Occasionally, but infrequently, I observe high time load (150-250%) after selecting a song that normally would be in the 50-80% range. This is predictably accompanied by audio crackling and glitching. If I check Windows task manager, overall CPU utilization is always under 20%, which is where it always is. If I exit and reload Cantabile, select the same song, the time load is back in the normal range.
The only commonality I can see is the songs where this happens often have multiple Kontakt linked racks. (I know, I should avoid Kontakt for live performance.) The fact that this behavior is very sporadic and does not indicate high CPU load or competing tasks leads me to believe it might be a Cantabile issue. Has anyone ever seen this or have any recommendations (besides dumping Kontakt)?
This happens to me with some VSTi plugins like B-3X but I don’t use Kontakt so it’s not necessarily tied to that VSTi IMO. I did 2 things to help. First I found that simply cycling the engine off and back on would do the same as shutting down Cantabile. So I put a controller bar button with the load displayed on it that when pressed cycles the engine and corrects the problem. I think it must be some memory usage conflicts since it only happens when I load large setlists that pre-load the VSTis. Hope this helps..
@dave_dore yes, that definitely helps. I will try the engine recycling approach the next time this issue occurs. Can you post a screen shot and command/parameter settings for the controller bar button you mentioned? Thank you!
Thanks, Dave. I assume I have to be in Live mode for the controller bar button to be visible? If so, is there a way to get Cantabile to startup in Live mode?
I am answering my own question, for anyone who may want to start Cantabile in Live mode. The is a /livemode command line switch you can insert on your Cantabile shortcut.
FWIW I have a binding that cycles the Engine after 4 secs on startup. It’s in a “Soundcheck” song that’s the first song on every Set list… it has my main sounds for levels, but it also has bindings that set certain plugins to my defaults, cycles a problematic plugi, etc. Seems to run smoother that way. Project Lasso also helped.
Tom
Just a quick thought: are these songs actually changing the loaded sounds of these linked Kontakt racks? In that case, temporary overload would be an expected consequence of this use case: when you change the Kontakt content by loading a song (and consequently a Kontakt rack state), Kontakt will get busy purging old samples from memory and loading new ones. So I’d expect the system to be more than usually busy in that phase - resulting in drop-outs and time load, because processing is still waiting for Kontakt to get its act together.
If this is the case, the only real remedy is to have Kontakt racks that never change the loaded Kontakt status (as long as you have enough RAM to have them all loaded at the same time). That will avoid the re-loading of samples.
Alternative hypothesis: crowded RAM - too many samples loaded, so Windows needs to swap samples from RAM to disk cache. Have you checked your RAM utilization?
Just poking at the “Kontakt specificity” of the issue…
I have a few Kontakt linked racks that use instrument banks that change sounds by sending program change via bindings. I am uncertain whether instrument banks purge samples when a different instrument/slot is selected. The majority of my Kontakt racks do not change sounds, however.
The fact that @dave_dore (and possibly others) experience the same issue with non-Kontakt plugins or linked racks leads me to believe this issue is not specifically related to Kontakt.
I should reiterate that this problem is very sporadic. Using the same setlist and songs, I can go several gigs without having any time load issues. Then out of the blue, it happens, as it did on Friday night.
Once the high time load issue starts, it continues when other songs within the setlist are selected until I exit and restart Cantabile. Perhaps an engine restart would also resolve, something I will test the next time it happens.
I have a feeling that this is a Cantabile bug, as it occurs on two different Windows 11 25H2 laptops. I know @brad is working on a refactoring of the audio engine, so maybe it will be fixed when that is released.
