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New system came and I'm getting 3 completely different CPU ratings.. (pg. 3)
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| Kenny Rogers |
| try limit your instruments and efex use. im pretty sure you are overdoing things, and btw zeta is known to be a cpu-hog, maybe try another synth like synth1 which is alot simpler? also lower the polyphony in the instances, i bet you dont need all of them. disable filters u might not use, set filter to 6dB/oct, mute/disable oscs and lfos u dont use etc etc. this is common knowledge for saving cpu and should be used whether or not u have the best computer in the world. good luck. |
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| Mad for Brad |
| Is Zeta really that CPU heavy ? I remember using it on a Pentium 4. what I don't get is people were making tracks ITB 3 years ago and managed making music that sounded as good if not better. The problem is not your computer. |
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| owien |
| quote: | Originally posted by Mad for Brad
Is Zeta really that CPU heavy ? I remember using it on a Pentium 4. what I don't get is people were making tracks ITB 3 years ago and managed making music that sounded as good if not better. The problem is not your computer. |
some of the patches can be cpu heavy in zeta i think robby has tought himself how to make tracks in certen way and doesn't what to change incase he cant come up with something. |
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| DJ Robby Rox |
| quote: | Originally posted by Mad for Brad
Is Zeta really that CPU heavy ? I remember using it on a Pentium 4. what I don't get is people were making tracks ITB 3 years ago and managed making music that sounded as good if not better. The problem is not your computer. |
I don't make a minimal sounding style of music and you're right I did manage myself to complete tracks when I was on a pentium.
But I also had certain rules I never broke like never using more than 1 synth for a bass. Everything really changed once I started learning about layering and anytime I use just 1 synth for almost anything now it sounds too "typical" or expected.
I've gotten some pretty original sounding basses sometimes by using 4-5 layers just for the bass. Then I sometimes throw a drone in there which is another synth, and often now I'm adding fxs sounds that wind up becoming part of the bass too.
Its likely I've got stuck in a rut or have tricked my ears into thinking unlayered sounds all sound thin/brittle. But I find by using more synths, and equalizing the sounds together right, it always sounds warmer/lusher more condensed like you'd expect from analogue.
I just can't get a sound I like by working with just 1 synth, and I think I attribute it to the fact that a lot of my "new" sounds are from combining layers rather than learning radically new ways of programming inside the synth itself.
I just enjoy layering/experimenting and sometimes I'll have 7 or 8 synths open for one sound all with different tones, and I'll combine/delete/tweak just to see how different sounds will mesh together. Sometimes it sounds like an unintelligible mess, other times it sounds articulate and much more present than before.
Its largely ed up my process of sequencing, but at the same time I have noticed my sounds have definitely improved. I can revert back to a more minimal styled approach, which I'm sure would benefit me a lot by forcing me to focus soley on form and what not, but all my 2-3osc sounds in the past always sounded like . I've also submitted basslines before that were made with just 1 synth and had people tell me it sounded boring or expected, while the only compliment I ever got on one of my basslines was a layered one. It just fills out "in between the notes" that I find so much software lacking in, and not like keyswitching but most software oscs just sound flimsy to me.
Not trying to turn this into another hardware vs software debate but I definitely find that if I don't layer my software it sounds nothing like the analog sounds I hear coming out of competent analog synths, like the tetra. You will never get a 1osc sound from software that sounds like the tetra, people here like to argue it comes down to programing skills but digital is far too abrasive for my tastes, and layering is the only way I know how to warm it up.
I also understand I'm just layering other digital sounds, but it still seems to fill them out so its at least closer to where I want to be.
Sorry for the rant. |
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| Aesthetic |
Robby - 15 z3ta's for what? If you program your sounds well enough you will only need 1-2 instruments per part really.. and don't forget FL is smart enough to disable plugins from using resources when you're not playing them within the track.
I don't know what your tracks sound like but if you're playing 15 z3ta's at once you probably can't even pick out about 10 of em :). Not having a go mate, I use a core2duo clocked at 3.0GHZ and it just does me fine.
The chip is nearly 3 years old now and it does me well enough on 4GB RAM. I cannot imagine you'd be having that much difficulty with this new AMD chip. Maybe try finishing an actual track rather than getting upset that you can't add 1 million z3ta's in to FL studio for s and giggles. |
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| DJ Robby Rox |
Man I know I'm getting bashed for this but trust me when I say I didn't know you can do this in FL lol.
And thanks aesthetic I definitely agree with what you said, and most likely I prob don't need 4-5 layers at any time when sequencing.
I literally had no idea you could shut off plugins by muting them, THEN hitting smart disable. Years ago I looked for an "off" option or something that alluded to the possibility of doing it, and never found it so just assumed it couldn't be done.
I know what mute does, and smart disable, but I didn't realize using them both can shut off plugins completely.
This is obviously a big tip for me, I'm obviously retarded, and I definitely won't be complaining about CPU anymore. I've seen 100's of tuts on FL, read almost the entire bible, but never knew you could do that haha.
You people might as well just bash me I think I've earned it at this point. I've basically followed DJ Ranns pattern to a t right now. =] |
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| DigiNut |
| quote: | Originally posted by Mad for Brad
Is Zeta really that CPU heavy ? I remember using it on a Pentium 4. what I don't get is people were making tracks ITB 3 years ago and managed making music that sounded as good if not better. The problem is not your computer. |
As a synthesizer it's really not too bad. Some of the effects, however, are very inefficient. I don't remember offhand which ones, but if you look through the patch banks to see which ones are really brutal on CPU, they're usually the ones piling on the effects.
Also, does FL have true multi-core support yet? Last time I checked it only had partial multi-core/multi-threading support which meant that getting a top-of-the-line CPU was just a waste of money. A quick Google search also reveals that a lot of FL users forget to turn that option on and don't get the benefits of whatever multi-threading support is available. |
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| DJ Robby Rox |
Hey Digi I had checked Imagine Line before I got my 6 cores and it said on the site version 9 is full muticore for both generators and effects.
I also wanted to check for myself and threw a whore of an izone patch over a basic kick sample and the processing is definitely being divided between all 6 cores.
There was also a rumor going around that FL designates cores (like one for gui/one for mixer/etc) and from what I can tell the processing is being divided evenly, so I don't think thats true at all.
Definitely looks like true multicore in version 9, but for people still using version 8 they won't have the benefit of multicore fxs processing. |
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| Kenny Rogers |
| you might wanna start looking into freezing tracks if you use 5 synths for a baseline! just saying that is not normal! but if you bounce them down to one single wav you save alot. obviously your workflow is the problem, not the gear. |
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| DigiNut |
| quote: | Originally posted by DJ Robby Rox
I also wanted to check for myself and threw a whore of an izone patch over a basic kick sample and the processing is definitely being divided between all 6 cores. |
I have no idea what "izone" is supposed to be, but even so, that only proves that the instrument itself is multithreaded. If the sequencer is true multi-core then it will run different (single-threaded) generators on different cores, and if it is actually any good at being multi-core then it will also have to do some kind of load balancing.
And in fact if FL is reporting much higher CPU usage than the task manager, it is almost certainly because it isn't properly using all your cores. If you keep loading up plugins and spike FL all the way up to 100% (according to FL), you'll be able to see pretty clearly in the task manager which cores aren't being fully utilized. I don't think any sequencers are perfect at this - load balancing instruments and effects across cores is fairly involved CS theory, like operating system design on a smaller scale - so if you've got plugins with wildly erratic CPU characteristics (like z3ta+) then you're going to see inefficiencies.
z3ta+ is an old plugin, definitely single-threaded, so it's a reasonably good theoretical test (if not very practical - as others have said, nobody uses 15 of them in a single project). Your "izone" test was, unfortunately, meaningless. |
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| Beatflux |
| quote: | Originally posted by DJ Robby Rox
people here like to argue it comes down to programing skills but digital is far too abrasive for my tastes, and layering is the only way I know how to warm it up.
I also understand I'm just layering other digital sounds, but it still seems to fill them out so its at least closer to where I want to be.
Sorry for the rant. |
Trillian sounds fat right out of the box.
DCAM synth squad sounds pretty good too. It doesn't rely on effects to make it sound good like a lot of other synths.
I think most people know that every synth has its own limitations, no matter how popular or renowned.
Excess lower mids in the mix can rob a bassline of its "deepness" and warmth. If you keep piling on layers, the mid frequencies can pile up quickly. |
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| Storyteller |
hey robby,
If interested you could check out the actual cpu usage of fruity loops. Just press ctrl+alt+del, start the task manager and go to the cpu tab. Then play the song and see how fruity shares the load on your cpu per core. It might just provide a bit more insight on what is happening. How many cores FL actually uses and if it does so efficiently. |
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