What's my bottleneck NOW?

[Bunjji]

I think the mbox

[tenkas]

Check your DPC latency

DPC Latency Checker

[Aec]

That's fine on Windows but I'm also using mac osx, is there a meter for that beause I travel with my laptop alot and am experiencing the same issues, on a smaller scale of course.

[Masaaki]

Something is wrong, or not appropriately configured.
Video card? Onboard wireless? BIOS parameters?
It'll be better to ask hackintosh community, maybe?

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by Bunjji

I think the mbox

I think not. It's essentially receiving a stereo stream over USB. Why on earth would you think this?

[cpu28]

Originally Posted by psycho_monkey

I think not. It's essentially receiving a stereo stream over USB. Why on earth would you think this?

If the drivers are not that good, it doesn't really matter if it only a stereo stream. Bad drivers will reduce daw performance quite a bit. I bet on the mbox.

[Aec]

I've installed the newest drivers off their website, so I know they aren't broken/old like the CD sometimes causes.

Anyway my pc is no where near 500US..

[Bunjji]

New drivers are not necessarily good drivers . . .

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by cpu28

If the drivers are not that good, it doesn't really matter if it only a stereo stream. Bad drivers will reduce daw performance quite a bit. I bet on the mbox.

The Mbox drivers are fine. Used previous versions of Mbox loads of times with no issues. If there's a problem with drivers, it's the rest of the computer. The Mbox 3 does NOT have a reputation for unstable drivers, in fact quite the opposite.

If the interface can't receive a simple stereo stream, it's just not fit for purpose. I'm pretty certain the Mbox, with the numbers that have been sold, would have a rep for unstable drivers were this to be the case.

Given that the OP is doing orchestral scoring, and using intensive midi libraries, don't you think that's more likely to have an impact?

At any rate, he should be able to confirm by switching to his internal onboard audio and seeing how that performs, thus eliminating the Mbox from the equation.

[Goddard]

Iirc, Mbox 3 Mini is USB 1.1 (not USB 2.0) although dunno if that matters.

Are you inputting MIDI when the problems occur, or just playing back already recorded MIDI tracks? Or a combination of inputting (playing) and playing back? JUst wondering if it could be more of a MIDI overload problem rather than an audio issue.

On PC, you might try running Resplendence LatencyMoni which can help pinpoint if there are any drivers which might be causing latency issues:

Resplendence Software - LatencyMon: suitability checker for real-time audio and other tasks

[Aec]

Originally Posted by psycho_monkey

At any rate, he should be able to confirm by switching to his internal onboard audio and seeing how that performs, thus eliminating the Mbox from the equation.

Internal audio is just a little worse since it's stock.

I just wan't to be able to reach a higher track count and play simultaneously.
Do I need sometime of PCI HD rig? I know my boss has PT10 HD rig and he never experiences clicks/pops, of course those are mostly audio tracks.

[BenSW]

What's the CPU usage when you get pops? (both in Cubase and in Task Manager -> Performance)

Also I can't tell if you're also streaming lots of samples directly from the HDD.. is the 3TB HDD 5400rpm?

[cpu28]

Regarding mbox3. Its not exactly high end. Also being a usb card, I still think that it is the bottleneck. If the onboard audio performance is just a little worse, kinda proves my point. Bad Asio / Core audio performance will degrade the whole system performance at high system loads.

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by Aec

Internal audio is just a little worse since it's stock.

"Just a little worse" - as in pops and clicks more? in that case, problem is probably not your interface.

Being "stock" you should still be able run a stereo audio playback through it. I can run everything I run on HD Native on my macbook pro inbuilt soundcard, up to a point. There's less processing power, but that's the processor, not the audio interface.

Originally Posted by Aec

I just wan't to be able to reach a higher track count and play simultaneously.
Do I need sometime of PCI HD rig? I know my boss has PT10 HD rig and he never experiences clicks/pops, of course those are mostly audio tracks.

PT HD does NOTHING for soft samplers. It will take the load of the audio processing off your computer, leaving you more processing power for your samplers, but if you've got mainly instruments, you won't notice a massive difference- in some respects, performance might actually be worse.

Just how many tracks are you trying to run? people running massive orchestral libraries generally have one machine per section - the Hans Zimmers of this world etc. Given that you've got plenty of RAM, it could just be that you're hitting the limits. I don't think you can expect to run a full orchestra, with a multi-sample for each individual part, from one machine.

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by cpu28

Regarding mbox3. Its not exactly high end. Also being a usb card, I still think that it is the bottleneck. If the onboard audio performance is just a little worse, kinda proves my point. Bad Asio / Core audio performance will degrade the whole system performance at high system loads.

Read my post I'd just made. I just don't think you're right here. "High end" is nothing - a better USB interface, a FW interface, a PCI interface shouldn't really be better when it's just running a stereo stream. Onboard sound shouldn't struggle either. In my opinion, if the onboard sound is ALSO unable to work (and "just a little worse" is almost certainly perceptive - it's probably exactly the same performance), it points to the fact the Mbox isn't the problem.

I'm not defending an Mbox, I'm just saying if it can't play back a stereo stream, it's not fit for purpose, and this clearly isn't the case. If the computer is at it's absolute limits, then it's possible that a more efficient driver MIGHT make a difference...but that isn't the case here.

Simple thing is to try a different interface by begging or borrowing..just taking into a music shop should be possible. If you still have problems...not the interface.

I really think people saying it has to be the interface are leading the OP in the wrong direction, but you have to just apply basic fault finding - isolate one thing at a time, and test that. It's really down to him to do that.

[hugol]

Originally Posted by tenkas

Check your DPC latency

DPC Latency Checker

Yep - this is excellent advice. Just because you've got a fast PC doesn't mean there isn't a lot of stuff going on that is preventing good low latency real-time performance. (It doesn't mean your computer is slow - it just means lots of stuff is hassling your CPU for attention and preventing it dedicating quite enough time to get reliable low-latency/click-free audio performance). DPC performance can vary enormously between PCs of supposedly the same overall spec.

And your choice of audio interface and it's associated drivers will indeed be very significant as well (an interface might work perfectly on one PC but not on another due to the hardware and things like DPCs).

Troubleshooting this stuff can be a major PITA. I've had problems that were due to particular motherboard BIOS revisions (and nothing but a BIOS patch made any difference). However this is rare and you should try disabling CPU power management states in your BIOS setup for starters. Also try disabling things like networking (wireless/wired) to see if that makes any difference. You can even get issues due to marginally dodgy SATA connections - sounds odd, but I've seen this before - so try re-seating / replacing cables.

[shanabit]

Originally Posted by Goddard

Iirc, Mbox 3 Mini is USB 1.1 (not USB 2.0) although dunno if that matters.

I had issues with a USB 1.1 as well. I think the op really needs to get VE Pro to host all those libraries so it will give Cubase less fits as well