problem with adding plugins (mix system)

[digidesigner]

any ideas why my pro tools will not let me add more plugins (no dsp available message) even if there is three chips available on one mix farm and one free chip available on another mix farm card according to the dsp usage wiew?

my setup is: Pro Tools 5.0.1 in 9600_G3 with 2MIX farm cards, D24 and two DSP farm cards. digitest tells me that all cards are fine

any help appreciated!

[songman]

The mix cards have three different kinds of chips. Some plugins need one particular type of chip. So it may be that those chips are all used up. You can always try to replace plugins from one chip to another to make precious chips free. The plugin manager is not very intelligent. It will allow plugins which can sit on any of the 6 chips to go and sit on the precious chips even if there is no need and thus block those chips from being used by plugins which do need the precious chips. Do this by deactivating those plugins, then allocating the precious chips (click on the bargraph) and reinstantiate everything. The chips on mix cards are ordered as follows (left-right = up-down in the system usage window) ABCAAC, where the A chips are the precious ones (reverbs and the like).

Cheers, Bob.

[frenchman]

One thing that might help in some circumstances :

When loading the session, plugins are loaded in the same order as the tracks (left to right in the mix window, top to bottom in the edit screen.
By putting the heavy plugins that need the special DSPs at the left of the mix screen session : Reverbs, Delay plugins, Time blender etc., you avoid some problems.

[digidesigner]

thanks people!

btw, where could I get more info about different chips found on mix farms and what plugins do they in fact support? And is there a same problem with HD accel cards (different chips on a card)?

[songman]

This is what I know,

The chips on the mix cards are ordered top-to-bottom in the usage window A B C A A C where:

A fast smaller memory
B no memory
C large slow memory

Need A: D-verb, GRM TDM, DAD Valve, DAD Tape, DUY Shape, Max DUY, Reverb One, Autotune, PitchDoctor, PurePitch, SoundBlender, many Waves plugins but not all

Need C: EchoFarm

Most other plugins can sit on any chip, but don't count on it always happening automatically. It often takes some manual fiddling because the dsp manager has an IQ well below that of an amoebe and hence it will often report it cannot find a free dsp, whereas with some manual switching there is heaps left. If you have some time to spare, you could figure it all out for yourself by allocating particular chips (A, B or C) and then verifying which plugins you are able to instantiate on the remaining types.
I have only discovered the above by experience and trial and error, I do not have the data for all plugins. Some plugin manuals contain (partial) information too.

Cheers, Bob.