I've just started experimenting with X2 (just a few days) and I would like to know what behaviour I should expect as "normal". I opened a bass loop up in the Loop Construction view and changed a couple of the notes' pitches to match a midi riff which I had manually inserted (I am waiting for a midi cable to arrive and then I can actually play something from my control keyboard!) Now when I play it back it is popping and clicking (unusable in a song) where I have made the changes. Is the Loop Construction just a notepad for ideas, or should I hear a cleaner sound?

There are a few causes for pops and crackles and such, so let me ask you a couple of questions:

1.  What driver mode are you using? (ASIO, WDM?)  Check this in Edit>Preferences>Audio>Playback and Recording

2.  What is the Sample Rate set to in Sonar?  Check this in Edit>Preferences>Audio>Driver Settings


3.  Also, what is your reported total round trip latency?  Preferences, same window as in number 2.


4.  For your audio interface, what Sample Rate is set there?  Also, what is the ASIO Buffer Size set to?


Bob Bone

Thanks for the quick response. I tried both drivers, made no difference. I tried it at 44.1 and 48, no difference. Total Roundtrip: 45.1 msec. 2166 samples Again, I tried the RME at 44 and 48. Buffer size is 1024 samples. I must admit though, I don't really understand the relationship between the audio interface and the settings in Sonar. I haven't even been able to see if I get any latency from my keyboard yet, as I'm waiting for a midi cable (hopefully tomorrow) Thanks again

Have you done any system optimization for audio? Like turning off power management features, disabling start programs... anything like that? 

No, nothing at all. I'll try that next. Thanks.

Don't know anything about loop construction mode but it sounds like the edited areas aren't crossfaded.

eg- when you split a track into sections and change the volume of one section there will be a click at the object border. You need to use the fades menu to effect a fade or crossfade. 

That computer seems beefy enough to run at 44.1 without those kinds of noises.  I'm thinking it may be something else going on.

Do MP3/WMA files play through Windows Media Player with no noise? (sorry - gotta ask)

What bit-depth are you recording at?

Also, please download and run DPC Latency Checker, to get a measurement of your system's expected ability to processes audio, such as with Sonar.

Here is the site - last I checked there was no actual installation - you just download and run: http://www.thesycon.de/dpclat/dpclat.exe

Bob Bone

That latency you reported is crazy high.

Mine is running at something like 5 ms, I think - I run 44.1 / 24-bit, with an ASIO buffer size of 128

Bob Bone

So, I used the DPC Latency Checker and got this answer: "Some device drivers on this machine behave bad and will probably cause drop-outs in real-time audio and/or video streams. To isolate the misbehaving driver use Device Manager and disable/re-enable various devices, one at a time. Try network and W-LAN adapters, modems, internal sound devices, USB host controllers, etc." This would appear to suggest a problem but it's not precise which driver is causing the conflict. I decided to try and record at 24 bit & 48k after reading quite a few articles and, my laptop should, theoretically, be able to cope easily. I recorded something at 16bit 44.1 in 2008 (obviously on a much older, inferior laptop) with Producer 7 and had no problem with latency, so I imagined this would be plain sailing. More fool me I suppose! I'm sure it is something that I have not set or set wrong though, or maybe there is something running in the background which I am not aware of. So, off to do some detective work. Thanks for all your input.

On the graphic display in the DPC Latency Checker I have a row of yellow columns hovering around the 1000 µs and then red columns at various intervals going to 16000 us and above. I don't really know what I'm looking at but I would guess this is a program running in the background?