Hi, 

I have just invested in a new pc and thought I would share my experience with running sonar x2.
Hopefully this may help others in diagnosing why there may be problems and how much a better speccd pc can be to all of the components of a studio.


I had a 2 year old quad core and sata 2 7200rpm disk drive with 8gb of DDR ram 2. On paper it should be good enough to run x2 no probs and it ran x1 fairly well, no crashes and x2 it had problems which have been mentioned here by many members. White screens, stopping of playback for no reason, breverb instances blanking out etc etc.


With a new spec computer I am having absolutely no problems with x2. Using exactly the same arrangements, plugins, audio tracks etc. components apart, the only difference to my previous setup is the fact that I only installed x2 on it he new one, not x1 and 8.5 as with previous pc. In fact when I uninstalled x1 after x2 installed on the old one, and x 2 wouldn't load half of my arrangements.




I paid a grand for this from novatech.. Old pc in brackets...


I3700k 3.5ghz. (Quad core 2.5ghz) 
Ssd 240gb sata3 port (None)
Sata 3 2tb hd <4ms (Sata 2 640gb 7200rpm)
16gb  ddr3 1600hz. (8gb ddr2)
Dvdrom. (Same).

2gb cheap and cheerful gt 640 ( 1gb nvidia )


Soundcard is a 8i6. On the new pc 3ms setting runs fine. On old, it would struggle at 6ms. It makes me realise the Scarlett is great, it just didn't have the right pc running it.


I put the fact that I am having no errors at all or spikes down to.. In order of preference..


1) running sonar from a ssd drive.
2) the additional speed of the ram.
3) no previous versions of sonar on the hard disk. Clean install. I think this is important.
4) better USB bus on the motherboard for the soundcard and peripherals.
5) processor .


So then I put the ssd disk in the old pc with the same ram in a sata 2 port and it appeared to be stable for a good few hours. No problems. Maybe that's all the old pc  needed. Food for thought .


So if helpful for anyone having troubles with x2 I would, certainly recommend a ssd and getting some quick ram in there as a cheap option which will benefit the pc and not break the bank. I would also recommend installing sonar x2 on a seperate hard disk , or uninstall older versions of sonar before you install x2 on that disk.


Hope this helps people who are having problems. What would be interesting to see if any people are having crash problems using ssd and clean install of x2 and 16gb of 1600 ddr3 in an i7 system. If not then these glitches and crashes must be related to the hardware it is running on or the precious installs of sonar on systems, or both.


Very glad I bought the new pc  it and x2 is now running really fakin quick and smooth. Please post up any other knowledge or experiments using sonar x2 on different pcs or hardware configs. 

I recently built a new PC, primarily for Sonar.  My signature has most of the specs.  I upgraded from a Q6600 Quad processor. 

I originally used an SSD (OCZ Vertex 4, 128GB) for the OS and Sonar and other recording software.  However, as SSD's have not proven their reliability yet (see comments by some of our DAW builder members in the computer section as one source) I have went back to a conventional hard drive.  I now have a 7200 RPM, SATA III interface 1TB hard drive and feel more comfortable. I'm building another home computer for some utility uses and as a "test" system (I do part-time PC support) and I'll use the SSD on that system.

I have noticed better Sonar performance such as bouncing to clips within a track.  With the new system this function is noticeably faster than it was with the old PC.  I've just started to use some MIDI, which I haven't used before, so I can't compare that.

I don't plan on going to Windows 8 with the DAW system.  I've had the pre-release versions of Win 8 installed on one PC and I'm not impressed with it.  From reports there are some compatibility issues with some hardware drivers and Win 8 which also precludes rushing to install Win 8.

Jack

When X2 is running, how much data gets written and read to the %temp% folder; and how much to the swap file?

I have set up servers with separate partitions for these two. I suspect, now, that I was over-thinking things!  But perhaps not.

I've just done the same ! New higher end PC. Sonar X2 upgrade, runs like a dream.

SSD drive + more RAM makes everything happen very quickly, compared to what I've been used to.

Only thing is I'm still using my old soundcard (M-Audio Delta 66 - WDM drivers), and I thought I would get better latency with the new PC, and while it's better, It's not as good as I thought it would be. More spending may be in order.

I'll ask this here, even though I've asked elsewhere too. I'd like your input.

Professional 2D video card or entry level 3D video card?  

I am running a core 2 quad with no issues.... So I can recommend anyone who'd like to have the advantages of X2 to get it while it's hot...
 
If you do have issues with a core 2 quad and Sonar it probably is an hardware issue. If a drive starts to fail or memory (heat will wear out both... ) it can be nessesary to replace those...

I'm using the Intel HD4000 video, which is built into the  i7 CPU's.  I've seen posts from other Sonar users that are also using the built in Intel HD video and no one is reporting any problems with this and Sonar.

There is also a different HD version built into i5 CPU's.

I plan on installing a 128GB SSD Drive to install Windows and other programs on it as well as Games. and use the Slave HHD (standard 1 TB Hard Drive) for the project files and audio storage. below is my system setup to date. =========================================================== Microsnot Windows 7 32bit Mother Board ECS BF8200A AMD Athlon(tm) II X4 640 Processor,440 MHz 4 Core(s), 4 Logic Core(s) 16.00GB Installed Physical Memory. XfX Radeon HD5770 Graphics Cars. IDT HD Audio.

This is a really helpful thread IMO. It is hard to argue with success.

Julien

2 weeks into a new build (upgrade really):

i7 3770K
Gigabyte MB
16 gigs of RAM
Using the on-board Intel video without a hitch (6.6 in Windows index)
Intel 120 GB SSD
WD 1 TB 7200 rpm drive for audio files etc.
Windows 7 64 bit
M Audio 2496
Edirol UA 101

So far this system rocks, SONAR x2a is stable, not one hitch. What really surprised me was that I didn't have to re install Windows. I thought for sure I'd have to start from scratch. But since I upgraded from a Gigabyte MB running a Q6600 to this system (see specs above...similar hardware) Windows didn't bark at me or give me any grief. All I had to do was reauthorize a few plug-ins (KORG, NI etc.) and I was good to go.