Pro Tools is critically low on memory

[Marsdy]

Originally Posted by suicune

Hi George

Your problem lies here:



Superior and Kontakt can both be highly RAM intensive depending on how many samples you have loaded. Now I know what you're thinking - I have 32GB, but you've probably missed a crucial bit of info being fairly new to the forums. PT10 is a 32-bit application - it cannot address more than 4GB of RAM and frankly starts to get a bit flaky long before that. So here are a few possible short and long-term solutions for you respectively:

Short term:

1 Check your session for any plugins you aren't using at all and remove them
2 Switch superior to using 16-bit samples
3 Unload any drum kit elements you are not using
4 Try enabling Kontakt's memory server - this loads its samples external to the plugin thereby reducing the load on PT

Long term:

1 Upgrade to PT11 or higher
2 Look at an external plugin hosting solution like VEPro or Bluecat

What he said.... You're lucky to be getting out of memory error messages. They kick in when Pro Tools uses around 2.8GB of memory I think . When I used PT10 it would just crash with about 2.3GB memory usage. Keep an eye on OS X's Activity Monitor.

As for Pro Tools 11. The problem just goes away. 11.3.1 was by FAR the most stable version of Pro Tools I've ever used. Every VI I can think of has long since been compatible.

[gyiakoumi]

Hi

Thank you all for the suggestions, I've since installed Pro Tools 11.3.1 and the issues have stopped. However I have another issue now so I thought i'd ask it while I'm here...

Whilst i'm in a session and all appears to be fine, if I activate another instrument plugin on a new track (in this case Waves Element 2) all of my tracks start to distort.

But not the 'it's in the RED' distort, I mean as if the sample rate has suddenly changed. Has anyone else here experience this problem and can shed some light on it?

Thanks
George

[cwsand]

Originally Posted by gyiakoumi

Hi

Thank you all for the suggestions, I've since installed Pro Tools 11.3.1 and the issues have stopped. However I have another issue now so I thought i'd ask it while I'm here...

Whilst i'm in a session and all appears to be fine, if I activate another instrument plugin on a new track (in this case Waves Element 2) all of my tracks start to distort.

But not the 'it's in the RED' distort, I mean as if the sample rate has suddenly changed. Has anyone else here experience this problem and can shed some light on it?

Thanks
George

I was just going to mention FWIW that if you run into memory errors with a lot of VI's, bouncing them down to audio tracks and disabling the VI will help free up resources.

As far as your other issue, you should start a new thread.

[gyiakoumi]

Originally Posted by cwsand

I was just going to mention FWIW that if you run into memory errors with a lot of VI's, bouncing them down to audio tracks and disabling the VI will help free up resources.

As far as your other issue, you should start a new thread.

Hi

thanks for the tip! will do.

George

[innerbooty]

I'm very late to this party, but this thread was incredibly helpful to me. Running PT 10 HD2 Accel here on a Mac Pro 2009 OS 10.9.5. System for the most part super stable (knock wood). But I just found an affordable copy of NI Komplete 10 Ultimate, which I'd been looking for for a while. But started hitting memory errors right away when loading bigger Kontakt instruments. Figured, hey, I've only got 12 GB RAM, I'll max out to 64 GB, problem solved! Whoops. OWC/MacSales website led me to believe my Mac Pro could take 64 GB. Ponied up for that expensive upgrade. Whoops, turns out their site is misleading and my Mac Pro can only take 32 GB max I believe. No problem, still a lot more RAM than I had... Load up Kontakt Abbey Road drums and immediately starting getting "Running Low on Memory" message, even with PT only using around 1.8GB RAM. Huh..?? Then found this thread and many questions answered...


Question, considering it's now 2020 and this thread was from 2016 - if I were to upgrade to a new version of PT, what would the most cost effective upgrade be? Thinking 2012 Mac Pro cheese grater w/ on HDX card, Pro Tools version ... ? Get an old 11 license? Or something else? Maybe this should be another thread...


Thanks for any tips! The advice in this thread was super helpful... - Steve

[Marsdy]

Originally Posted by innerbooty

I'm very late to this party, but this thread was incredibly helpful to me. Running PT 10 HD2 Accel here on a Mac Pro 2009 OS 10.9.5. System for the most part super stable (knock wood). But I just found an affordable copy of NI Komplete 10 Ultimate, which I'd been looking for for a while. But started hitting memory errors right away when loading bigger Kontakt instruments. Figured, hey, I've only got 12 GB RAM, I'll max out to 64 GB, problem solved! Whoops. OWC/MacSales website led me to believe my Mac Pro could take 64 GB. Ponied up for that expensive upgrade. Whoops, turns out their site is misleading and my Mac Pro can only take 32 GB max I believe. No problem, still a lot more RAM than I had... Load up Kontakt Abbey Road drums and immediately starting getting "Running Low on Memory" message, even with PT only using around 1.8GB RAM. Huh..?? Then found this thread and many questions answered...


Question, considering it's now 2020 and this thread was from 2016 - if I were to upgrade to a new version of PT, what would the most cost effective upgrade be? Thinking 2012 Mac Pro cheese grater w/ on HDX card, Pro Tools version ... ? Get an old 11 license? Or something else? Maybe this should be another thread...


Thanks for any tips! The advice in this thread was super helpful... - Steve

Hi Steve
Have you got Kontakt Memory Server turned on in Kontakt’s preferences? This way Kontakt won’t load samples into Pro Tools’ memory allocation which I think realistically is less than 2.5GB of useable RAM.

[innerbooty]

I do now, thanks to this thread. That was one of the several great tips I learned here yesterday. Instruments seem to load more slowly with Memory Server turned on, but that's fine. A worthwhile tradeoff. Thanks again!



(Still mulling if/what the proper next move is, upgrade-wise. Don't think I want to go all host-based. But I'm happily muddling along in PT 10 HD / OS 10.9.5 for now...)