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  #1  
Old 11-24-2010, 06:44 PM
Mixchump Mixchump is offline
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Default Current System Limitations

Question for all you folks that have done the HD9 upgrade...

At present, my mix-room system is a Nahalem Dual Quad Xeon, HD|6 (PCI Core and 5 PCI Accell) by way of a Magma PE6R4i chassis, and 32-fader D-Control. The only outboard I'm using these days is the System 6000 (still can't be convinced that the plugin sounds anywhere near as good...)

I work almost exclusively at 96kHz, and when I get stuff in to mix, I usually upsample to at least 88.2 or usually 96k because I much prefer the way the mix bus comes together in that environment.

I quite often mix records in 5.1 but mostly monitor my stereo downmix for balances, and often times the label doesn't even know they have 5.1 mixes on their drive. I do this because I enjoy it, and when a surround release becomes viable for that artist, there's something in the can that was created when the song was fresh.

Anyhow, I'm often frustrated with the 96-voice limitation at 96k, and often end up sharing voices around so that I can properly have things on their own rails. Problem is, of course, once you've assigned explicit voices for things, they can only have TDM plugins. Now, even with HD|6, I'm always hitting the wall with TDM horsepower, especially when I start sharing voices around. The CPU meter is hardly ever above 30%, even with tons of MDW eq's, AutoTune EVO on tons of BG vocals, Waves SSL stuff, etc., all running RTAS

My question is this. If I do the HD|9 upgrade, and run my mix on the native mix engine, using core audio for I/O, will the CPU complain substantially about having to build a complex mixer with many 5.1 Busses (Drum Sub, Drum Backbus, Band Mix bus, Vocal Mix bus, Surround Reverbs...)? It seems that I can cap out the TDM cards VERY quickly with plugins, but I can toss RTAS stuff on for days, and barely even hit half way... Does the routing side of the ProTools mixer require a lot of CPU?

Basically, I need to somehow overcome the bottlenecks that I have now, and I'm hoping that buying a 12-core beast and going with a Native mix engine, that I can go beyond the TDM maximum I'm currently stuck with...

If I was to use the Native playback engine, can you still access the I/O for digital hardware inserts (my trusty System 6000)?

While I don't particularly love the idea of having my TDM cards sitting idle, I just need to get work done, without wanting to stick a fork in my eye...

Do I have to buy an HD Native card, or can I use my existing hardware?

Aaaarrgggghhh... Too many questions...

Thanks, in advance, to anyone who's knowledgeable on these things..!..

Cheers, eh?
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  #2  
Old 11-25-2010, 02:24 AM
suicune suicune is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

Hate to burst your bubble, but all hi-end versions of PT9 (HD TDM, Native and CPTK) are still limited to 96 simultaneous voices at 96kHz. See pages 11&12 here:

http://akmedia.digidesign.com/suppor..._v90_69545.pdf

So you'd get nothing out of it at all, except possibly maxing out your cpu. And using the core audio drivers for HD hardware is limited to 8 channels IO on HD interfaces, although I don't know how this affects D-control.
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  #3  
Old 11-25-2010, 02:47 AM
garnoil garnoil is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

Avid should up the number of voices for HD systems.
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  #4  
Old 11-25-2010, 02:59 AM
suicune suicune is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

It's currently limited by the TDM hardware - that's the entire point. They've enforced the limitations on the native systems purely so that they don't suffer a TDM users revolt (although they kinda had that anyway with PT9 - you've gotta feel a little sorry for them).

Until we see new TDM hardware cards with massively increased voice counts we're stuck with it.
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  #5  
Old 11-25-2010, 05:30 AM
garnoil garnoil is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

What are the voice limitations in Nuendo? is the limit determined by the CPU power? may be it is worth locking PT to a Nunedo rig to up the voice count. I am getting a new computer (whole new system) and I was thinking to go PTHD native (to lock to my HD2) but may be Nunedo is better for voices.
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  #6  
Old 11-25-2010, 06:48 AM
digidesigner digidesigner is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

I think I would give a try to 44 or 48khz sessions. You would have double of everything...
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  #7  
Old 11-25-2010, 07:13 AM
Sean Russell Sean Russell is offline
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Default

But at 48k, the air is gone. Melodyne and other plugs seem to breathe more at 88 and 96k. It's a more accurate capture.

That, and 96k is the major label standard for archival.

And, to the OP, you won't be able to share voices Natively.
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... but does it help the chorus?
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Old 11-25-2010, 01:49 PM
digidesigner digidesigner is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sean Russell View Post
But at 48k, the air is gone. Melodyne and other plugs seem to breathe more at 88 and 96k. It's a more accurate capture..
Really? In that case 48khz and 96khz mixes should not null, can anyone prove that to be true? I only track and mix at 44.1 so I cannot easily do it my self but I would be interested to know if this is for real or if it is one of these things people tend to imagine.
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  #9  
Old 11-25-2010, 06:18 PM
Sean Russell Sean Russell is offline
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Default

Recording at a delivery sample rate is a personal choice. To me, 88 and 96 sound more open.

Anything with flange/chorus/time-based effect stuff will never null, and I don't care about nulling. I care about the track.

And to answer my own sig - it does help the chorus. It's a game of inches, people.
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... but does it help the chorus?
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  #10  
Old 11-26-2010, 06:28 AM
digidesigner digidesigner is offline
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Default Re: Current System Limitations

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sean Russell View Post
Recording at a delivery sample rate is a personal choice. To me, 88 and 96 sound more open.

Anything with flange/chorus/time-based effect stuff will never null, and I don't care about nulling. I care about the track.

And to answer my own sig - it does help the chorus. It's a game of inches, people.
I do care about nulling, if something perfectly nulls no matter if it was 44.1 or 88.2 khz form start then I see no reason to use more resources than needed. Will try this myself then thankyou.
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