Sample tank 4 cpu usage

[gordon44]

Hi
I'm using Studio one 4 and Cakewalk/bandlab(ex Sonar)

in both programs if I add say 4/5 cpu greedy samples from Sampletank 4 on say channel 1-4/5
The Cpu meter in both DAW's is maxing out

Sampletank is the only track on each DAW and there is no online monitoring/input echo

is this right?? seems ridiculously high

[mod redacted]

My pc is quite modern - I7 7700 4.2Ghz 16 mb ram and a focusrite 214i

Thanks Gordon

[Peter_IK]

This is not the normal behavior. You'll need to open a ticket with IK Support at http://www.ikmultimedia.com/contact-support where they can troubleshoot and assist you directly with this issue. Thank you.

[gordon44]

Thankyou Peter I will do that

but I would be grateful if any one on the forum could repeat my test

which is insert one Sampletank 4 instrument track on their DAW
Add 5 instances of c7 grand binaural piano or equivalent

and report what the CPU reading is
just for interest and to confirm that my system has a problem

Thanks in anticipation
gordon

[garfy]

Hi Gordon

Finally got round to doing your test, as this kinda thing interests me

Done on my, now rather vintage, MacMini (specs in sig). I'll put my findings and then explain why, but I think the issue(s) that this kind of usage can lead to is to do with how the DAW addresses virtual instruments, rather than the instrument itself (in most cases anyway, not to suggest that you don't have a fixable issue).

1 instance of ST4. 5 MIDI channels. 5 presets all C7 Grand Binaural
CPU = 103.9% (1 thread) 13.5% (of total CPU) Unplayable!

1 instance of ST4. 1 MIDI channel. 1 preset of C7 Grand Binaural
CPU = 34.8% (1 thread) 3.84% (of total CPU) Plays nicely

5 instances of ST4. 1 MIDI channel each. 1 preset of C7 Grand Binaural each
CPU = 35% (1 thread) 5.10% (of total CPU) Plays nicely

Caveat 1 - the drive that my sample content is on is a 5400rpm, so I don't expect masses of track count out of it. If I need to, I render down or freeze, but it doesn't happen often as I'm not a heavy sample user.
Caveat 2 - the I/O buffer is set to 256 samples

Now, I know why it works like this and it may be the same for other DAWs. Logic has a slightly irksome way of distributing load across CPU cores/threads, but it always leaves thread 8 for 'live input' i.e. whatever MIDI track is armed or selected, the CPU is ready to take the strain of an incoming performance and is ready to playback samples/record incoming MIDI. Hence why my 1 ST4 with 5 C7s is unplayable - that one instance of ST4 just overloads the thread, even though the remaining threads are basically idle.

By way of a final (unreal world) test I could get up to 13 MIDI channels of "Cellos Sustain" preset in a single multitimbral instance of ST4 before my CPU hit 100% on the 1 live core, so all this is very dependent on the preset used as well.

Anyway, hope that sheds some light.

[gordon44]

Garfy

Thanks for taking time out to do the testing

What you say makes a lot of sense
I will add multiple instances of sampletank to a project in my DAW and let you know how it goes

all the best
Gordon

[gordon44]

hi Garfy

Just ran a very similar test to yours with the buffer set to 256 samples

Ran 5 instances of sampletank 4 in studio one with a high end piano sample on each
instance - the results were roughly the same as yours
Cpu usage about 30-40% actual usage about 20%

I think, like Logic, Studio one piles all the work on one core(updating studio one to use Multicores is the most requested update in Studio one)

So this probably a good work around if I want to use multiple high end samples in a project/song
I will wait with interest to see what support say about it being a 'fixable issue'

Once again thanks for the help

gordon

[andreas.pratsch]

Hi everbody!

I use a MacBook Pro with 4 cores and Cubase as DAW. ST4 standalone allows the loading of many great sounds without the processor displaying too much load.
That changes dramatically in Cubase.

As an exemplary sound I used the, admittedly, very big Black LP Full Keyswitch as a test sound. Loading this guitar takes a while, I did not measure it, but it might have been about 60 - 70 seconds.

The CPU load increases enormously. I loaded 4 of these guitars and could play in one instance, after that there were already drop outs. Turning off the amp simulation in the fx section provides a remedy.

Compared to my other 64 bit plugins sampletank 4 already takes a lot of resources. Just opening a vst instance consumes a lot of cpu, so much power does not need any of my other plugins. Not even celtic era, which needs a lot of power.

I use guitars anyway only about shreddage which offers many effects without overloading the CPU too much. But as a test object, the e-guitars in ST4 are well suited. So I´m sure it will effect also other instruments using many effects.

I'll test if it works better with Cubase to open more instances of ST4 and only use 2-3 sounds there instead of a single ST4 instance with 4+ sounds.

[garfy]

ST4 standalone allows the loading of many great sounds without the processor displaying too much load.
That changes dramatically in Cubase.

Again, this sounds like something to do with the way that the DAW handles processing load/threads. Does Cubase have it's own CPU meter showing the individual threads and how much is being used?

[gordon44]

I would also be careful adding numerous instances of Sampletank 4 on one project/song if your machine doesn't have a good chunk of RAM
Each instance on my machine grabs about 2 gig of RAM - and I have crashed my machine when adding too many instances of Sampletank.

Gordon

[Peter_IK]

That is when SampleTank's multiout/multitimbral nature is really useful. You can have many parts so you wouldn't typically need that many instances running separately.

[shmihe]

I ran five tracks of piano (single-instance of Sampletank 4), into Reaper. Babyface Pro with 512 buffer at 48 kilohertz.

Piano was C7 Grand Binaural - Natural, and I turned off only the AC reso, and convo room effects.

System is an MSI gt72 laptop, with a 2.7 gigahertz i7 6820hk, overclocked to 3.7 consistently.

Sampletank was using about 10gb of my 32 gigs ram, and Reaper showed Sampletank as using up to 9% CPU on its own (in Reaper). Reaper was running up to 12% CPU overall.

I am not sure if this is similar enough to your test, but I am pretty pleased with the results for myself, because I would probable consider this piano to be one of the more brutal ones on CPU in Sampletank 4.

I also ran Windows task monitors to see that Reaper was reporting fairly accurate, and also to see the multi core usage.

5 huge grand piano samples at once is way beyond a real-world usage of this, although I understand it is just a test. And it is nice to just see what this can do with multiple tracks of multiple instruments.

I normally track and record at 96 kilohertz, but I just couldn't get the latency good enough at that high, it was starting to take too much CPU. At 48 kilohertz, and 512 buffer, the latency is doable for me, the RME has 11 milliseconds RTL @ those settings.

**edited for clarity**

[gordon44]

Hi shmihe

Have you tried Just one instance of Sampletank in Reaper with multiple high quality samples say about 5, loaded into the first 5 channels
This is the scenario when my pc was maxing out
I would be interested to see your results
gordon

[shmihe]

Hi shmihe

Have you tried Just one instance of Sampletank in Reaper with multiple high quality samples say about 5, loaded into the first 5 channels
This is the scenario when my pc was maxing out
I would be interested to see your results
gordon

I edited my post above (1st sentence) for clarity. I re-read it and realized it wasn't worded so clearly.

So, - it was just a single instance of ST4, with multi (5) versions of C7 Grand Binaural - Natural on multiple tracks, all running simultaneously.

I definitely had to turn off the AC Reso and Convo Room effects, and could not lower the buffer (to 256) because of clicks/pops and dropouts.

[kcearl]

I cant believe this is sampled based, the CPU usage is off the chart for the C7, which is the highlight...considering I have multisampled pianos for Kontakt that barely register in Ableton Live this really needs to be addressed.

No point in sayings its the daws fault or are we not meant to be using it as a plugin?


spent a day downloading and installing this but Im pretty disappointed, it was meant to replace my FA, guess it wont just now

[garfy]

Sorry to hear you are having issues with ST4 kcearl

No point in sayings its the daws fault or are we not meant to be using it as a plugin?

You're correct, it's not necessarily the DAW's fault, but it will increase overheads in RAM and CPU and also the way it interacts with plugins.

If you are having the same issues in the standalone version as well as the plugin, I would suggest you open a ticket with IK Support https://www.ikmultimedia.com/contact-support/mi/

Everybody's systems will be different but support will be able to give you some one-to-one help to get to the bottom of your problems.