your current by 25% for multicore measurements -- the measurement that matters to Pro Tools.

(That's one reason a lot of pro audio people were annoyed with the new Mac Pro)

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Thank you so much for the answer. I will try to do what you suggest, and I will deactivate plugin by plugin. But it's supposed that all the plugins I have installed are the very last version of each of them. I mean, I have installed ProTools as well as the plugins from scratch in the new machine, and everything has been updated to the last version.

I will keep you posted.

Thanks again!

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

300 tracks is a lot for any computer. After shoving the buffer up as high as it will go, I would start by committing any/all VI tracks(one instance of Keyscape C7 drags my rig down:eek:). Then maybe commit anything that makes sense. I do feel that 2018.4 is a bit less stable than 12.8.3:o

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Having the latest plugins is great, but that's not a guarantee against an outright bug in a plugin/incompatibility with a version of Pro Tools, and certainly not against denormalization issues.

Plugin sensitivity to denormalization can happen with otherwise good plugins. Its not at all a problem that plugin vendors, including Avid, seem to take seriously enough and actually treat like a bug.

And yes as others are pointing out your systems may just be underpowered, but when I see overloading issues when the transport is stopped I like to know it's not a denormalization problem.

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Hi !

Thats a huge session but i would start with a blank session fisrt and see if you have any wierd cpu spike . If not then start adding some plugins you are using in the session with the issue until you find the culprit . I would choose a blank session to isolate the audio that sometimes can cause wierd things too when imported from other locations . Also its gonna be more easy to troubleshoot as the session is more " light " .

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Hi guys,
with a blank session and no tracks my CPU is around 4%-5%. By anyway, as Darryl has pointed out, I'm not sure it is a denormalization problem, because my system is at almost 60% completely stopped. Actually, many times my system does not allow to my to make play, which is very weird.

To be honest, I'm not exactly a newbie, and I have been working with ProTools if I'm not wrong since version 4, and I can ensure you this is the first time I am regretting to have changed of version, the very first time.

It's true that PT12 have some new cool things, that you will be with me, nobody can not understand why there are not available since many versions before. But this is the first time I really feel that instead of taking a step forward and improve the quality of my system, I have taken a step back in terms of quality.

First because the audio engine the ProTools has changed. I have done my first album with PT12, and I do not want to say that it sounds bad, but sounds definitely different, even just listening music in one stereo track. It has something in the high end very weird I can not define. IMHO PT10 sounds more fat and consistent, and by consistent I mean that now my mixes out of my studio do not sound the same that inside my studio, and that's something are getting me crazy. And as I said, I am not a newbie, I am almost 50 years, and you can bet that I have mixed lots of albums since PT4. LOL

Maybe, I need to use the new sound, but this has never happened to me before with ProTools since this version. Maybe PT11 was the same, but I have changed to 12 from 10.

But second, the question of the plugins. I have always mixed using TDM plugins processed with my HD cards. Only when my system was exhausted I used to use Native plugins. But now, everything is Native, and the only AAX plugins I have got are the Avid plugins, the Phoenix from Cranesong and the Massenbourg EQ, just those ones.

Some years ago I did many tests with the different plugins in TDM versus its Native mode. Many of them sounded the same, like the Waves SSL EQ. But for example, the SSL Compressor of waves did not sound the same in TDM mode versus Native mode. I do not say that TDM version sounded better or worse, but it did not sound the same, and samples did not cancel out in phase after processing them with identical parameters. IMHO the TDM plugins sounded better than the Natives. And I would say that the AAX also sound better than the Native ones, and I suppose at the level of the TDM. But this is something that I can not demonstrate by the impossibility of using both formats within the program.

And finally, the amount of bugs that ProTools still has. There are even times that things are fixed, and others that already worked before in previous versions are ruined in new versions. Besides being a musician, my formation has been as an IT Engineer, and really, this is something I can not understand why it can happen, just because I know what I'm talking about.

What it really scares me is to think that my new Mac was underpowered, after have spent almost $6.000, and buy all the RAM possible, the fastest SSD, etc... It is very sad! Well... It is not sad it is annoying actually! :mad:

Tomorrow I will have the opportunity to look into the problem. I will keep you posted! Hopefully I can find something the culprit!

Thanks anyway to all of you for your help on this!

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Hi friend 4-5% cpu at idle is not normal . For me that point that something its messing with the cpu in the background . Tomorrow when you are there do a re-check on your system OS optimizations .

Re: ProTools 12 Ultimate - CPU Overload without playing
 

Hi Jesus,
I have never done any optimization in MacOs in all these years. What do you suggest me to do? In this new version, you can not even select the amount of processors ProTools is using, like I used to do in PT10.