why is protools so spoiled in terms of it's OS enviroment and hardware profile ?

[gdorworth]

When you can remember your Protools Authorization number by interative installs it does not speak well for the quality of software currently being shipped or the QOS process prior to release.

Here's my current unstable situation:

Brand new 003 Rack+ Factory shipped with PTLE 8.0.0314
i7 920 2.66MHz build
ASUS PT6 deluxe mobo
6GB OCZ Gold 133MHz DDR3
500GB Segate 7200 rpm
1.5GB Segate 7200 rpm
Pioneer 20X DVD Burner
ASUS EH4350 VGA
SIIG 2 port 400 TI Chipset 1394a
Windows Ultimate SP1

I have not been able to find a stable combination for this setup with PTLE 8.0.0314. The PT system is good for one session after a fresh install which appears to work fine. Intermittently exiting and loading the same session will load or hang in reading perferences, DAE loading, or Initializing Globals. When it hangs it LUTHANC ( Locks up tighter than a ....) which took be while to figure out that the only way to get back machine control is dump power on the 003 Rack+ to generate an interrupt for a DAE error.

There appears to be a total lack of error recovery in this software. The end user is never given proper feedback to possible errors or installation problems. It also appears that this product has no built in tracing or error logs to aid in trouble shooting or debugging.

If as noted by Digidesign the TDM engine is prone to frequent problems relating to the hardware / software operating enviorment, why not log some error messages or write some trace files or at a minimum display an egg head message to the user.

I have faithfully cannibalize Vista to PT's recommended settings. Still unstable. My first call to Digi support last night took 30 minutes to connect to a techinical support rep, which attempted to help me.

His suggestions:

1) Pull all the 6GB of 2GB memory sticks and replace in an experiment to see if the memory was bad? I marked the sticks and tried all combination. Did not help running any of the three sticks in 2GB memory configuration.

2) Update the drivers to ASUS EH4350 video card. Did that still unstable.

3) Contact someone with a similar hardware set up on this forum and hope they can help. D O I N G__T H A T__N O W ! !_____H E L P ! !

Would like to get back to writing some tunes. Any tips or help would be greatly appreciated.

regards
gordon

[JMS40]

You should start your own thread and provide the information provided in these two topic's:

Help us help you - what you need to know before posting!

General Troubleshooting - Pro Tools LE on Windows (XP & Vista)

• A concise list of the troubleshooting you've already tried - please be as specific as possible! The first thing we'll ask is 'Have you done everything in the Setup and General Troubleshooting thread?', so we'll want to know that you've done ALL of it and, if you've not done everything, we need to know what you have or have not done, as this can have a huge impact on further troubleshooting.

Windows users need to provide a Sandra report, as indicated in the Setup and General Troubleshooting thread (information on how to download Sandra and generate the report is included in those threads).

The more information you can provide, the easier it will be for Tech Support and other users to assist you - take the time now to document everything you can and you'll save time in the long run.

If you have been referred to this thread and reply without providing the information requested above, including the Sandra report for Windows users, your post is very likely to be given lower priority in favor of those who have provided complete information.

[TOM@METRO]

Originally Posted by gdorworth

When you can remember your Protools Authorization number by interative installs it does not speak well for the quality of software currently being shipped or the QOS process prior to release.

Here's my current unstable situation:

Brand new 003 Rack+ Factory shipped with PTLE 8.0.0314
i7 920 2.66MHz build
ASUS PT6 deluxe mobo
6GB OCZ Gold 133MHz DDR3
500GB Segate 7200 rpm
1.5GB Segate 7200 rpm
Pioneer 20X DVD Burner
ASUS EH4350 VGA
SIIG 2 port 400 TI Chipset 1394a
Windows Ultimate SP1

I have not been able to find a stable combination for this setup with PTLE 8.0.0314. The PT system is good for one session after a fresh install which appears to work fine. Intermittently exiting and loading the same session will load or hang in reading perferences, DAE loading, or Initializing Globals. When it hangs it LUTHANC ( Locks up tighter than a ....) which took be while to figure out that the only way to get back machine control is dump power on the 003 Rack+ to generate an interrupt for a DAE error.

There appears to be a total lack of error recovery in this software. The end user is never given proper feedback to possible errors or installation problems. It also appears that this product has no built in tracing or error logs to aid in trouble shooting or debugging.

If as noted by Digidesign the TDM engine is prone to frequent problems relating to the hardware / software operating enviorment, why not log some error messages or write some trace files or at a minimum display an egg head message to the user.

I have faithfully cannibalize Vista to PT's recommended settings. Still unstable. My first call to Digi support last night took 30 minutes to connect to a techinical support rep, which attempted to help me.

His suggestions:

1) Pull all the 6GB of 2GB memory sticks and replace in an experiment to see if the memory was bad? I marked the sticks and tried all combination. Did not help running any of the three sticks in 2GB memory configuration.

2) Update the drivers to ASUS EH4350 video card. Did that still unstable.

3) Contact someone with a similar hardware set up on this forum and hope they can help. D O I N G__T H A T__N O W ! !_____H E L P ! !

Would like to get back to writing some tunes. Any tips or help would be greatly appreciated.

regards
gordon

I've noticed that the majority of i7 users here are on XP. Have you tried that?

[gdorworth]

Hi Tom,

I did notice that most of the i7 users are running XP Pro SP3. I considered both and regret now the vista choice. My game plan for tonight will be XP Pro SP3 to see if can get a stable system.

Regards,
Gordon

[phobia]

Originally Posted by DigiTechSupt

Shan, the DigiOS wouldn't be a solution either, as it would still have to take into account the myriad of possible hardware configurations that people may have. How do you write an OS that can account for the variety of video cards, motherboards, BIOS versions, etc. without making it another bloated pig?

Besides - you can already get a fully functional, stable, reliable system by following compatibility requirements and reading the extremely helpful user info provided by you and others when building a computer, yes?

I suppose a DigiOS (controlled version of existing brand) and a more active Digi hardware compatibility activity could help out a lot (as pointed out elsewhere in this thread I think).

I mean if PT (LE) users, working all day for (more or less) money in their studios, can come up with hardware specs, and trying out newer, faster, hardware - on spare time - I think maybe a great company like Digi should be able to spare one or two persons to do this as well. And to keep up fairly good with the performance step-ups happening every twice a year or so.

I love PT, and I would love it even more if some of it's problems disappeared.

Cheers,
- J

Ps.
Why not build at least 4 different PCs inhouse in a varying price/performance range, up to i7 or other. Install, test, tweak OS, test, test, post exact HW specs and OS-tweaks.

Keep these specs up to date as OS and hardware evolves.
Possibly a ready made OS-image w drivers would help even more.

[kbruff]

Originally Posted by DigiTechSupt

I won't necessarily argue about the 'sensitive' part - unstable, yes, because instability can be caused by many things, not all of them being the app itself.

The Pro Tools engine is based on TDM architecture, which is all real-time. It's sensitive because interruptions to real-time threads throw everything out of sync, and errors occur. Other apps aren't as sensitive to this as they are based on 'highest priority' threads and they're willing to make other compromises to avoid errors.

On Windows this is especially problematic (real-time threading) because there are SO many variables and much less rigorous driver testing on the part of manufacturers. Everything from the motherboard BIOS to the sound card or NIC drivers to the video card driver can all have an effect on real-time threads by interrupting them. I won't even get into the havoc caused by all the background apps that typical PC's have running.



A very good question indeed. This is something that's on ongoing battle - the TDM architecture (which is what the LE engine is based on) excludes many options that would be available if we weren't using TDM hardware. LE could be taken to a new engine, but that would require a complete rewrite and management of the application - it, essentially, would be almost twice the work (since TDM and LE share many features, development on one is easily integrated into the other).

The easier solution is a little more time and attention on the part of the end user, as a properly configured system works quite well and is very stable.



If there were, don't you think we would have done it by now?

Please if you will provide Sandra report of a properly configured system.

Also provide case studies, of how this sytem was qualified including session testing constraints, steady state performance conditions.

Case study should illuminate: long term steady state, vertical track expansion, horizontal time based expansion, robust usage of pluggins with compex automation laws

I am hoping you have three classes...

(01) Traditional post production
(02) Intense music creation employing substantial midi and VI's
(03) Scoring using many edits and sample based audio regions

Vendor of this system, Rough order cost, and lead time.

I am an electrical engineer and when we specify a system, our customer will drop us if we fail to verify that our proposed product does not meet the end users normalized performance requirements.

Regards,
KB

[Shan]

Originally Posted by mano111

The way I see it there are 2 options:

1. do your 'homework', and save money and time when buying a PC.
2. buy a Mac pro.

Unfortunately option #2 doesn't free you from the problems either. That camp is plagued with more issues than ever. RTAS on Mac is quite the pain. Try it and you'll see. I maintain a few local PT Mac computers and they're not free from issues. That I can attest to.

The DAE and PT was designed and made for DSP cards. It was never intended to be run natively. That's a big part of the problem right there. How they even got it to work natively at all is quite the engineering miracle.

Shane

[TOM@METRO]

Originally Posted by Shan

The DAE and PT was designed and made for DSP cards. It was never intended to be run natively. That's a big part of the problem right there. How they even got it to work natively at all is quite the engineering miracle.

Shane

Just glad they did.

[Shan]

Originally Posted by DigiTechSupt

See my reply in your other thread.

Even though a system my be 100% compatible, there is still the possibility that someone may have a defective component or other issue unrelated to Pro Tools, but that affects Pro Tools performance.

Just to add to the above comment. Some of the original Tyan Quads 3 years back were having major issues only after a few months of use. We even went as far as replacing mother boards. The problem came down to the PSU. The difficulty with spotting this as the source was that the PSU worked perfectly. It was just no good for that specific MB. That type of troubleshooting can be quite maddening trying to spot the source. Not to mention that it appeared to look like a Pro tools issue even though it wasn't.

Now that the source was discovered, I have a stack of 5 perfectly working Tyan motherboards collecting dust.

Shane

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by gdorworth

When you can remember your Protools Authorization number by interative installs it does not speak well for the quality of software currently being shipped or the QOS process prior to release.

Here's my current unstable situation:

Brand new 003 Rack+ Factory shipped with PTLE 8.0.0314
i7 920 2.66MHz build
ASUS PT6 deluxe mobo
6GB OCZ Gold 133MHz DDR3
500GB Segate 7200 rpm
1.5GB Segate 7200 rpm
Pioneer 20X DVD Burner
ASUS EH4350 VGA
SIIG 2 port 400 TI Chipset 1394a
Windows Ultimate SP1

I have not been able to find a stable combination for this setup with PTLE 8.0.0314. The PT system is good for one session after a fresh install which appears to work fine. Intermittently exiting and loading the same session will load or hang in reading perferences, DAE loading, or Initializing Globals. When it hangs it LUTHANC ( Locks up tighter than a ....) which took be while to figure out that the only way to get back machine control is dump power on the 003 Rack+ to generate an interrupt for a DAE error.

There appears to be a total lack of error recovery in this software. The end user is never given proper feedback to possible errors or installation problems. It also appears that this product has no built in tracing or error logs to aid in trouble shooting or debugging.

If as noted by Digidesign the TDM engine is prone to frequent problems relating to the hardware / software operating enviorment, why not log some error messages or write some trace files or at a minimum display an egg head message to the user.

I have faithfully cannibalize Vista to PT's recommended settings. Still unstable. My first call to Digi support last night took 30 minutes to connect to a techinical support rep, which attempted to help me.

His suggestions:

1) Pull all the 6GB of 2GB memory sticks and replace in an experiment to see if the memory was bad? I marked the sticks and tried all combination. Did not help running any of the three sticks in 2GB memory configuration.

2) Update the drivers to ASUS EH4350 video card. Did that still unstable.

3) Contact someone with a similar hardware set up on this forum and hope they can help. D O I N G__T H A T__N O W ! !_____H E L P ! !

Would like to get back to writing some tunes. Any tips or help would be greatly appreciated.

regards
gordon

first thing, move this over to the i7 thread. just search it, its the BIG one. me and a couple others that have been kinda spearheading the i7 builds hang over there more for this stuff.

what is your power supply?? have you properly installed your video card, motherboard drivers? do you have the asus overclocking utility (cant think of the exact name) installed?? if so uninstall. but go over this then move your post over there. thanx