Problem With Aria/JABB3/GPO4/GAS - Sonar 8.5 - Presonus Firestudio Mobile - Win 7 x64

[Frank D]

Help!!

I have finally got around to setting-up a new i7 PC w/ 8 Gb RAM I had built in the Spring.

I have successfully loaded Sonar and have it playing nice with the Presonus FW box. At the advice of Cakewalk, I was instructed to use the ASIO drivers with the Firestudio Mobile and they seem to be working fine.

I then loaded my three Garritan packages, and they too seem to be working predictably as VSTi inserted softsynths (16 stereo instrument slots per instance) ...

... UNTIL ...

I start filling the ARIA player with more than just a few instruments. My sample/demo piece of only a couple of tracks will play fine at first, but as soon as I add "too many" instruments, all the samples get cut-off short, like they are 1/2 notes choked down to 1/8th notes.

I am talking only two ARIA instances, and not much more than 20-24 instruments total when the gremlin strikes. Even after I delete the 2nd ARIA player (and it's loaded instruments), it still cuts the samples off. As a reference point, on my 4 yr-old legacy Music PC (w/ only 3Gb RAM), I can play-back many more JABB2/GPO3 tracks in the ol' KP2 without a problem.

I then tried inserting a Cakewalk-included softsynth (TTS) and a clone of the ARIA-pointed track and it plays back correctly ... it seems limited to the ARIA hosted samples.

I know many of you use ARIA and Sonar 8.5 ... any ideas, pointers, or observations you may share with me?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Regards,

Frank

[bionicbub]

Frank --

Have you tried any of the following in SONAR:

1. Adjusting the size of the ASIO buffers
2. Using read and/or write caching (Options -> Audio... -> Advanced tab)

The read and write caches are adjustable-size buffers like the ASIO buffers, and all of these adjustments will most likely affect your latency, but latency is no problem for me because I don't perform live. I believe latency is only a problem for live performers; some people just "like" to have instant responses, but they are by no means necessary for recording.

[rbowser-]

Frank - I can't think of a definite answer for you, but Arvid has started you out with good things to try. As a Sonar and Garritan user, I can assure you there's not something different/wrong about Aria in Sonar. But there are so many buffers to adjust, that part of straightening things out can be maddening.

Arvid - There's something potentially confusing in your post that I want to point out for the sake of not confusing other readers:

"...I believe latency is only a problem for live performers; some people just "like" to have instant responses, but they are by no means necessary for recording..."

Latency is a huge problem for anyone using a keyboard in their studios. I guess you're calling anyone with a keyboard a "live performer." But to have a delay/latency over 10 msecs makes it impossible to play the keyboards in time to a metronome or other tracks. It's not a matter of just "liking" instant responses - if anyone is actually playing music, not just inserting data with a mouse - they need to get their latency down. Mine is around 5 msecs and that works fine for me.

Frank, there Has to be a sweet spot with your buffers in balance that will make this problem stop. Look at the audio settings in Sonar, the in-out buffers - and of course your interface control panel, as Arvid said.

Randy

[bionicbub]

Yes, Randy. Any form of real-time activity qualifies as "live" performance, since you are dealing with time-critical situations. But you would not have to be working with as many instruments as Randy mentions in order to do that.

Thank you for clarifying that for other readers.

The simple kind of playback that Frank describes is not time-critical, however. I cannot envision someone loading ARIA with as many instruments as he describes and trying to play them all at once with a keyboard, although one might like to have one or two other instruments playing during live input, in which case, Sonar lets you "Archive" unneeded and unnecessary tracks for that purpose and thereby reducing the latency.

Since I am a piano minor, keyboard input is a natural for me, so I have done my fair share and more of inputting by that method, even for percussion parts, for many years.

[rbowser-]

Hi, Arvid - Thanks for your reply. Your definition of "live performance" was probably easier to understand than I thought earlier, but thanks for the clarification.

If you look in on Forums like the one for Sonar, you'll see that the vast majority of users wrestle with latency issues because to use keyboards and other controllers is the most common way of using MIDI, and to have a discernible delay between hitting a key and hearing a note makes recording impossible. Notation users generally are inserting note-by-note, and so don't have the same concerns. But to get latency well below the 10 msecs point isn't just a trivial "speed is better" issue - those of us playing music and using recording software Have to tame that latency down.

Frank, do report again when you've had a chance to try more things on your system.

Randy

[Haydn]

What version of ARIA player are you using?

I ran into this issue a couple months ago and an update to a different version fixed the problem.

Jim

[Frank D]

Hi Arvid, Randy, and Jim,

Boy is this frustrating! THANKS for all your prompt replies; I REALLY appreciate any and all help on this!
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I'm going to start with Jim's question 1st since I'm sensing this may be an ARIA problem.

The VSTi inserted player I've been using is:

ARIA Player Multi_x64 VST ... and on the settings page, the version info is:

ARIA Player 1.02 v. 1.093 Win x64

I bought JABB3 and GPO4 in the Spring so possibly there is a later ARIA I should be using?
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Arvid and Randy ...

Yes, Randy has nailed my sentiment exactly ... and the importance of using Sonar (or any DAW for that matter) and the absolute need to play music into a project in real-time with minimal latency and hear everything that has been previously input.

The fact I was able to reasonably do that on my 3yr-old music PC (I was off by a year in my original statement) is what is so hard to fathom on my new box ... it is literally twice as powerful and only performing half as well (not even!) as the old boy. I just completed my Christmas CD project on the old XP PC (using KP2), including mixing, and didn't have a hiccup.

The original PC used WDM drivers (I have a great Dakota audio card that has worked flawlessly since 1998), but when I tried using the WDM drivers with the Presonus Firestudio Mobile, it was not working well at all. That's when Cakewalk told me to use the ASIO drivers, which I'm not all that familiar with, but everything seems OK with them.

Here's some settings ... if something hits you as odd, give me a yell! ...

Audio Settings:
Driver Mode: ASIO
Playback I/O Buffer: 1024 Kb
Record I/O Buffer: 256 Kb
ASIO info ... Buffer Size: 11.6 ms; 512 Samples

Global Setting:
(MIDI Tab): Playback using 1024 ms Buffers

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Thanks again Arvid, Randy, and Jim!!!

Frank

[rbowser-]

Very frustrating, Frank

There really aren't any "one size fits all" settings, as you know. The mantra over at the Sonar Forum is that every system is unique and will need different settings that can only be found by experimenting.

That being said - here are the settings I use, compared to what you listed:

Audio Settings:
Driver Mode: ASIO
Playback I/O Buffer: 1024 Kb--- I have that at 512
Record I/O Buffer: 256 Kb--- I have that at 512 also - Your setting seems small and possibly problematic
ASIO info ... Buffer Size: 11.6 ms; 512 Samples--- I have mine at 5.8, 257 samples. I raise that sometimes when mixing large projects, since latency doesn't matter once you're mixing.

Randy

[Frank D]

Hi Again, Randy ...

Yes, no one-size-fits-all!

Thanks for providing me with your settings ... I'll try futzing with mine again tomorrow, but I can assure you, I've been doing that for a while now. I go back to Cakewalk Pro Audio 8, so this is not uncharted water for me ... it's just that this is the first time since '98 I've hit a show-stopping problem in a CW/Sonar config.

I sense my basic settings are "in the ballpark", simply because I was able to add a Cakewalk/Sonar instance of TTS (after I had already hit the ARIA "chopped-sample" wall), and have it cleanly playback a copy of the very ARIA-pointed track that plays with the chopped affliction. IOW, my headaches seem limited to the ARIA tracks only. Hmmmm.

If it's not too much trouble Randy, could you check next time you have ARIA loaded what version you have? I'm suspecting what Jim 'Haydn' mentioned could be my problem. I'm going to check on the Garritan site again if they list the latest version No., but if I remember right, last time I looked I wasn't able to find out what the latest version of ARIA is. Maybe w/ a fresh head I'll find it ... hoping Jim let's me know which version fixed his similar problem.

Thanks again Randy!

Frank

PS: If it is indeed that I'm using an outdated, superceded version of ARIA, do you have any idea how I would:
a) get the latest version downloaded?
b) Get the latest version to supercede my outdated version?

I guess I'll cross that bridge when I find out which version is the latest!

[Frank D]

Back Again with an up-date ...

I found a link on the Garritan.com site to Ariaengine.com and was able to answer a few of my own questions. This site provides both version history and downloads.

I have ARIA v. 1.093 and as it turns out, this dates way back to February of this year.

There have actually been 11 minor up-dates since then, with the latest ARIA being v. 1.106 (August 23rd).

The last ARIA "stable version" listed is v. 1.098 (May 13th).

I downloaded both versions tonight and will try updating mine Monday ... wish me luck! I'll let everyone know how I make out.

Regards,

Frank