HD12.7.1 stability insights

[algroves]

Hi,

For background I am a career PTHD user of ten years, running my own commercial studios and travelling to various studio's.

I recently overhauled my age'ing PT10 system and traded up to a HDX1 running PT12.7.1 on a 5,1 MacPro 3.06 12-core, 48gb ram running OS10.12.3.

I'm having chronic issues with the instability on this system, main ones listed below;

• 'Pro Tools has unexpectedly quit' - this happens at random but I can re-create it consistently under certain condtions eg. trying to import session data from a session containing plugins. I was able to work around it by first importing data mins plugins, and then importing only plugin assignment and setting data.
• 9171 and 9173 errors. This can happen on sessions with barely any tracks or heavy sessions with 50+ tracks. Monitoring system usage shows CPU usage to fluctuate from 10-60% regardless of session size, when using the HDX playback engine. When switching to onboard playback engine, usage drops to <10%.

I have been through various topics on DUC and have some points of discussion/questions that I wanted to put forward.

1. Is OS10.12.3 known to be unstable? Avid compatibility chart lists 10.12.2 as qualified but not .3 - any experiences?
2. Does the increased usage on the HDX playback engine point to any particular culprit of the errors on my system?
3. I am running an unqualifed AMD Radeon 5780 GPU, which takes up both PCI-e power sockets on the motherboard. I am using an E-Sata > Molex adapter from one of the HDD bays on the motherboard then going to the supplied Avid Molex > 4pin connector cable to power the HDX card. Could this feasibly be causing an issue?
4. The main system drive is an Anglebird 256GB SSD, and the recording drive is a Seagate HDD running at 5900RPM. Could this drive be causing crashing/CPU error issues by being a) too slow and/or b) too full?

Any insight would be gratefully appreciated!

Cheers

Al

[PMF Media]

at a glance, your HDD spinner running at 5900rpm is likely the cause of most of your issues, 7200rpm is the base minimum... if PT can't retrieve the data fast enough {made worse if the HDD is fragmented} it'll kick up all sorts of errors.

Start there and report back, 7200rpm data drive a pretty cheap these days and work well, just make sure there's no power management built into the drive firmware, if the drive spins down and goes to sleep, it'll cause issues as well.

[Carl Lie]

Not sure how many third party plugs you use but you need to update them to their latest versions.

C

[JFreak]

Originally Posted by Carl Lie

Not sure how many third party plugs you use but you need to update them to their latest versions.

This.

EVERY SINGLE TIME you update either PT or operating system, you should really go through all of your plugins and check for new versions.

[Extreme Mixing]

True about the old plug ins. And they can cause problems whether you're using them, or not. The slow drive could be a problem but I often use 5400RPM drives without problems as long as they're USB3 and the session is not too large.

Steve

[treason]

Originally Posted by algroves

Hi,

For background I am a career PTHD user of ten years, running my own commercial studios and travelling to various studio's.

I recently overhauled my age'ing PT10 system and traded up to a HDX1 running PT12.7.1 on a 5,1 MacPro 3.06 8-core, 48gb ram running OS10.12.3.

I'm having chronic issues with the instability on this system, main ones listed below;

• 'Pro Tools has unexpectedly quit' - this happens at random but I can re-create it consistently under certain condtions eg. trying to import session data from a session containing plugins. I was able to work around it by first importing data mins plugins, and then importing only plugin assignment and setting data.
• 9171 and 9173 errors. This can happen on sessions with barely any tracks or heavy sessions with 50+ tracks. Monitoring system usage shows CPU usage to fluctuate from 10-60% regardless of session size, when using the HDX playback engine. When switching to onboard playback engine, usage drops to <10%.

I have been through various topics on DUC and have some points of discussion/questions that I wanted to put forward.

1. Is OS10.12.3 known to be unstable? Avid compatibility chart lists 10.12.2 as qualified but not .3 - any experiences?
2. Does the increased usage on the HDX playback engine point to any particular culprit of the errors on my system?
3. I am running an unqualifed AMD Radeon 5780 GPU, which takes up both PCI-e power sockets on the motherboard. I am using an E-Sata > Molex adapter from one of the HDD bays on the motherboard then going to the supplied Avid Molex > 4pin connector cable to power the HDX card. Could this feasibly be causing an issue?
4. The main system drive is an Anglebird 256GB SSD, and the recording drive is a Seagate HDD running at 5900RPM. Could this drive be causing crashing/CPU error issues by being a) too slow and/or b) too full?

Any insight would be gratefully appreciated!

Cheers

Al

I have a very similar HDX2 system based on the 2012 Mac Pro 12core at 3.06GHz, 48GB RAM, 2x 512GB SSD (Apple). I'm using the WD Black 6TB drives for recording run on a PCIe seated eSATA card (4 port eSATA). I've got a Magma 3 Slot PCIe expander for the HDX cards and I'm also running 2 UAD Octos (1 card seated in the chassis with the HDX cards, the second in the Mac Pro).

I've partitioned my boot drive (a 512 Apple SSD) into 2 256GB partitions. One (MAIN) has macOS 10.11.6 and PT 12.6.1, the second (APLHA) has macOS 10.12.3 and PT 12.7.

I don't use Sierra (ALPHA) in my any of my work. I find it unstable and running the same session on both partitions, the session on Sierra uses about 10-15% more Native CPU than the EC partition. As I do the occasional MIDI track, I'm also partial to PT 12.6.1 as it handles MIDI without the compensation errors of 12.7.1.

To be clear - both partitions (MAIN & ALPHA) have current versions of all plugs and both partitions plug directions are exact matches.

I'm waiting for the next version of PT to see if they fix the MIDI issues (again) and see what macOS it pairs with.

Meanwhile - my own anecdotal experience is that on Xeon based Mac Pros, EC 10.11.6 is the best performer. YMMV.

Good luck!

[Barry Johns]

Originally Posted by algroves

Hi,

For background I am a career PTHD user of ten years, running my own commercial studios and travelling to various studio's.

I recently overhauled my age'ing PT10 system and traded up to a HDX1 running PT12.7.1 on a 5,1 MacPro 3.06 8-core, 48gb ram running OS10.12.3.

I'm having chronic issues with the instability on this system, main ones listed below;

• 'Pro Tools has unexpectedly quit' - this happens at random but I can re-create it consistently under certain condtions eg. trying to import session data from a session containing plugins. I was able to work around it by first importing data mins plugins, and then importing only plugin assignment and setting data.
• 9171 and 9173 errors. This can happen on sessions with barely any tracks or heavy sessions with 50+ tracks. Monitoring system usage shows CPU usage to fluctuate from 10-60% regardless of session size, when using the HDX playback engine. When switching to onboard playback engine, usage drops to <10%.

I have been through various topics on DUC and have some points of discussion/questions that I wanted to put forward.

1. Is OS10.12.3 known to be unstable? Avid compatibility chart lists 10.12.2 as qualified but not .3 - any experiences?
2. Does the increased usage on the HDX playback engine point to any particular culprit of the errors on my system?
3. I am running an unqualifed AMD Radeon 5780 GPU, which takes up both PCI-e power sockets on the motherboard. I am using an E-Sata > Molex adapter from one of the HDD bays on the motherboard then going to the supplied Avid Molex > 4pin connector cable to power the HDX card. Could this feasibly be causing an issue?
4. The main system drive is an Anglebird 256GB SSD, and the recording drive is a Seagate HDD running at 5900RPM. Could this drive be causing crashing/CPU error issues by being a) too slow and/or b) too full?

Any insight would be gratefully appreciated!

Cheers

Al

On a side note, I strongly recommend upgrading your computer to a 12 core. I'm more than happy to help. PM me if interested.

[algroves]

Originally Posted by Barry Johns

On a side note, I strongly recommend upgrading your computer to a 12 core. I'm more than happy to help. PM me if interested.

My mistake, I'm already on an 12 core.

Cheers

[algroves]

Originally Posted by JFreak

This.

EVERY SINGLE TIME you update either PT or operating system, you should really go through all of your plugins and check for new versions.

Hi,

This was a totally fresh install on a brand new machine, and all the plugin/software installers were downloaded fresh from the manufacturers websites. So I'm assuming they are all the most current versions.

[Drew Mazurek]

Originally Posted by Barry Johns

On a side note, I strongly recommend upgrading your computer to a 12 core. I'm more than happy to help. PM me if interested.

Barry, did you used to sell Amway?!!!?

totally joking BTW!!

whoever sells those upgrade kits owes you a commission!