Audio / latency problem out of nowhere - driving me nuts!

Hi, For a long time already everything runs fine with a 6 ms round trip latency then suddenly today it just got all weird. I noticed things seemed slower than usual, i look in my settings and the latency miraculously went way up to 9 ms or so. I've been trying for a hour to get it lower again but no success. It's freaking me out. I completely disabled the on board sound card in the bios (this wasn't even a problem before). I re installed my Quad Capture drivers and out of pure frustration i did a clean install of Sonar. Nothing works! It refuses to go back to the 6 ms latency! How how how does this happen out of nowhere? I also tried setting it to 96 khz(which worked before but was never needed) and it won't do that either. It says 1 or more cards do not support this. Well, i only have 1 card running and that's my Quad Capture. Anyway, i shouldn't need to do that in the first place. What is going on? I'm not sure what's more frustrating. That it doesn't work or that it just stops working out of nowhere and acts like i'm running a totally different machine and sound card. Thanks.

No update. Computer is not connected to the internet. I have a AMD 6 core with 8 gigs running Windows 7. This shouldn't really matter though as i haven't changed anything and i was running 6ms without a problem. There are tons of things checked and unchecked in the settings. Anything specific you want to know? This is so frustrating :( Thanks.

It's set at 44100. The audio buffer is set at 4 (96 samples) Driver selected is Asio. This is currently resulting is a round trip of 9.8 ms. Keep in mind this is EXACTLY the same setting as before. But before this resulted in 6 ms! Also before i was able to up the sample rate to 96000 without a problem. Now it says my audio device doesn't support it. This occurs for any project. Effects or no effects. That's just what Sonar does right now.

Ok, added it to my sig. Not sure how it will change anything though as i didn't change any hardware or software. So nothing that could affect the latency.

Did you add a computationally heavy plug-in to one of your busses? Stick the LP64 on the master bus and you can really hear the latency if you try and record with track monitoring.

Did you do a complete uninstall of Sonar? If not Sonar leaves many traces of the software behind. Do a search on how to completely uninstall Sonar and try again. This worked for me back when I had Sonar 6XL and ran into a problem with my sound card driver's. 

Tripod


Is there a way to complete remove the current settings in Sonar? I noticed when i reinstalled it it kept the previous settings. Eventhough i deleted the software.

you can try deleting AUD.INI
 
make a back up, though you probably wont need it.
 

stickman393 - I added nothing. This latency problem happens when i start up Sonar. Before adding tracks or plugins. It acts like i have another system or sound card or something. Geo524 - Thanks, i will do a search and try that again. robert_e_bone - I said i re-installed it. That's all. I'm not sure where what you consider bad responses. But either way, thanks for your help. chuckebaby - even with the Windows search, impossible to find. But i will try again later today. bvideo - Can you explain that better to me? Are you saying i should or should not use the on board sound card? It was enabled all the time without any problems. I currently disabled it in the bios hoping it would fix things but it doesn't. And with slowing down things i meant i was playing my drums and noticed a lag where there wasn't one before. Turned out it went from 6 to 9ms.

I was thinking to let Windows have its own sound card (the onboard one) so it does not interfere with Sonar's settings for your Quad capture. So probably like your original setup. Your sense of timing of a 3 ms time difference is quite remarkable. There are some other things that can cause more significant lag in Sonar, namely use of certain effects that require looking ahead in time (like stickman says); examples are like perfect space or the transient shaper. Another Q? Did you at one time use the direct monitoring feature of the Quad's mixer (would likely eliminate all lag)?

tripod,its all about back to basics.
 first, when deleting aud.ini you should have nothing plugged in to your usb ports and exited from sonar.

basics- I find when im knee deep in a problem , I start with the basics, lets do it!!

1-open up sonar, go to preferences, make sure you quad capture is selected under playback.
2- in preferences under drivers, make sure ASIO is selected,(you have installed the drivers for your device?)
3-start with one basic track and record a test rhythm for about 30 sec./add another track of the same instrument and see if you have latency? you shouldn't, not with 2 tracks anyway

sometimes its the simplest things like driver mode was switched somehow(not likely, but it happens)
if your using a certain synth or audio plug in, try another one.it could be just that plug in or synth.
if it is a synth, check your preferences "midi devices" just eye scan it to make sure everything jives.

I don't think the prob is as bad as it appears, probably something simple we are just overlooking.

think basic and outside the box not in it :)

Pff i tried it all, checked it all, removed it all, installed it again... Nothing... The only way i can get to 6 ms now is by moving the buffer size all the way down to 32 samples which ofcourse won't work because it makes things completely unstable. If i up the sampling rate i get an error message saying 1 or more soundcards are not compatible. This was never a problem before. You could say well disable the on board sound card but then i still get the same problem. And i was able to do it before with the on board card enabled... I'm running out of options here...the only thing i can think of right now is completely wipe the disk and re-install everything including Windows or buy another software. Both options are kinda ridiculous but i'm not sure how much longer i can handle this...

Have your audio interface drivers been updated without your realising? Sometimes the latest drivers aren't always the greatest. If they have roll back and see if that helps. I had similar issues once and that was the fix for me (still is).

Having said that if nothing has changed it seems very strange to suddenly see a changed reported latency with exactly the same settings, something must have changed. Is MS Wavetable enabled in MIDI devices? If so disable it - I have known that to cause all sorts of wierd seemingly unrelated issues.

Tripod


No updates. Computer is offline. Anyway, i wiped the disk :) Windows almost done installing...

Bit late now I know but a top tip for when you're done. If you haven't already invest, in a good backup package (I use Acronis) and take an image once you've got a clean install, then take an image regularly of your working setup.
 
At least then if you need to go back to a clean install or a point in time it's there in minutes without all the faffing around.

Well, i'm really ready to cry now. After wiping the disk, reinstalling Windows and all the software the problem was still there. I gave up. basically stopped playing/recording. Today my new octa capture arrived. 100% sure this would solve my problems as i figured the only thing that was left that could cause the problem was my quad capture that must've been bad. Just installed the 600 Euro octa and guess what? Same problem. I don't know what to do anymore. I really don't. I'm beyond desperate now. Even at 9ms i'm getting cracks and bleeps. I should be running this thing at 5ms easily without a problem. And what i just CAN'T understand is why it won't go higher than 44.4khz! It keeps saying 1 or more soundcards can't use it. There are no other sound cards!! I have an on board card that is disabled in the bios! And even when i had not disabled it before when everything was working this wasn't a problem in the first place. What else can i do??? What is left? How is this possible?

That can't be the problem. I did a new install of Windows and Sonar. And i deleted AUD.ini about 5 times already. I'm thinking this must be a hardware problem somewhere. It's not Sonar itself, it might be Windows triggered by some hardware. My guess is the on board soundcard and or the bios. But i have no idea where to go from here. Other than installing a new motherboard. Which i do happen to have but man, i really don't feel like doing that.