Starting to get crackles in playback when CPU at about 57%

I had the same issue and fixed it by increasing my Playback I/O buffer size from 256 to 1024. It's in the audio settings :)

Thanks EtherealEntity, I'll try what you said.

Kalle, if so this is not a good sign as I am running a dual core processor at the moment.
Planning on going quad core though.

I used to have pops/crackles at about 60-70% cpu.

But when I installed XP SP3 and some development tools like Visual Studio this started already at 40-45% cpu.

So I got a new computer for audio because of it.

I think around 60% is not bad. But try disabling a lot of fancy stuff like visual styles and shadows on popupmenues and stuff. Thing that makes problems arise quicker if turned on. Use the optimize for performance and go with that for settings for a while and test and see.

+1 to download dpclat meter

http://www.thesycon.de/de..tency_check.shtml 

This will tell you if you need to start messing with your computer.
For Xp I disable anything to do with internet in the devise manager. system restore, and as said above set for best performance, You computer is a little under speced to do a lot of vsts, so optimizing it will squeeze a little more for you.
Moving the buffer slider to right a little sometimes helps.

Hi, guys and thanks for all the input.

I finally got a round to trying this out.
and what Etherealentity suggested worked for me.

I have heard about freezing tracks with synths but I have not tired it yet.
Will give that a go as well.

The sound card I have is in my sign, it's a PCI Quartet sound card made by Infrasonic.
I have a feeling I should have gone for the E-MU derivative as the supplied drivers on their website for my sound card do not work right with my system and a fair few other systems as installing them causes IRQ conflict which causes a constant 25% CPU usage.

Fortunately the drivers which came with my card do not cause this and the support team for Infrasonic are non existant.

Bring back the old days :-)

Desperate Dan


I have a JPG Somewhere of Cakewalk Pro Audio 9 running smoothly at 90% of a P3 CPU, with 33 Plugins running. 
No matter what PC I have I have never seen Sonar 1-9 or X1 Run over 60% without some sort of Audio Artifact.
Bring back the old days :-)

No, don't. If you have a desire for the "old days", then don't upgrade, but don't try to deprive the rest of us.