How To Cure Latency Problems?

The problem is in the sound card. low end (factory cards) and even the "mid level" cards are really not designed to do the processing necessary to handle the load MC or any other modern program puts on them. The latency comes from the card's inability to process the synth parts fast enough to get the sound out at the same time as the audio. You might be able to get the settings close enough to give a playback that's close enough to play in sync.... but it's really stretching the limits of the card to do it.
The best solution is to buy a soundcard or interface that can handle the work load without latency...at least not where you can hear it and it affects your ability to record in sync.

You mentioned that you recorded 20 years ago...just midi. You might be able to record just midi w/o problems, but when you put audio in the mix.....that's when latency rears it's ugly head with the cheaper cards. Also, back a number of years ago, the cards & programs process the sounds a bit different than they do today. Even then...with my old rig, I can remember spending time on tech support with latency issues.

There are a few people here who can help with your current card, and might be able to get it working for you.
The "CURE" is to upgrade to a "pro level" card/interface.... and latency will be a thing of the past for you.

ORIGINAL: Beagle

the mixer won't resolve latency problems with MIDI being sent to softsynths, a mixer will give you 0 latency for monitoring audio recordings, but MIDI doesn't go thru the mixer.

I've bought a new mid-level sound card (SB Audigy) and I've slid my sliders, but it still sounds awful.

I wish you had come here and asked our opinions before spending money on the audigy. the sounblaster cards are not designed for recording and you'll likely not get good latency out of them. for low latency with midi you have to have a soundcard with drivers written designed for recording. check my website for recommendations on soundcards designed for recording.

I can give you some suggestions of things to try with the audigy, but they may or may not help. you can try moving the latency slider to the FAST side in OPTIONS>AUDIO>GENERAL. that will reduce your latency, but it very likely will start popping, clicking and possibly make your system dropout during recording and playback.

as far as the MS GS Wavetable, you can only access it if you're in MME driver mode. MME driver mode will give you the WORST possible latency. Besides that, the sounds in the MS GS Wavetable are the worst possible sounds you can use - the sounds in your Audigy should be a lot better than the MS GS Wavetable - so I'd use them instead. Also besides that, the synth sounds in the softsynth included with MC is better than the sounds included with the Audigy, so I'd further recommend learning to use softsynths instead anyway (do tutorial #8).

I might be able to trade in my Audigy for a better card - it's been less than 30 days since I bought it. Is the EMU 0404 what you would recommend? How many audio tracks do you think I can monitor with it at the same time without a noticeable delay? I see two versions of EMU 0404: USB ($200) and PCI ($80). Is the PCI version sufficient?

I want to kill latency once and for all so that I can think about creating music. Either that I'm going to spend my time playing tennis and video games. Debugging computer problems does not stir my inner muse.

Steve

If you have a desk top the PCI version should be a fine card to use....good price too. I do not use the 0404. I have the external interface Saffire. I had the 0404 in my desktop at one time. I can't say for sure cause I really never used it much.

Ask in another thread for advice from users of the 0404 card.....

Guitarhacker (and Beagle)

I've been searching the archives and I found another post (by the Guitar Guru from 2004) which seems to be contradicting you. Like what I think I read from Robomusic he is saying that the latency problem can be solved by using a mixer. He wrote:

NOTE: Latency only deals with incoming signal. You will hear previous recordings fine, just not what you are currently recording.

However, it seems to me that I was hearing a delay in the previous recording. If the problem is only with the incoming signal then I could monitor the guitar or vocals I am recording from the mixer and hear the previous recording without delay from the sound card. However, I will check tonight when I get home. I think my delay was in the previous recording playback.

Will latency ever cause the recorded tracks (audio and MIDI) to get out of sync with each other? I'm guessing that's impossible, but I thought it sounded like that was happening at one time during playback. Also, it seemed like the tempo was slower in playback. Is that possible? If I recorded a song that lasted 3 minutes could it take 4 minutes to play back due to latency?

Steve

I used to use the 0404 card...but I found it and the software complicated. So I eventually sold it and got the Saffire...it costs more but I can use it...and that's what is important.

The problem I had with the EMU-0404 was the patchmix software & Proteus.... good sounding stuff but with my feeble brain....I need simple.

GH is right.
In this case, Guitar Guru has fallen for an illusion. Playback is very much subject to letency, and is really where most of it comes from.
You can't tell that playback is subject to latency, because you have no reference to what initiated the sound. When you play songs in the Windows Media Player, these have 500ms of latency. That's 1/2 a second. This is the default setting for MME(the basic Windows driver for XP), which is why when you set the driver mode in MC to MME, you initially have that huge delay.
When you record an input, you DO have a reference from the initiating source, and this delay is immediately perceptible.
By monitoring from the mixer, you can hear your audio sources before they go through the process. Or with a sound card that has direct input monitoring, you can hear the same. However, this all goes out the window when you are using soft synths. How fast you hear these is entirely dependent on how efficiently your sound card handles playback, and how fast your CPU processes the synth data. The synth output is all on the playback side of the equation.
It takes a certain amount of time for the synth itself to process it's data, and for most of mine, 8ms is the magic number.
i can monitor audio at 2ms, so I interpret this as 6ms for the synth to di it's thing, and the additional 2ms to comvert the output to sound.
Your own impression that the delay is from the previous recording is quite correct. If you try to play along with previous tracks, your new track will be consistently behind, by whatever the latency is.
If you are seeing a change in tempo, that's not latency. It could be caused by different sample rates, different timing masters for playback and record, or some other mismatch somewhere in the system.
Getting back to your question on the different versions of the E-MU0404, they will both ultimately cost about the same,
The USB version has the preamps and A/D converter(sound card) integrated into one unit. The user interface is simpler, but less flexible.
With the PCI version, a mixer is almost a must, and you need at least some kind of preamp(s) for audio input.
The E-MU0404PCI($100) + a Behringer Xenyx802($60), makes for a solid package that is hard to beat.
Since you seem to be primarrily looking at synths, this seems relevant.
I record all my synth tracks live, in real time. I have up to 12 synths running(this varies, depending on how hard the particular synths hit the CPU).
Most projects have betwenn 15 and 30 track, a mix of audio and MIDI. I hold off on heavy effects(ie, Reverb) untill after all tracks are recorded, then bump the latency to 20-50ms for mixing.
Bottom line, for purely audio work, the more basic cards will work, but if you are using primarilly soft synths, you need a capable sound card.
And boost your RAM to at least 1 Gb. 512Mb is a killer with the synths.

yes, these guys are right. that thread you found from guitar guru is misleading at best. and rob's right, even tho I said that MIDI latency is what you're dealing with - it's actually the AUDIO aspect of it which causes the problem, thus the need for a good soundcard and drivers.

I had the exact same problem when I started. I speak from experience - I bought SHS4 and plugged in my keyboard and wow - horrible latency. then I did something stupid and I bought a soundcard without consulting anyone on the forums. I bought a SB LIVE! USB. better, but latency still sucked badly. then I finally wised up and found out from the forums that you needed a sound card which was designed for recording with drivers written for recording. I went and bought an EMU-0404, but the package was opened and it didn't have the cable or software with it. I took it back and exchanged it for an M-audio Delta 44.

WOW. what a difference. latency is at 5.8msec during recording and the sound quality is absolutely audible!

would never consider an onboard soundcard or a SB card again!

Hey Steve, I agree with Hacker about the firewire. Two weeks ago i purchased a delta 1010lt (pci) which I'm sure with a little more workingh out would have yielded pro results and allowed for expansion. I brought it back and picked the presonus firebox and I am runnining it on vista with the supplied ASIO drivers on MC4 with no latency, stuttering, crack and pop and I'm getting clear recordings. I'm new to recording and although I did pickup some great knowledge trying to get the pci going, it really goy to the point where I realized how utterly important your interface is. i don't think it's a matter of just getting a mid level sound card to work "ok". I have a berringer mixer but I'm not using at all. I get a good strong signal and it also has a 48v preamp for mics. After my sound card struggles I felt it was well worth the money. Good Luck.

I notice that my audio tracks now have DXi symbols on them. Why did that happen? How do I restore them to be audio tracks? The audio wave still appears in the wave pane.

I'm not sure if there is a connection yet, but in the past two weeks, I have seen at least two of you experience thiis same extremely bizaar behavior. In the same two weeks, Microsoft has been shuffling the deck, by sending SP3 updates to XP. Sometimes these updates can have unexpected results, as a side effect of what they intend to do.
Do you have automatic update enabled?

"Live Update" is Norton/Semantac. I refuse to have Norton on my machine - it bogs the system down and causes problems.

I hate auto updates...... when they come in ...even windows updates at times screw up the system until they issue a new update that fixes that issue but creates another....... and on it goes....