Need advice for setting up my PC for X1.

Hi everyone,

I'm going to be putting a second HDD in my PC and I want to format and reload everything when i do this. Basically a fresh start. I've been having quite frequent crashes with X1 and some with 8.5, but extremely rare. I'm open to the idea that it could be something wrong with my system or the way I have it set up.

Is there any advice anyone could give in what I should do when I do the fresh install? For example, I assumed the C++ files would have been updated automatically by Windows Update, but I recently found out I have to do it manually. When I install Windows, is there anything else I'll have to update or adjust like C++ that isn't done automatically with Windows Update? I have already downloaded the latest drivers for my mobo, mobo bios, video card, and audio unit.

I checked, and my HDD's support NCQ so I was planning on enabling AHCI mode and activating NCQ.

Here are my system specs:

Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P55M-UD2
CPU: i5 750 2.66Ghz Quad Core
RAM: 4Gb 1333 Kingston
VIDEO: Sapphire HD5450
HDD: WD Caviar Blue 7200RPM SATA 320Gb 3.0/Gb Trans. Rate 16Mb Cache
M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB
Windows 7 Professional 64bit
Cakewalk Sonar X1 Producer 64bit
Cakewalk Sonar 8.5 Producer 64bit
Nothing overclocked.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Bub

Looks nice.  I'll only comment on the NCQ.  If you are running RAID, turn it off.   As to a single drive, it most likely will not help or harm.  NCQ is mainly for concurrent access (read:servers) and it has a bit of overhead.  You can find more, I am sure, on the good and bad of NCQ on server forums.
 
 
Nice kit,
Good Luck
 

Window 7 tweaks from Presonus

Windows Vista tweaks Should work for 7 as well.

Katie_Katie


Looks nice.  I'll only comment on the NCQ.  If you are running RAID, turn it off.   As to a single drive, it most likely will not help or harm.  NCQ is mainly for concurrent access (read:servers) and it has a bit of overhead.  You can find more, I am sure, on the good and bad of NCQ on server forums.
 
 
Nice kit,
Good Luck

Thanks Katie. I've been doing some more digging around on the net about NCQ and TCQ. Some say to enable TCQ and disable NCQ and some say to disable both.

Thanks again.

Bub

VigilantSound


Window 7 tweaks from Presonus

Windows Vista tweaks Should work for 7 as well.

Wow! That article at Sweetwater about the Vista tweaks was an eye opener. It goes directly against some things I've read here. Hmm.

Very informative, thanks for the links!

Bub

Bumped to see if I could get any more input.

Thanks.

Bub

Bub


Bumped to see if I could get any more input.

Thanks.

Bub

   Get off of Vista . Win7 64b .. i have a 4 drive system
   2 drives for xp32b 8.5.3 .. 2 drives for win7 64b X-1

   the chipset drivers/inf drivers and video and audio
 were updated then X-1  installd. it works fine over here
  and I do not see any of the issues others are having..
 so far.. jon

Win 7 Tuning Tips from NI
Win XP Tuning Tips from NI

Howdy Tweakers,

I know that some tipsters recommend turning off System Restore.  I remember reading an article by Craig Anderton where he counseled leaving Restore on for the system drive (usually C:) and turn it off for the music recording drive(s.)  I have followed  this and have no problems.  System Restore has saved my butt many times.

I know others counsel using a drive imaging program and image the C: system drive.  To this I say, "Yes, that too."  Restore can be tamed with command line tool VSSAdmin.  

gustabo


Win 7 Tuning Tips from NI
Win XP Tuning Tips from NI

I likes These one's as well..

not to get away from this post..but the faq isnt working..so im wondering how do i make a post asking a question?

Bub


Hi everyone,

I'm going to be putting a second HDD in my PC and I want to format and reload everything when i do this. Basically a fresh start. I've been having quite frequent crashes with X1 and some with 8.5, but extremely rare. I'm open to the idea that it could be something wrong with my system or the way I have it set up.

Is there any advice anyone could give in what I should do when I do the fresh install? For example, I assumed the C++ files would have been updated automatically by Windows Update, but I recently found out I have to do it manually. When I install Windows, is there anything else I'll have to update or adjust like C++ that isn't done automatically with Windows Update? I have already downloaded the latest drivers for my mobo, mobo bios, video card, and audio unit.

I checked, and my HDD's support NCQ so I was planning on enabling AHCI mode and activating NCQ.

Here are my system specs:

Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P55M-UD2
CPU: i5 750 2.66Ghz Quad Core
RAM: 4Gb 1333 Kingston
VIDEO: Sapphire HD5450
HDD: WD Caviar Blue 7200RPM SATA 320Gb 3.0/Gb Trans. Rate 16Mb Cache
M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB
Windows 7 Professional 64bit
Cakewalk Sonar X1 Producer 64bit
Cakewalk Sonar 8.5 Producer 64bit
Nothing overclocked.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Bub

An Intel SSD for windows 7-------> no brainer. It will give you 20-40% in performance boost. Virtual memory set to that drive.
 
 
Rest can be normal SATA 300-drives set to fake RAID "Raid 1" in Windows 7 x64. Samsung spinpoint F3 Tera-disk are really great . Great performance low noise..

I wanted to check back in and give some results.

I did all the Windows 7 adjustments that PreSonus recommends.

So far I haven't had any crashes in X1 (knock on wood). The bugs are still there, but I haven't been crashing on a regular basis like I was.

Another thing I noticed was how fast picture files load now. I have an HD camera and have approx 5,000 pictures I've taken that are 2.5 ~ 3 Mb on my external USB HDD.

Normally when I would open a picture file it would take 1.5 ~ 2 seconds to fully load. This is an eternity in terms of computer speeds. After I did the PreSonus recommended settings I can click through my pictures as fast as I can double click and each one loads instantly.

Glad to hear you are not getting the crashes (I'm knocking on wood too!) That's the thing that would drive me bonkers. I've had two. One was my favorite DP (roll) and the other was saving a "dummy" project with time sig/tempo changes. However, I'm not so sure it wasn't related to the bit bridge as that project does indeed have an AT3 sighting lol!

Get a huge hard drive for images and just take a disk image at every stage. When I rebuilt I took three:

• Full Windows install with all the basic utility apps (Foxit, Disk Defrag, RegCleaner and crap)
• Windows with essential DAW apps installed (SONAR, Sound Forge, etc)
• DAW with all the plugs

I never use System Restore. Though it's probably faster for some quick roll-back when there's a problem it gives me peace of mind to just image the drive and go make some tea.

For VSTs, I copied the whole folder over from the old machine onto the desktop and would just add a few at a time, so I could test and confirm. MOST times there wasn't a problem but occasionally one would be wonky, plus it gave me a chance to purge as this coincided with me going from "must have every free VST EVAR!" to "how few of these can I get away with?"

Thanks Gustabo for those links...