Owing to gremlins in my “meat & potatoes” song file I am forced to rebuild it.
The brief is:
4 or 5 instances of Pianoteq
1 or 2 instances of VB3
5 or 6 instances of synths OB-XD and/or Tyrell N6
Thus far I have had them all loaded into one song as embedded racks, toggling each on/off as needed, and all on the same MIDI channel (1).
I won’t go into the details of the issues I’ve been having as they are noted elsewhere, but since I’m rebuilding I wonder whether there’s a better way. I’m using Solo rather than performer.
Would it be better to have them all running constantly, on individual MIDI channels, and achieving rack changes via by changing MIDI channel sent from my controller? I had assumed the load on my CPU would be better with the running/suspended approach I’ve been using thus far, but am not knowledgeable on this.
If there’s a better solution I’m open to suggestions. Song switching is an option, but I prefer the simplicity of toggling instruments on/off (i.e. need a grand for this song, Rhodes for the next, then B3 etc) as my song requirements are simple (no layering or splits in general).
I think the solution may depend in part on your computer and interface. If everything runs fine while all are on and not suspended, then sure you could switch with channels. Or just turn the routes on/off (I’d use Song States, or a song level binding triggered by a button or note or whatever). FWIW I haven’t run into any issues doing it the way you formerly did it, with embedded racks, using Song states to switch. However, like you, I have had song files get corrupted or suddenly develop issues. Digging into the issue and figuring out which plugin is causing the problem was key to a solution. OTOH I have had song file issues where I believe the file got corrupted or whatever from copying it over too many times; I’d take a basic file from another song, save it as the new song, adjust as needed. It sound like you use just one song file for everything so this may not apply to you, but after doing that for a few years and getting some occasional problems I start new songs from a very basic template or from scratch, and haven’t had any issues since. Hope that helps somewhat!
T
There’s certainly no reason why one can’t use channel-switching, if the computer can run all the instruments at once. However, if my understanding of the term “instance” is the same as yours, you are talking about having 10-13 VSTs live at one time, correct? I would be pleasantly surprised if your CPU could handle this load under all situations. And you would need to rigorously test all the possible scenarios to make sure that some combination of programs previously loaded into the unused VSTs doesn’t push the overall setup past the limits.
If you’re looking to run only one song, I would consider suspending the unused pieces to save CPU bandwidth. If you are curious whether this is really necessary, create a song with all the elements running, then play with switching MIDI channels while watching the load in the Monitor. In particular, look at the Time Load: if it’s exceeding 90% you might have problems; if it regularly goes beyond 100% then your setup is poised for problems – even if it ‘seems to work OK’ in the tests.
Do you have a spare knob or other control on your MIDI controller that you could use as a ‘program change’ command? For that matter, does your controller support sending program changes? If so, you could consider using MIDI program change (PC) to select the sound you want and disable the others:
ex:
PC0-9 – grand piano
PC10-19 – Rhodes
PC20-29 – Clavinet
PC30-39 – Hammond Organ
PC40-49 – Synth #1
etc
I do this for my bass sounds, because I use Moog’s Mariana for synth bass, and it’s kind of a ‘resource hog.’ I give each of my bass VSTs a range to store the sounds I need. In the case of the Mariana, it’s relegated to PC20-29, and I use a binding to suspend it when any other PC is called. (My other bass VSTs are disabled whenever PC20-29 is active, too.)
@drawbars you are right re “instances” that I would have to have 16 or so all running. Thus far (before my master file went wrong) I have only had 1 or 2 running at a time. Suspect there will be issues if I go for the midi channel change option.
Thanks for explaining the PC option - I had always intended to go down this route but ran out of energy trying to understand it - seemed so simple to bind a button to toggle running/suspended on each rack but PC is more elegant. I’ll give it a try
you are right re “instances” that I would have to have 16 or so all running. Thus far (before my master file went wrong) I have only had 1 or 2 running at a time. Suspect there will be issues if I go for the midi channel change option.
Yes, I have two PCs running Cantabile in my one-man-band: a Gen12-i5 dedicated to guitar, bass, and drums; and a Gen13-i5 dedicated to synths and Leslie sim. To date, I have never been able to get more than 5-7 VSTs running at once without occasional glitches. If you can get 16 VSTs running happily on your rig, you have an awesome setup!
As mentionned, 4-5 instances of PTeq is a lot for this kind of instruments!
I would understand 2 intances to avoid Reverb tails and sustain cutted abrupty when using program change, but more than 2 in live situation shows bad ressources management.
I wouldn’t be so critical here - I guess this is just a way to work within the limitations of the Solo version. Instead of using rack state changes to switch sounds, simply have multiple instances with different sounds - and as long as RAM is not an issue, this could work out.
Of course, baseload adds up even for non-playing plugins, but if you deactivate them when not playing, even that goes away. What remains is a bit of overload risk when switching.
Personally, I couldn’t live without the Performer features, but as always with Cantabile, there are multiple legitimate ways to get things done…
Thanks for all the help here. I think my master song was overworked with the various instances of plugins. I’ve started to work on having each instrument as its own song and, so far, am glitch-free. No doubt an upgrade to Performer will follow soon…
