Cutting out during playback

I'm new to the recording scene and let me start off by saying: Man, is this one of the most challenging and addictive tasks I have undertaken in forever! Well anyways to my question:
I have the latest version of Sonar 8 utilizing a basic USB input from a mixer. When I recorded a guitar track everything was great! What an amazing piece of software! I recorded a vocal track and during playback it seemed to cut out maybe once or twice a song. Sort of sounds like what you would hear when you hit an unplugged speaker wire on metal. I recorded a second vocal track and harmony track and now it cuts out constantly, at least 2 times a second. I am running a compression and multiband EQ on one of the tracks. My CPU usage sits at 50% during playback and ram is being held at around 60% usage. What could be causing this problem? Can anyone help?

Specs:
Macbook
2GB RAM, 160GB HDD (lots of space free)
2.4 Core 2 Duo
Windows 7 RTM with all updates

Hi Derek - Welcome to the Forum.

The thing that pops out at me is that you're using Windows 7 RTM on your Macbook. Are you using Boot Camp? Or are you using a virtual machine program like Parallels?

If you are using a virtual machine, then it's no surprise that the CPU is sitting at 50% with just 2 tracks, even with multiband effects. You just plain won't get much done in that software environment.

If you are using Boot Camp, it's more of a challenge to figure out. However, 2GB is not much for Windows 7 and Sonar 64. How about installing Sonar 32 (which can be installed on the same drive) and see how it does.

Installed 32 bit and it still cuts out. Seems to be using less CPU but same amount of cutting.

The performance on boot camp is that of a native OS.
The project is
one guitar track with plugins: TL64 Tube leveler and LP64 Multiband
two tracks (one for verses and one for chorus) with FX compressor gate from cakewalk and LP64
one harmony track with no plugins
Also, the crackling only shows up with multiple tracks running. For instance, just guitar is fine. Add the chorus and verse tracks and it crackles noticably (just vocals without guitar shows no crackle)
Add harmony track and the tracks plays slowly and crackles.
Settings:
(general tab)
24 bit audio driver depth (crackles with 16 also)
44.1k Sampling
4 buffers in playback queue
100msec buffer size
300msec effective latency
(advanced tab)
MME 32 bit driver mode
all others are default

Freezing the guitar track seems to cut down on most of the noise. Possibly that's my only option. Any further input is appreciated tho!

ORIGINAL: macatticus

TL64 Tube leveler and LP64 Multiband

MME 32 bit driver mode

The LP64 plugins are extremely CPU intensive. A lot of people refer to these as mastering plugins. Call em what you want, but regardless they suck serious CPU. I would not track with these plugins. You should see your CPU usage drop drastically. I don't have the TL Tube Leveler so I'm not sure about that one. Try replacing the LP64s with Sonitus. Then once your done tracking, and mixing, master with the LP64 stuff. Just a suggestion.

Also, you should only use MME as the driver mode with generic onboard sound cards that doesn't support ASIO or WDM. If you have a sound card that supports ASIO or WDM definetly use either of those as your driver mode. Again, only if your sound card supports either ASIO or WDM.

As far as bouncing, yeah, that will eliminate the realtime processing of the effects bin and you should recover your CPU cycles being sucked by the tracks effects bin. However, I'd still just replace the CPU intensive plugins with something else.

But with his pc specs, he should be able to run those LP plugs with no harm done. Its his sound card and his sound card settings that are giving him problems. I can run more than 20 LP plugins with my quad core DAW.
Cj

I am using a USB audio input that came with my Behringer XENYX 1204. It is a UCA200

bingo, you just proved it. Those Behringer cards are ......., well its not a very good interface and it doesn't have very good drivers

It is a laptop so I won't be able to add another sound card

Just because its a laptop, doesn't meant you cant have a different sound card. you can get an Echo, a Motu, an RME, or an M-audio
you need to disable your sound chip in your devise manager anyways, so yes, you do and should use a different sound card/interface
 

Do you all have any specific suggestions? As I have just started out, my current build of equipment is extremely limited. Would there be an interface option below $100?

I'm taking it that PCI means the PCI bus on a desktop computer. I'm using a Macbook laptop. Any other suggestions? Also, I switched it to WDM and it is not crackling at all, and the CPU maxes at 30 every now and then using the higher intensity plugins on 3 of the 5 tracks. I do have one other question however. It says my input will only support 44.1 K with 16 bit. I know there are higher settings but can someone explain what this means and will it be suitable to record for the time being?