New Music PC, comments anyone?

AndreD · Post by **AndreD** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 6:09 am

to rob:
at what cpu load doas your system starts to produce crackles @, lets say, 7ms latancy (44.1)?
(if HT is active for shure!)

[ This Message was edited by: Andre Dupke on 2003-10-19 11:51 ]

Rob van Berkel · Post by **Rob van Berkel** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 6:50 am

@Andre:
I'm afraid I can't answer that last question Andre, as I run without HT. As I understood from various postings in this group HT gives quite some problems on SFP systems. And as I started with my new board on 98, which doesn't support HT, I disabled it. And I have to admit that I forgot about enabling it again in BIOS since I made the switch to XP Pro.
But you made me curious - I will definitely enable HT to see what goes, ok? I'll keep you informed.
Cheers,
Rob

AndreD · Post by **AndreD** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 7:08 am

...and you have to change the pc mode from acpi to acpi multiprocessor...

that was the beginning of our problem:
everybody is talking about HT but we could´nt get any performance advantage with our hamburg-audio-pc setup in HT mode. (contained asus p4 p800 deluxe).

so we did serveral tests and the end of the story is:
only asus p 4 p 800 REV 2 (no deluxe) rocks solid with HT, N2/SX and SFP!

...and now, i´m giving away our hard acquired knowlage 2 pz

[ This Message was edited by: Andre Dupke on 2003-10-19 11:56 ]

Rob van Berkel · Post by **Rob van Berkel** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 12:14 pm

On 2003-10-19 08:08, Andre Dupke wrote:

...and now, i´m giving away our hard acquired knowlage 2 pz

Well thank's

Ok, you get one free advice in return: turn of HT and see where it gets you

I couldn't run stable with HT (logic + SFP) but I will investigate things further.
Cheers,
Rob

AndreD · Post by **AndreD** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 5:17 pm

logic is not adapted for HT!
the sx/n2 performance incrases about 10%...

logic workaround:
try to set apps for a single "virtual" processor:
taskmanager/processes/right mouseclick on sfp or logic, set sfp to processor 0 and logic to processor 1 (assign or something like that).

[ This Message was edited by: Andre Dupke on 2003-10-19 18:44 ]

WayneSim · Post by **WayneSim** » Mon Oct 20, 2003 5:41 am

WOW... you guys don't make this choice easy.

"But you made me curious - I will definitely enable HT to see what goes, ok? I'll keep you informed" -Rob

Could you keep us informed Rob. That is if you have the time to mess around with things.

This is actually becoming a hard choice. Asus has 4 motherboards out that seem good. P4P800, P4P800 Deluxe, P4PC800, P4PC800-E Deluxe.

It seems that I can find one person to recommend each board. AHHHHH.... I was hoping for a unified agreement on a single motherboard.

One thing is certain I can't have ANY crackles, in the audio on this system!

Thanks for all your input everyone. I appericate the time you all take to post.

[ This Message was edited by: WayneSim on 2003-10-20 06:43 ]

AndreD · Post by **AndreD** » Mon Oct 20, 2003 5:47 am

the question is:
do you want to benefit from sx/n2 HT support or not...

WayneSim · Post by **WayneSim** » Mon Oct 20, 2003 7:57 am

On 2003-10-20 06:47, Andre Dupke wrote:
the question is:
do you want to benefit from sx/n2 HT support or not...

Ummm... It's a good question. But I'm not really sure. Since I never used it i don't know. ATM I am using Cubase VST. I don't plan on changing any time soon. Only cause it does what I need it to do. However SX does look nice!

Sunshine · Post by **Sunshine** » Tue Oct 21, 2003 4:03 am

Andre and Rob,

both of you have been very helpful, thank you for this!

I have a question.....
Did any of you notice the demormalization problem that shows up occasionally? I´ve heard that it`s exclusively a P4 thing. Especially older plug-ins suffer from this symptom?

Rob van Berkel · Post by **Rob van Berkel** » Tue Oct 21, 2003 2:35 pm

Well, you're more than welcome

Sharing experiences and discussing those is what this forum is all about. But I'm afraid I can't recognize your last point. Denormalization - how does this effect appear? What exactly do you mean with it?
All I see, but it's not P4 related, is the render-to-disk in Wavelab which misbehaves when using a (noise-profile-based) noise-killer: it cuts off high frequencies at low volume levels of the processed wave-file, something that doesn't happen when I run the wave through the filter at normal (playback) speed.
Cheers,
Rob

Sunshine · Post by **Sunshine** » Wed Oct 22, 2003 5:45 am

The denormalisation problem is a processing glitch where the CPU spikes to very high CPU load levels. Thsi happens especially when a plug is not being used or fades to silence (or simply when the song stops). This is due to a P4 feature called denormalisation. I was told you don`t necessarily have to experience this when using a P4, but some users do suffer from this symptom.

See the normalizer plug from fishphoes...
http://www.digitalfishphones.com/main.p ... &subItem=6

WayneSim · Post by **WayneSim** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 4:01 am

Looks like I have decided to go with these specs.

ASUS P4P800
2.6c CPU
1gb Ram 2x 512 Corsair TWINX (XMS3200C2)
40gb, 8mb buffer WD HDD
120gb, 8mb buffer SATA Seagate HDD

Thanks to this thread! With the cost of the Asus P4P800 being around half the price of the P4C800-E deluxe. I think I can't pass it up. Due to Andre Dupke comments, I think I will choose this board. Also with the price drops of intel's CPU's. This is working out to be perfect price wise. I will now have money to spend else where

. (like Project SAM's new Trumpet Libary)

Thanks to everyone who posted. A special thanks to both Andre Dupke and Rob van Berkel for their first hand insight into these motherboards.

Final comments people? I will be buying this system in 1-2 weeks. So you still have time to recommend something else

.

Nestor · Post by **Nestor** » Sun Oct 26, 2003 2:01 pm

I have this exact amount, kind and specification of RAM and I am very pleased! It's the very best choice you could posibly do...

Nestor · Post by **Nestor** » Sun Oct 26, 2003 2:08 pm

Yes! I would recomend you, strongly, to be careful about the way you installe everything. There is a method for it and it is best if you do follow a logical order.

We have already talked about it quite a few times in the forum.

GET A PROGRAM TO MAKE IMAGES OF YOUR "C" DRIVE!!!

As soon as you have installed your Windows and basic drivers, do an image with TrueImage software, it's great, easy and reliable.

I do not recomend you to use DriveImage, cos DriveImage 7 is having problems at the moment... TrueImages is much cheaper it does the same thing.

You will be in peace whatever it may happen... The only thing you ahve to do is to go back to your last image, and there you are... save and sound again! I have overcome many problems thourgh this method, and you don't need to be so careful when tweaking, you can try things without worring too much cos you know you can come back.

This truly is a great advice: do get TrueImage, build a partition exclusively for your images, and keep them separate from anything else, sometimes, burn your images into CD when you think they are perfect.

WayneSim · Post by **WayneSim** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 11:04 pm

no more final comments?

Are we all done, finished bidding, Last call, aaannnndddd SOLD. Now let me check with the owners