hard drive setup for Kompakt?

[Uncle Bob]

Hardware gurus and/or NI tech: any help possible on the following? I’m not sure how to set up my computer for best results with Kompakt. I have two 40 gig hard drives and 1 gig RAM. Processor is an Athlon 2.4 on an Invidia chipset board.

20th Century:

Using Giga, I had Gigastudio installed on drive C (IDE channel 1, master). Giga samples and files were stored on drive D (IDE channel 2, master). Since an IDE channel will only be as fast as the slowest device in that channel, I hooked the CD-ROM drive up to ch1 (IDE channel 1, slave) because it is so much slower than either hard drive, and because the “streaming” drive must be kept as fast as possible. This is according to Nemesys/Tascam and other posts on the Northern Sounds Giga forum.

21st Century:

On installing Kompakt, I intended to follow the same pattern in order to maximize polyphony. NI, though, didn’t provide an option for the storage of samples on a different hard drive. I have installed Sonar on Drive C, though, and will store Sonar files on Drive D.

Questions:

1) Does the “Giga” setup above help with Kompakt/Kontakt polyphony as well? Or, since NI mentions NOTHING about computer hardware, is it simply not as great an issue as it is with Giga? If it is, how can Kompakt be set up with the app and samples on separate drives?

2) Is it a good idea to circumvent this problem by purchasing an inexpensive PCI IDE controller card to add a third IDE channel? Has anyone tried this? Good results?

3) With Kompakt as a DXi/VST (which I am using for the first time) in Sonar, would a better setup be Drive C = IDE channel 1, master, Drive D = IDE channel 1, slave, and CD-ROM = IDE channel 2, master?

Thanks for any suggestions!

[Alan Russell]

Bob,

you might want to remove Gigastudio and place that one on a separate computer as I have done.
Giga can cause conflicts with the applications you have mention if placed on one machine.

The Kompakt computer with Sonar is correct here using Kompakt samples as a DXI. All applications should be installed on the C: drive and the libraries on a separate drive. If the drives are at a minimum of 7200 rpm you do not need an additional controller card as long as they can be plugged to something.

As far as the 1 Giga Ram goes, you\'ll need to up it to 2 Gigs if you want to have more instruments on the canvas to score. The polyphony issue can be adjusted in Kompakt. This can be configured.

I hope you have a decent sound/breakout box card installed..

Alan Russell

[Rich Pell]

Hey..yea, what Allan suggested is about right.have your programs,samples and audio all on seperate drives.On my main DAW I`m using a Highpiont Rocket IDE controller card and I can`t recomend it enough.The point of it is it makes all your drives Masters and speeds everything up a bit,but thats cause i have 4-80GB HD`s.If your only using 2 drives dont worry bout it...Rich
P.S.Welcome to the 21st century. images/icons/wink.gif

[robgb]

I have all of my Kontakt samples on my second drive in the same directory I store my gigs.

My KomPAKT samples, however, are on the same drive as the app, automatically put there during installation, and having them there does not seem to have any effect on polyphony or cpu drain at all.

Kontakt/Kompakt seem more effecient, less buggy than GigaStudio. A generation ahead. Be interesting to see what Giga 3 can do.

[robgb]

Please ignore.

[Rich Pell]

Originally posted by robgb:
I have all of my Kontakt samples on my second drive in the same directory I store my gigs.

My KomPAKT samples, however, are on the same drive as the app, automatically put there during installation, and having them there does not seem to have any effect on polyphony or cpu drain at all.

Kontakt/Kompakt seem more effecient, less buggy than GigaStudio. A generation ahead. Be interesting to see what Giga 3 can do. <font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">U speak the truth.For a while i was using QLSO all on 1 drive without much performance issues.To be honest,as curious as I am about GS3, I`m REALLY glad I havent had to deal with GS 160.I`ve heard WAY too many horror stories. Rich

[Uncle Bob]

Thanks for your replies.

Rich, do you know the model number of the Highpoint Rocket IDE controller card you use? One of the reasons I haven\'t already ordered one is that I see a ton of negative comments about the Highpoint cards on Newegg\'s user comment page. Not about the functionality of the card, but about installation nightmares.

[Rich Pell]

Hey Unca Bob. Yea its the Rocket 133/133S.I had a comp. genius instal and tweek my whole system for me,and knock on wood,I`ve never had a problem so far. The card comes with a little intstallation manual so i dont think its that hard. u have to configure something in yor BIOS so maybe folks are missing that part of the instal.It definatley Accelerates cause im getting amazing performance...Rich

[Uncle Bob]

Got it, Rich - thanks.