How many plugins can you get away with?

[BabylonWillFall]

How many pluging can you run in one session?

As soon as i have over 8 rtas plugins in my session the cpu meter goes up mad high and it starts to stutter...


I have a P4 3ghz with only 512MB ram...


will upgrading to 1gb of ram solve this prob and allow for more plugins?

When using other software like acid i can happily use up to 30 plugins in my session... Is RTAS THAT much more greedy??


Blessings

[JonnyGinese]

I think upgrading to 1gb will help you out... also.. what bit rate and khz are you using? if its at 96khz i can see why it wil be going up.. but at 48hz you should have no problem..

My 24/48 template for a full band has:
4 Amplitube's(guitar amp modelers) = to about 8 d-verbs
3 BF76 compressors
8 focusrite compressor/limiters
2 D-Verb's (one short one long)
4 7-band EQ-III's

All of which are buss'ed and everything...

My CPU usage when I open the session is only about 30% and everything is smooth as butter...

Now.. if i had this same thing on 24/96.. my CPU would be at about 80% and everything would be choppy looking... It would "work" but it wouldn't look pretty (meters will move slow, timeline will skip numbers placement tracker will chop).. I'd also get CPU dropouts and crap.

SO.. unless your P4 system is running liek trash or if you're running at 96khz i don't know why you would have this problem.

Oh.. and my system is an Athlon 64 3700+ with 1gb ram..

Hope this helps..

Jonny

[BabylonWillFall]

thanks for your reply... yea man im at 24/48 so that shouldnt be the prob

i guess i will up to 1gb ram then i think it will sort it out.

Maybe because im using mainly waves plugins??? i hear they are particularly greedy...

are rtas plugins much more greedy than direct x plugs like i used to use?


Peace

[spkguitar]

More memory is only really going to help if you're using plugs that require samples to be loaded, like samplers or impulse reverbs. Most plugins consume CPU power, not memory.

And different plugins consume different amounts. An EQ is not going to take up as much CPU power as a reverb, so quantifying "how many" is really impossible. It is one of the reasons why daveC came up with his test: so users could compare the performance of their systems.

A lot of people have the denormalization problem when using reverbs (especially d-verb). You may be subject to that; for more info, search this forum or google for "denormalization".

[LSW]

More memory is only really going to help if you're using plugs that require samples to be loaded, like samplers or impulse reverbs. Most plugins consume CPU power, not memory.

And different plugins consume different amounts. An EQ is not going to take up as much CPU power as a reverb, so quantifying "how many" is really impossible. It is one of the reasons why daveC came up with his test: so users could compare the performance of their systems.

A lot of people have the denormalization problem when using reverbs (especially d-verb). You may be subject to that; for more info, search this forum or google for "denormalization".

I've been reading about this DaveC and the test, but I've searched and haven't found out what it is or how to do it. Can you direct me on this? Thanks!

But you're right about the plugins - hard to put a number to it - although, it seems that the poster should be getting more than he is.

I'm starting of with a new computer AND new to PT/Mbox. I went one day on the internal laptop drive (Dell 9300) and didn't get too far. That was expected, but I wanted to see.

Then, I hooked up an exteral USB drive for audio - and just started adding effects inserts at random to a demo song I created with a handful of tracks. Flawless. And that's even without most of the OS tweaks.

So - a 3gig processor should be able to handle the plugins just fine - I'd look first to the audio drive performance - then to other things.

[spkguitar]

The DaveC test is like our 0-60 test; in all practicality, it means nothing. But it does give a good reference and comparison between systems. It was made back when the track limit was still only 24, so change everywhere it says 24 when referring to tracks to 32 and you have the modern version.


I'm still guessing that he is experiencing denormalization.

[rageagainst]

ye I had serious problems too once upon a time! It was down to denormalistion too. It was those pesky d-verb that was fckin everything up! Was driving me scatty for days untill some kind person here let me in on the secret! I got ridof them and my CPU usage dropped instanly by about 40% from 100% I didn’t even have that many plugins out too.

[vocalvoodoo]

I've recently been having that problem with Waves RenVerb. Maybe it's that. I never had the problem with RenVerb (for years) but now all of a sudden it's doing it. Seems to be a Waves 5.0 problem for me inparticular. I may switch back to 4.0.

[Chris Cavell]

thanks for your reply... yea man im at 24/48 so that shouldnt be the prob

i guess i will up to 1gb ram then i think it will sort it out.

Maybe because im using mainly waves plugins??? i hear they are particularly greedy...

are rtas plugins much more greedy than direct x plugs like i used to use?


Peace

Babylon, which waves plugins? You need to be far more descriptive...some waves plugs use hardly any juice, but others (like the linear phase "mastering" plugins that use FIR algos) use a ton of juice. Reverbs tend to use up more juice than most "normal" plugs...even when they aren't encountering the denormal issues. In the end, it all depends on EXACTLY what plugins we're talking about here.

[neatguys]

original question how many plugins?
255 simultainiously on my davec at 24 bit on my emachines 6811 laptop