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  #1  
Old 10-11-2002, 07:56 PM
kris whitten kris whitten is offline
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Default SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

I finally got the Sonnet 1 ghz card thanks to Steve Labus of Sonnet for hooking us up. He had to pull some strings, but they are interested in the results too, so this is where it all begins.

DISCLAIMER: MY MACHINE ISN'T OPTIMIZED.
I HAVE ALL KINDS OF STUFF ON MY MACHINE, AND DECIDED TO TEST IT THIS WAY BECAUSE A LOT OF PEOPLE HAVE MORE THAN PTLE ON THIER RIG. I CAN ONLY ASSUME RESULTS WILL BE BETTER AS SOON AS I REDO MY MACHINE. I ALSO WANTED TO SEE IF JUST SWITCHING THE CARD WITHOUT DOING ANYTHING ELSE WOULD GIVE ME RESULTS... You know, real world worst case scenerio style

I have a G4 400 agp. os 9.1, ptle 5.1.1, dae set to 2, 128 buffer, 200mb of ram to ptle and dae, 1gb of ram, korg OASYS, promax controller card, 4 20 gb hard drives, 001, and I was able to get 12 tracks with the DaveC test.

I then upgraded to 9.2.1 b/c I was installing the Sonnet card, and a Radeon 8500.

I ran the dave C test again, and only got 9 tracks (wonder if it was the OS upgrade, I noticed it swelled my system folder from 50 mb to 85 mb)

Steve drove over and put the card in, something I felt I could do but they wanted it that way.

The install took 2 minutes, and required a small philips screwdriver.

We plugged it in, and it fired right up.

I tested my system on startup from the time you see the happy mac, to full boot and it used to take almost 90 seconds.

This card decreased that to about 35 seconds !!!

(it even sounds faster)

We fired up PTLE 5.1.1

much faster boot, app. half of the time as normal.
We started the DaveC test.

I got 19 tracks 5 plugs per track !!!

This was more than double my previous attempt of 9 earlier in the day)

I then fired up my korg card, and started recording, mostly midi driven synths, drums, etc.

Plugged in a bass and had my friend jam. All of the typical stuff.

Audiosuite processed some stuff, MUCH faster.

Took an older 74 minute dj set I had on my drive, and Bounced to disk Tweakhead setting.

Previous attempts took 8 minutes to convert after bounce.

This time 3 minutes 15 seconds !!!

At this point I was amazed enough to stop playing and go to sleep.

I HAVE NOT done much else yet. I wanted to ask you guys to give me some ideas for testing.

i.e. how many renverbs on a track, or any other CPU intensive plugs you can think of.

Overall, at this point, I have to say it has really sped up my machine. I feel it has doubled the power.

Let me also say that they have agreed to let me beat on it for a month, and then I have to give it back. THey have not given me anything, other than a loaner, and I believe in exposing the truth.

So far so good. No crashes, freezes, or other wierd stuff.

We have a month to put it through the mill so send me your requests !!!
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  #2  
Old 10-11-2002, 08:07 PM
valvebrother valvebrother is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

Kris,

Thanks for doggedly pursuing this! Your results are VERY encouraging; I have an almost identical set-up, Oasys, etc.

I think, for all that you're doing, they should give you a card; you may have just helped them make a sale with me! Or, at least give it to you wholesale!

D
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  #3  
Old 10-11-2002, 08:39 PM
GORILLA GORILLA is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

WOW!!! 19 tracks 5 plugs per track!!!! Kris was your G4/400 sluggish during all this? What were the five plugs per track? Your right here...I do have more than just PTLE on my machine, I know my other apps. will benefit from the card.
You never gave up! Thanks for letting your machine be our gineau pig!! STRESS TEST the heck outta it!! C4's/ Ren Verbs/ Bomb factory's LA2A... [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
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Old 10-11-2002, 08:52 PM
kris whitten kris whitten is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

Gorilla

It was sluggish at 9 tracks, and sluggish at 19.

I tried to get 20 with the upgrade, but it wasn't happening (I was in the red)

But yes, overall it felt as fast as my ex girlfriend's dual gig 133mhz in os 9.

So far so good !!!
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  #5  
Old 10-12-2002, 03:51 AM
GORILLA GORILLA is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

Hey all, I once got 22 tracks with my G4/400 896mb Ram and over 19 plugs in a session with the 001. The faders were sluggish as heck mixing down but, I got it through a BTD! Opened a new session and SHAZAMM! Good to go! I tried opening that same session with the 002 and it wasn't happening! Definitely need a quicker computer for the 002 [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

just my 4 cents [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
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  #6  
Old 10-12-2002, 06:51 AM
John H John H is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

This is great news.

If it performs that well with an unoptimised extension set I can imagine you could get excellent performance with that setup.

It certainly gives more options for people with older models.

I'd concider getting a used G4 like a 466Mhz model for about £600 then add one of the sonnet cards and one of the new Deskstar 180GXP drives with 8Mb cache for my next mac, It'd save a fortune over a new model.

Is it fine under OS X ?
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  #7  
Old 10-12-2002, 08:18 AM
Dopamine Dopamine is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

Kris,

Pretty impressive indeed!

Maybe you could do a test where you have a full music session with 24 tracks. Start with no plug ins, then begin stacking some cpu intensive plugs (like the bf sans amp for example). Then let us know how many you can stack before you notice any performance loss.

Also, how big of a difference did the Radeon make? Are scrolling and screen redraws much much faster?

I was dubious about this but your post has given me hope. Also, have you tried using the 32 track beta? I'm scared to try it on my g4/400.

Thanks!
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  #8  
Old 10-12-2002, 08:35 AM
jkowalcz jkowalcz is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

Kris - great first report - thanks. Have you noticed how much hotter your machine is running with the 1 GHz card? A post on XLR8yourmac.com mentioned a noticeable increase in heat after installing the Sonnet card. The powerlogix card includes a fan - but who wants additional fan noise if not required - thanks again!
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  #9  
Old 10-12-2002, 08:38 AM
suyenfung suyenfung is offline
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

sweet. i know what i want for christmas.
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  #10  
Old 10-12-2002, 10:19 AM
lwilliam lwilliam is offline
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Location: Allison Park, PA (Near Pittsburgh)
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Default Re: SONNET 1 GHZ UPGRADE RESULTS !!!

This is great news. Thanks for following up on it! So is 19 tracks about equal to the "stock" 1Ghz?

Can you try running Altiverb on it and see how many tracks you can run? My setup is similar (G4/400 AGP, OS 9.1), but no OASYS.
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