PT TDM 7.4.2 + Superior Drummer + G5 Mac = Rebuild System Four Times

[ChrisMitchell]

Hello All,

I tried this in the Virtual Instruments section, with no luck.

I am going to condense what has been a month long nightmare into as short a "what the hell do I do?" question as possible (I just read this post back. Trust me, it's as short as I can make it). If there is any detail you think I missed, please do not hesitate to ask. It's all in my head; just jumbled up from a month long process.

Per all my posts, this is for a friend who doesn't type that well, who I've been helping as his resident tech.

1. He has obtained Superior Drummer 2.0, EZ Drummer and a butt load of expansion packs (NFR copies via an artist deal. Lucky dog.)

2. He has the following rig:
PowerMac G5 Dual 2.5 Ghz (early 2005) w/ 6 GB RAM
OS 10.5.8
1 TB WD Caviar Black Hard Drive (originally was a 300 GB WD SE Caviar. Explained below).
Pro Tools TDM (HD3) 7.4.2
Sound Replacer and AutoTune 4 TDM plugins.
96 i/o's (three of them)
Apogee Big Ben Clock

3. EZ Drummer originally gave us a ton of grief while trying to run in PT, until I figured out reducing the RTAS Processor from 2 to 1 from within ProTools works wonders. Also figured out the hard way that I had to reboot before and after each install, or it crashes my hard drive (had to rebuild OS, reinstall Pro Tools, etc).. Now, it only has given a kernel panic one time since the last install of OS (last weekend), and that might have been a Safari flash plug-in thing (it was open in the background). He worked several hours last night on a song idea, and it was stable. So, EZ Drummer I'm calling stable. I just put this whole paragraph here in case it's important for my real problem below.

4. Superior Drummer has been a complete disaster. Again, I am TRYING to condense a month long tale into a few lines, so I apologize ahead of time. The short version is that it usually will not go through the installation process without crashing the system (locks up, freezes the mouse, have to hard boot). Now, it's a 50/50 shot on whether the system will come up after that, or if, as has happened twice, it nukes the file structure, where the only choice is to blow the hard drive away and reinstall the OS, Pro Tools, plug-ins, etc. Yes, I tried Verify Disk, Repair Disk, and Repair Permissions through the OS install DVD. Yes, I tried resetting PRAM, NVRAM, making sure all my FW400 external drives and all peripherals are disconnected. This exact thing has happened two times on two different hard drives, the 300 GB that came with it, and the 1TB I just purchased. It crashes on different DVD's at different times, so it's not a bad DVD, and I HIGHLY, HIGHLY doubt it's a bad hard drive for the same reason.

It did install one time. It had crashed during install, I rebooted, and by some miracle the system came back up. I uninstalled, rebooted, and reinstalled, and lo and behold, it went through the whole install process and completed successfully. I rebooted (I have to reboot between each install, because the installers are unbelievably unstable and will absolutely crash my system if I try to do anything else). Reboot came up fine, and I actually instantiated Superior Drummer. However, on the Avatar kit, whenever I tried to switch a snare, it generated an error about a file (I have a cell phone pic of it if needed), and force quit Pro Tools. Tried upgrading to SD 2.3 and Avatar library update; no help. We called it a night at that point, and walked away. My buddy tried to reboot the system, and the system would not come back up. It would get past Apple screen to blue screen, and then just sit there. No amount of Verify Disk, Repair Disk, Repair Permissions, Safe Mode, turn off, turn on, PRAM reset, NVRAM reset, begging or pleading would bring it back. So, 2 and a half short hours later, I had the hard drive reformatted, OS and PT reinstalled and configured (fourth time in a month).

I have attempted to contact Toontrack Support, and they basically say they have never seen anything like this ever, never, ever, and offer absolutely no help whatsoever. Any workarounds to get EZ Drummer working were from this wonderful forum or through Google searches.

I refuse to reinstall Superior Drummer again until someone can give me a workaround that is believable. The good news is that I have a complete system rebuild from scratch down to 2 hours 15 minutes, including all preferences set up, clock set up, and plug-in reinstalls (minus Toontrack plug-ins). Bad news is that I've had to rebuild my system four times in a month directly due to Toontrack software blowing my hard drive's file structure to smithereens.

I have an appointment with a friend who works at a Mac store, who is going to run diagnostics on my PowerMac to determine if it's bad memory, bad hard drive, bad controller, motherboard, CPU, whatever. Again, it's just Toontrack software causing this grief, and when it's not on the system, it behaves perfectly, and has for well over a year before I got Toontrack.

Possible solutions I've been presented with are
1. Purchase an Intel Mac and expansion chassis (for my HD PCI cards), and get with modern times. NOT gonna happen. Not for just one plug-in. I mix out of the box 99%, so that's a butt load of money for just recording audio.
2. Buy new memory and see if problems go away. Not until I get the diagnostic run. Not getting 6 GB RAM for nothing if I don't have to, although this is my top candidate for the cause of our ills.
3. Toontrack's suggestion of reinstall. Done that too many times to count.
4. Reformat hard drive and reinstall. Done that four times already.
5. Buy new hard drive, and install on that. Been there, done that. Ever try to find a hard drive after the Thailand floods? Not fun at ALL.

Does anybody have even a remote suggestion that could possibly explain, as the Toontrack artist rep put it, my "amalgamation" of problems?

How do I get Superior Drummer running without it blowing my hard drives up?
How do I get Superior Drummer stable if I do manage to install it without it blowing my hard drives up?
What the hell is the deal with having to reboot my system before and after each and every Toontrack software install to avoid it blowing my hard drives up?
Does anybody have a line on a free/shareware hardware test CD/DVD that I can run myself rather than dragging the system into New York City?
Is there a way to run the RTAS plugins on a separate system, and pipe them into the PowerMac? I'm willing to purchase a relatively cheap Intel Mac to do this if it will work. Doubt it, but I have to ask.

As usual, any and all help, information, or constructive criticism is greatly appreciated.

Note: The reason I'm being so persistent about Superior Drummer is that when I had it running for that 15 minutes, it sounded AMAZING!!!

[Craig F]

if you have a "stable" system clone it ASAP, Carbon Copy Cloner is good
if you have the original hardware test CD (might be on the OS disk) that came with the computer it's hardware test is good (not perfect but none are)
have you tried Toontracks forum? http://www.toontrack.com/forum/
if you want to set up MIDI over LAN you can probably get a mini to chase the G5 and may only need Grageband to play Superior Drummer (don't know havent tried it my self)

[tonwurm]

as craig suggests: clone your system drive, I use carbon copy cloner, too

- check RAM (use Apple hardware test on original install DVD)

- disconnect all peripheral and try again

- try to run your ext. drives connected to USB, only to see if there´s an issue with the FW-bus



I run a G5 too, all VI´s run inside Vienna Ensemble Pro, 1 instance running on the G5, another one on a macmini (audio + midi over ethernet), very stable

[ChrisMitchell]

Thanks for the quick reply.
Carbon Copy Cloner has already been done. Way ahead of you.

I don't have the original DVD that came with the system, as I bought it used. I just have the retail install of OS 10.5 (which I combo updated to 10.5.8).

Any suggestions for hardware tester software? TechTool Pro. Or where can I get the Apple Hardware Test CD?

[tonwurm]

in my case tech tool pro and other ram-checker software didn´t identify a defective ram-module, apple hardware test took a very ong time (a whole night long), but tracked it down

found this on ebay

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Apple-Mac-OS-...#ht_500wt_1164

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Power-Mac-G5-...#ht_500wt_1164

or you contact apple for a test cd

[woodsdenis]

I have a similar home system but run 7.4.10 on Tiger 10.4.11. Unless you have Leopard specific plugs this is a real alternative. It is Absolutely rock solid. I run EZ Drummer and have never ever experienced anything like you had . I have also run safari in the background and no issues. I kid you not, this is the most stable PT system I have ever used. I of course dont run huge sample based stuff or big track counts. Its a great writing and editing setup. The alternative is to run VEP on an external machine. I am sure if Superior had issues like this it would have surfaced by now. I feel for you, best of luck.

[specialkm]

Pretty similar system here which has run on both Tiger and Leopard. Also a Superior endorsee. While it's a pretty high calorie VI for an older G5, I have absolutely no problem having it run on a system very close to yours.

The only time I've had kernel panic problems it turned out to be bad ram. Try removing or replacing the ram.

[ChrisMitchell]

I'm going with the bad RAM theory, and ordered 8 GB of replacement RAM from NewEgg on Friday; it's too cheap not to. Cross your fingers. I'll keep you posted.

[ChrisMitchell]

I don't want to jinx myself, but I think I finally fixed the plethora of issues we've been experiencing over the past almost two months.

Two words. BAD ... MEMORY !!!!!

Put in the new 8 GB today, and immediately noticed a big difference with EZ Drummer and EZ Mix. Both used to take quite a bit of time to load whenever I loaded the plug-in, or opened a session with the plug-in. Not any more. They loaded immediately upon instantiating the plug-in.

So, I went for broke, and installed Superior Drummer. It was the smoothest installation out of the four times I've rebuilt the system. This plug-in used to take, no kidding around, 2 to 4 minutes to load. Again, not any more. Loaded instantly, and after loading the Avatar kit into memory, it played and operated completely as it should. My buddy is the happiest camper in New Jersey (maybe on the planet) right now.

We're going to let this ride as is for a few days before calling it stable, and loading the other expansion packs (Metal Foundry, etc). However, we've never gotten this far before without some kind of wackiness going on, so I'm definitely feeling this long ordeal is over.

Thanks for the input on this thread. Believe it or now, it was helpful.

[tonwurm]

fantastic