Has anyone with a dual model & PT 6 done the Dave C test ?

[John H]

It'd be cool to see if it actually does make a difference.

The only true test would be the same exact mac doing the test in PT 5.x.x then opening the session in PT 6 and adding as many audio tracks or aux tracks as possible till it craps out. It would be totally comparable and show how much better OS X handles things.

Same setting in each obvously, no point in testing in OS 9 with different buffer sizes.

I don't even own a dual model myself but seeing as it's going to mean buying a new mac or at least a more recent model like a QS 733 or something along those lines before I can really use PT 6 in any real sense, I'm really interested to see how dual models compare to higher clocked single cpu models.

You can see how badly my mac handles it under OS 9 my sig [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[KamaSutra77]

Try Xbench. Maybe we can figure out what actually effects performance, rather than a bunch of theoretical mixes.

[where02190]

Stick with the test that's been done so we can compare apples to apples, no pun intended.

Hope this is helpful.

[Gaffer]

O.K this is the test I ran.

*** NOTE Make sure your Sample rate is set at 44100 under the Setups-->Hardware menu option. Set your Hardware Buffers to 1024.
1) Open new PT session
2) Create a new mono audio track
3) Add PT stock effects Compressor, 4B-EQ, Slap delay, medium delay, long delay.
4) Open the System Usage meter to see the CPU utilization.
5) With your mouse select the newly created track from step 2 above.
6) Duplicate the track)
7) Record enable the track.
8) Repeat step 6 until your CPU goes into the red.
9) If your CPU is in the RED delete the last track created. IF it's still in the red, delete another track until the CPU is back in the green. Click on the CPU meter after every deletion to reset the meter (see warning below). Going into the RED means your getting a -9128 message from PT.
10) Hit RECORD, and record for 60 sec. (it doesn't matter what you record as the file still get's created). If your CPU goes into the RED then delete a track and repeat step 10 until you can record 60 secs. without peaking.
*** N.B. If you can achieve the full 24 tracks with record enabled and can record for 60 secs. start adding Aux tracks with the same plug-ins and keep going until you hit RED.


My system is a G4 400 with a Dual 500 upgrade card. 576 MB of Ram, Second IBM Drive for audio. I got to 15 Audio tracks, no slugish screen redraws either.

[CCash]

Keep it coming! Gaffer: What was your track count doing the DaveC test under 5.x?

I just read on the TDM forum where a guy with a dual 1GHz isn't getting any better RTAS performance with PT6/ OSX. I'm curious about dual-processor support because I want to upgrade my processor, and wonder if a dual is worth the xtra $.

[EjA]

Gaffer,
Excellent! This is exactly what we need to know. Thanks. (This is what I was trying to accomplish on my thread.) I assume you were in OSX for this test. . .What results could you get in OS9 using the same test?

Will anyone else duplicate Gaffer's test?

EjA

[wcody]

OK, here goes:

OS 9 and PTLE 5: maximum 11 tracks, with really jittery screen redraw performance.

OS X and PTLE 6: maximum NINETEEN tracks, with really SMOOTH screen redraw performance. Also, it's interesting to note that the CPU usage meter does not bounce around much. It appears that PT 6 married to OS X does a better job of processor resource allocation.

System: Dual 500MHz G4 (Gigiabit Ethernet), 1GB RAM
PT 6 settings: CPU usage limit 99%, 1024 buffer size, DAE playback buffer = Level 2, 44.1K, 24 bits.

Conclusion: I am STOKED! THIS is the reason I purchased a dual processor system almost 2 1/2 years ago. By my math, this is a 72% performance improvement, not including the drastically better screen redraw performance.

Bravo, Digi! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[Gaffer]

Originally posted by CCash:
Keep it coming! Gaffer: What was your track count doing the DaveC test under 5.x?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Same machine on 9.2 and 5.1 and I got 10 tracks with allot of slow screen redraw and also when I hit record, it took 3 or 4 seconds before it started to record. It did not do that under OSX.

One other thing that I have noticed is that Latency seems way better on OSX. I did a couple of overdubs earlier and never even thought of where my buffers were set to.

Being able to bounce to disk while still doing other things is also great.

[fenris]

If I'm not mistaken, screen redraw in Jaguar is entirely taken care of by the graphic card, that's what they called Quartz Extreme, so CPU load would not affect redraw. Anyone can confirm this?

[KamaSutra77]

G4 450 SAWTOOTH SINGLE. 1.5 GB RAM, SEPERATE 7200 AUDIO DRIVE.

1024 buffer, 85% cpu limit.

Dave C Configuration 10 tracks

Blank Tracks 32