A little depressed. I've been spending considerable time working on our old laptop to see if we can use it for live performance on keys. It was a pretty powerful computer in its' youth, but I get nothing but stuttering and popping. I've adjusted audio latency, tried every buffering configuration I can think of. I get near zero latency when playing, but then it starts stuttering due to CPU taxing, I think.

I have a feeling it's either the audio interface, a Roland UA-4FX, is grossly out of date and inadequate, and/or the computer is just totally shot.

I've tweaked Windows 7 settings to kingdom come to a more stripped down mode (killing all the bells and whistles to save CPU), after doing a fresh install, etc., and I get garbage. Many hours down the drain.


THIS IS WHAT I'M USING:
 
Roland UA-4fx with Windows 7 Driver
M-Audio Oxygen 88, connected via USB
Gateway Computer NV56, dual core with 4gb ram