Re: Optimizing Windows for looping

["aaronleese@flyloops.com" <aaronleese@flyloops.com>]

ah, come on guys ... no offense, but this is just scratching the surface ..... if you really want to optimize windows for audio, there are some other things you should really know about .....


1 - DPC's (Deferred Procedure Calls) ......

Windows handles driver requests (DPCs) in a first in, first out, manner (as opposed to prioritizing Driver calls)...... really dumb because some drivers (like audio) need to be services every time, or bad things happen (clicks, clacks and audio dropouts) ........ whereas drivers like .... say ... wireless connections ... do not .... but too often a badly written driver will do something which takes too much time and the audio buffer will not get serviced and CLICK.  DPC dropouts (and not program bandwidths)  are the main source of audio dropouts.

So .. what to do ... first, download the "DPC Latency Checker" utility .....http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

Run it and your looper .... and see what sorts of latencies you get ..... the software will tell you if your system can handle audio without dropouts.  If it goes to red, that is because some driver is taking too much time ..... you need to disable it.

You can adjust the registry and play with windows settings all you want ..... but will probably not find the right thing to turn off.  A better approach is to run MSCONFIG ... just go to Run .. on the windows start menu .... and type in msconfig ... or msconfig.exe for some systems.

This is the ONLY way to get a full list of background processes and services running on the machine.  Turn off anything that you don't need .... and try the DPC checker again.  A good way to start is to use the "turn off all non-critical tasks" and then turn stuff back on one by one.  This will require restarting.  Startup items are best turned off as well in my opinion .. though most of them are actually harmless.

2 - ASIO ASIO ASIO -------

This was already mentioned, but it is really important.  This could not be more clear .... ASIO is twice the speed (half the latency ..... 6-8 ms) of DirectX and 5 to 10 times as fast as most WDM based drivers.

By the way, ASIO4All and other universal drivers wrap windows drivers and DirectX drivers to make them ASIO compliant .... but do not be fooled ..... this will NOT get you better latency .... you need to have a soundcard with native ASIO driver.  Most devices are nowadays, so this should be easy enough ......

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From: "Raul Bonell" <raul.bonell@gmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 06, 2008 12:25 AM
To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
Subject: Re: Optimizing Windows for looping

... but if i remember correctly,

this does not deactivate the startup

sound not the outro. you must go 

and tweak the register directly.

it's all in the www.xpmusic.net

2008/8/6 andy butler <akbutler@tiscali.co.uk>

Which reminds me.

Another good optimisation is to
select "No Sounds" for all the Windows system sounds.

andy

improv@peak.org wrote:

No way! At the end of our gigs, I'll often play the Windows shutdown sound
through my bass amp (1200 watts of QSC through Trace Elliott speakers). It
always elicits a laugh. I do try to remember to mute the laptop channel if
I have to reboot during a gig, though.

Oh, there is one thing I would do. Turn that damn Windows introduction
music
off so that it doesn't play when it reboots!  :) Wow. At one gig, I had my
laptop plugged into the PA, and turned up loud, and that Windows tune
shook
the house. /K Talk about embarassing.

--
The Playing Orchestra: http://www.telefonica.net/web2/tpo
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