CPU Overloads and Crackling Playback

[Obsidian Dragon]

Adding my two cents:

If I recall, on the Intel MacBook Pros, the two Thunderbolt/USB-C ports on the left are on the same Thunderbolt bus, and the two Thunderbolt/USB-C ports on the right are on another Thunderbolt bus. Therefore the bandwidth is shared for devices on the same bus. Perhaps experimenting and testing if you put the external HDMI monitor on the ports on the opposite side from your Apollo interface and UAD Satellites might help. I'm not sure what other devices you have and their bandwidth needs, but avoid putting too much demand on any one Thunderbolt bus should be beneficial. Another solution might be to use a lower resolution external monitor (for testing) as it might lower the USB-C to HDMI bandwidth requirement.

[milosziv]

I'm on the latest PT 2023.12.1 - on a mac studio - running everything natively (silicon). I am short on time to try removing all plugins and adding them back in until I notice what might be causing it - so a solution like "it's an external monitor" issue would really be a nice thing to hear.

My CPU spikes happen most often when I'm running a Zoom meeting using a Canon camera as my webcam. Sometimes I feel like that's what's hogging an intense amount of resources, yet post-Zoom I continue to have the same issues. The crackling and dropouts also happen frequently on Aux IO tracks like PT Audio Bridge 16 where I have Apple Music playing 7.1.4 music... It's choppy at times..

I was hoping various upgrades of PT would've solved this - and I'm still hoping that Sonoma compatability happens soon so I can try an OS upgrade to solve this - but I do see lots of links of people having these same CPU spike issues.

If I find a solve I'll come back here to post.