MIDI Production PT 12 Impossible

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by strangeLoop

Musicman 691,

Share your experiences here doing MIDI production......

Are you getting clip overlaps, MIDI notes not sounding, MIDI notes disappearing, reliably cutting and pasting groups of notes, or AAE - errors?
What about adjusting knob and fader parameters on plugins and virtual instruments while playing back tracks?

I get tired of know-it-all people who have no real experience with the issue.

John Clavin

No clip overlaps unless I want them to. I do sometimes have an issue with MIDI notes not sounding but only when they're out of range of the orchestral instrument in use but no problem with what I call computational vi's like most of the Arturia stuff. Only had MIDI notes disappear when copying and pasting instead of merging onto a track. As far as fader & knob adjusting if it's automatable then no problem; I don't do manual adjust all that much because I only have a mouse and not a control surface.

I may get the odd 6101 error but maybe once every couple of months or so of daily use.

Then again most of my new MIDI work is happening in Digital Performer 9.02 and less and less in PT. I have reasons for the switch that aren't germane here and if you want to know why PM or email me and we'll talk.

[strangeLoop]

At some point in ProTools 11 or 12, Avid added a feature where you see a shadow of the MIDI notes when you move a MIDI clip around. This feature is completely unnecessary, and I think it is where the more recent MIDI problems started.

As to the more stringent requirements of ProTools 12, my CPU usage is at 14%.

An interesting note is that offline-bounce works very well. A 2 minute piece of music with virtual instruments and plugins mixes down in about 10 seconds. I would think that shows plenty of CPU power available. The problems seem to be real-time coordination, resulting in the AAE - 6101 errors.

John Clavin

[edwinstar]

i'm sorry, it will probably not help you big time :
i have no problems with pt12hd on a mac 4,1 (early 2009) pimped to 5,1 with 6-core 3,46 GHz xeon and 32Gb 1333MHz Ram, Radeon HD5770 GPU.
i use a HDX card. my OS is yosemite (10.10.5). i have the note 1 midi bug as well, but no nasty other errors.
maybe the problem lies with your Audio Interface, Graphics Card, broken RAM.
just want to let you know that having a stable PT system with a Mac 4,1 is possible.

[lesbrunn]

Originally Posted by ronwasserman

Bump up to 16GB of ram. 8GB is not enough regardless of what Avid says. 32GB is best if possible.

Agreed. More ram should make for a smoother experience all round. I have 64GB, but MIDI is still what it is in PT...unacceptably unprofessional. Avid is utterly incompetent, but I'm tired of ranting on the DUC. Industry standard indeed.

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by strangeLoop

At some point in ProTools 11 or 12, Avid added a feature where you see a shadow of the MIDI notes when you move a MIDI clip around. This feature is completely unnecessary, and I think it is where the more recent MIDI problems started.

As to the more stringent requirements of ProTools 12, my CPU usage is at 14%.

An interesting note is that offline-bounce works very well. A 2 minute piece of music with virtual instruments and plugins mixes down in about 10 seconds. I would think that shows plenty of CPU power available. The problems seem to be real-time coordination, resulting in the AAE - 6101 errors.

John Clavin

That shadow means nothing in the scheme of things. MIDI has never really been all that good in PT; serviceable but not what it should be. You can't pin your issues on PT until you do some serious upgrading of your computer - get more ram and get rid of ElCrapitan. Either do the firmware upgrade someone mentioned earlier and go to Sierra or backdate to Yosemite.

That offline bounce figure - do you have any of your vi's rendered out before the bounce or not? How many tracks and what kind of plugins? And are they all Avid plugs or third party?

[clausiii]

Originally Posted by musicman691

You can't pin your issues on PT until you do some serious upgrading of your computer - get more ram and get rid of ElCrapitan. Either do the firmware upgrade someone mentioned earlier and go to Sierra or backdate to Yosemite.

My Mac has no issues related to performance. Everything runs great with PT. High track count with many plugins and VIs with low buffer size. All good.
And it´s a 2012 MBP.
But MIDI makes problems in PT.
- Copy/Paste/Duplicate/Loop clips -> sometimes the first note in the clip disappears
- the first note will not play sometimes
- clips in sequence that are sized to the grid overlap each other.

so this is neither related to the OS nor to the computer performance, it´s PT-MIDI

Sierra
8GB RAM
SSD drives
no performance problems

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by clausiii

My Mac has no issues related to performance. Everything runs great with PT. High track count with many plugins and VIs with low buffer size. All good.
And it´s a 2012 MBP.
But MIDI makes problems in PT.
- Copy/Paste/Duplicate/Loop clips -> sometimes the first note in the clip disappears
- the first note will not play sometimes
- clips in sequence that are sized to the grid overlap each other.

so this is neither related to the OS nor to the computer performance, it´s PT-MIDI

Sierra
8GB RAM
SSD drives
no performance problems

No doubt you're having issues but the person I replied to has a system that's not up to snuff to begin with and until he fixes those issues (low ram and an OSX version that has been known to have issues with any recording s/w) then there's not much to go forward with.

[25ghosts]

Originally Posted by strangeLoop

I spent a week with Avid support scrutinizing and testing plugins and thought ProTools 12.7.1 was going to work. I only have Avid plugins and Air virtual instruments. Now I am into real MIDI production and the situation is a disaster.

Small 10 track session with a few plugins and 4 Air virtual instruments.
Constant AAE - 6101 error messages.
Often a big crash where ProTools won't play and a hardware reboot is the only solution.
MIDI editing, clips in sequence that are sized to the grid overlap each other.
MIDI editing, the first note in a clip will often disappear.
MIDI editing, clips often rename themselves. ( -01 added for no reason)
MIDI editing, MIDI notes will stop playing, I have to delete the note and replace it.
With jerky, sticky, faders and knobs it is very difficult to adjust parameters on virtual instruments and plugins.

All of these problems have been with ProTools since ProTools 11. My ProTools 8 and 9 worked flawlessly for years when I was doing the same type of sessions.

All prefs deleted, my CPU use is at 14%, my memory is at the most 30%.

Note: I really don't want to hear from anyone with solutions unless you are actually doing MIDI production or know someone who is.

John Clavin

Hi John,

as you I have been more or less unable to compose in Protools with VIs since version 11. V11 had a new Audio Engine, alas it was not better than the old one.

As soon as the session gets a little bigger than one VI I have to up the PB Engine Cache so much that I cannot play with a feel via Midi.

In the midst of Version 11 I was forced to switch to Logic Pro 10 for all my compositions as I would loose my temper before even getting to the nitty gritty of my composition. I was dumbfounded over the fact how easy Logic was Workflow wise and over the fact that no matter how many VIs I threw at it, it would never choke.

If you really need Protools and rely on VIs may I suggest you use NI Maschine. Launch it as a standalone and do you Composition there. Then close the stand alone and launch Protools and load up Maschine as a Plug in. Hit play and enjoy.

NI Maschine has great midi edit capabilities (Better and more reliable) than those of Protools (IMO). And aside from AAX Plugs it will load AUs and VST, VST3s.

Another option is to use Logic Pro to Compose and bounce the tracks (Very easy and fast in Logic) and import them in to Protools.

As to a remedy for what you are experiencing, I am sorry to say that in my quest of finding one, I haven't found anything but utter grief.

I feel left alone with a $20000 AVID Investment that I have sold for $4k but now produce happily on a 2016 MBP with Logic Pro X selling for $199 !

[grayter1]

Originally Posted by 25ghosts

Another option is to use Logic Pro to Compose and bounce the tracks (Very easy and fast in Logic) and import them in to Protools.

Once I made peace with that workflow (compose in Logic / mix in PT), my life got a lot easier. I spent too much time looking for a one-size-fits-all DAW, and all too often, expected PT to be that DAW.

Logic is an excellent compositional tool, and PT elegantly covers the rest of the process. I no longer spend my time pulling my hair out.

tg

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by 25ghosts

If you really need Protools and rely on VIs may I suggest you use NI Maschine. Launch it as a standalone and do you Composition there. Then close the stand alone and launch Protools and load up Maschine as a Plug in. Hit play and enjoy.

NI Maschine has great midi edit capabilities (Better and more reliable) than those of Protools (IMO). And aside from AAX Plugs it will load AUs and VST, VST3s.

Just remember that Maschine wants a minimum of El Crapitan or the latest revision of Sierra. For those on Yosemite or lower - no joy.