What to expect? PT HD-1

[pinosmuse]

Hi there,

I'm thinking about upgrading my PT LE system to HD.
To bad I can only afford HD-1.

The latency-stuff is driving me crazy and I'd love to have the expanded other software features (more busses etc) as wel.

I'd like to know what is possible in terms of using the HD card mainly for the mixer and using my MacPro (8-core) for RTAS processing.

Most of my work is music (bands) and I hardly use over 32-40 tracks @ 48KHz.

Will I be using to much voices for a HD-1 system?

I'd love to hear your experiences!

Thnx!

[BradLyons]

On one hand the computer you have is incredibly powerful, however there are still advantages to an HD1 such as latency-free monitoring with plugins, delay compensation, higher-quality audio bussing and summing, better plugin quality (TDM does sound better than RTAS), the ability to expand I/O and have your choice of I/O, etc. Being that you're recording bands, I can certainly understand the rationale being this----latency when recording yourself is tolerable, but when you have paying bands in there---it's not.

Understand that the HD1 card has to take up DSP for your mixer, delay compensation, track-count, etc. So with those (9) 100MHz chips, you'll only have (7) or possibly (6) available. There are some plugins that require an Accel card, although I don't believe that is the case for PCIe as opposed to PCIX. And there are many plugins that take a full chip, such as Reverb One or TL Space which might use 2-4 chips for a single instance. In addition when you purchase an HD2 Accel, you get more bundled plugin content included up-front. So do think about this----spending more now would be better than spending A LOT more later.

[JFreak]

You can easily do that track count, but just take a moment to think about your plugin usage. If you want to get rid of latency, you have to mix TDM-only, which means that you have 9 chips available and that has to cover everything.

1 chip for HD engine
2 chips for delay compensation
2 chips for reverbs ??

That leaves you 4 chips for the rest. Good news is that if you go PCI-express, then those four would be Accel chips and using good chip sharing capable plugs will get you there. It just needs some planning ahead until you can afford another card.

If that's okay to begin with, then just go for it. You can always add more horsepower later...

[pinosmuse]

Wel for the recording part of the job it seems not a problem at all.
I'll manage to do most of the needed plugs with the digi stuff, suppose these are pretty dsp-friendly(meaning eq's and dynamics).

What is it like in mixdown? How many tracks will I be able to use when using rtas during mixing? (hd does delay compensation for that to isn't it?)

Like I can just afford HD-1, I cannot afford upgrading all my plugs to TDM yet.

Thnx!

[carl_laruso]

dude.... DO NOT listen to JFREAK

you do not have to use only tdm plugs to avoid latency in mixdown!!!!! that would be insane! lol this is what ADC is for your right!

so basically dont worry about upgrading them to TDM but ebay is your friend when ever you want some tho....

voices wise you may burn through loads if you are using rtas on aux's but if your careful you should be fine - read the PDF reference guide it explains it real good

annoyingly i would advise HD 2 tho - just for the head room and free pluggs as described above

hope that helps man

C.

[shtik]

Sure for recording you'll have an advantage.

In mixing the track count you are talking about (not more than 64 voices), With one card I find myself running out of DSP power at a very early stage.

I managed to run similar mixes with only RTAS on an LE system with half the computer power you have. And still, I always love it when I have the option to not use RTAS at all.

Like other guys above said it would be wise thinking about a 2nd card if you intend to use DSP heavy plugins in your mixes. Or you can try and later see if you need more power.

I can say you can expect to mix something like 50% (depending on track count) with RTAS plugins, more or less. but it's too hard to predict, of course, it depends on how heavy the plugins are and how much of each is being used.

[suicune]

We work primarily with bands and we've just done the HD upgrade ourselves. I was very suprised at how quickly the voice count got maxed. Fortunately we went for a second-hand HD2, but the accel card was damaged and had to be repaired so for the first 2 weeks we only had HD1 and I was running out of voices a lot.

We're effectively doing the same thing you're planning to pinosmuse. We have very few TDM plugs and are running most of our stuff natively. I certainly don't think CPU is an issue for you, ours is only a 4-core MacPro and I haven't maxed the CPU out yet even with a session that made it up to 192 voices - with RTAS EQ and compression on almost all, plus 6 IR-1s, structure, ivory, autotunes everywhere, EA on at least half the tracks, and lots of other stuff. This despite the fact I've had to drop the number of processors to 3 to keep certain VIs happy.

I would suggest you find your current LE session which you think is the most demanding on your system and do the maths to see whether a 96 voice system would be enough for you. Remember the following points:

On LE, mono and stereo tracks count the same towards your track limit. But on a TDM system a stereo track takes up 2 voices.

An aux with TDM inserts or without any inserts at all takes no voices, but an aux with an RTAS insert takes twice as many voices as it's configuration eg 2 voices for a mono aux and 4 for a stereo. This is the real killer. 8 stereo RTAS reverbs = a whopping 32 voices.

RTAS instrument tracks take a voice per channel (1 mono 2 stereo)

Plus one additional voice needed for every record-enabled track if you are in quick/track punch mode, so if you wanna quick punch drums you'll need a lot.

Hope that helps.

[pinosmuse]

Hey guys,

Thanx for all the info.
Suicune: I'm gonna o the math!

[JFreak]

Originally Posted by carl_laruso

you do not have to use only tdm plugs to avoid latency in mixdown!!!!! that would be insane! lol this is what ADC is for your right!

Many artists can't monitor thru RTAS plugs, because that brings total latency to about 10 milliseconds. Doesn't matter if you compensate it or not, if the vibe is not there, it just isn't. To get rid of latency is one thing and to compensate for latency is another. I was simply pointing out that to GET RID OF IT will need some muscle.

Though if you're just mixing it doesn't matter if you compensate for 10 milliseconds or 10 whole seconds.