Logic Pro X is slow after installing SSD

Hello dear Logiquers,

 

my setup:

 

Logic Pro 10.0.7

OS X Mavericks 10.9.5

 

Mac Pro Mid 2010

12-core 2,93 GHz

32 GB RAM

Samsung 850 Pro SSD 512 GB

 

 

My Logic seems to be very laggy for some reason. That happens in following cases: When I load projects (while it loads plugins), when I quit Logic (even if no project was open), when I load plugins sometimes. In all these cases, the beach ball would appear. I don't understand this. It is a fresh install and I also added a Samsung SSD to my System. My score for the SSD is somewhere around 250-270 MB/s. I connected it directly to the board like a normal hard drive (thanks to the OWC SSD tray), so this isn't the issue I believe. Everything else seems quick.

 

So probably it has nothing to do with the SSD but just with Logic. Logic, as well as OS X and all plugins and libraries are installed on the SSD of my Mac Pro. App Nap is deactivated for Logic. I don't know what else I could do Perhaps someone knows more than me.

 

Many thanks, all help is much appreciated.

 

Edit: I noticed that when in the settings I turn off the "Core Audio", the problem is gone. It's sort of Logical when I open projects as the plugins don't load anymore, but the problem also disappears when I quit Logic, i.e. it quits instantly when Core Audio is turned off. Also, when I plug the headphones into the Mac (or when I take them out), it will tell me it is initializing the Core Audio. Is something wrong with the Mac perhaps?

What I forgot to say was also that this is a very small project I'm testing this with. 10-12 tracks or so. I am not even really using the Mac yet but just running tests to make sure everything runs okay!

What audio interface are you using? make sure you have their latest drivers for that for starters. maybe try resetting Logic preferences to default via http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT200260

I am using none yet, that's what is weird. Does that mean something is wrong with the built-in sound card?

I tried doing what the Link you gave me said, but none of that worked.

Your built-in is likely fine. Maybe one of the gurus here might have some further suggestions. As long as you have enough scratch disk space left on your drive and a good amount of ram, Logic should work normally unless you have a buggy plugin loading.

Is everything installed from scratch or did you use the migration assistant, clone, or time machine?

How is the disk formatted?

Is it set to GUID Partition table?

Yes I installed everything from scratch. Yes it is set to GUID Partition table!

I tried to reset the PRAM and also kill the core audio in the terminal, nothing helped.

Ok.

Just to exclude the Samsung SSD interaction from the equation.

Try making a clone using Super Duper to a spinning disk and boot you computer from that disk instead. Do you encounter the same issues?

Okay, can I make this clone on one of the internal drives of my Mac Pro?

This is going to take a while I guess. But just one thing I have to say – I noticed this is only happening with Logic, all other apps open instantly. When I mean all other apps then I'm talking about the apps that come with Mavericks, I don't have anything else to test on this Mac. But I'll install iPhoto and load all my photos into it to see how fast or slow it is. I think iPhoto is a rather heavy app, so I thought it would be good for a test!

 

Perhaps this way I can avoid making a clone? Also my SSD score seems reasonable for SATA II:

 

http://fs1.directupload.net/images/150113/jb67frh9.png

But I'll install iPhoto and load all my photos into it to see how fast or slow it is. I think iPhoto is a rather heavy app, so I thought it would be good for a test!

 

Perhaps this way I can avoid making a clone? Also my SSD score seems reasonable for SATA II:

 

I don't see the point in this.

If you want to exclude the SSD from the equation I would just do the clone.

It will not take that much time and it is pretty painless. It is also a great back-up to have if things go wrong.

 

It's probably not the SSD but it's a good thing to try out as a troubleshooting measure.

 

Okay, can I make this clone on one of the internal drives of my Mac Pro?

That's an optimal idea.

Yes, it went faster and simpler than I thought. Usually I am not a fan of these kinds of things, but it worked! So once everything was copied to the HDD, I booted from there and started Logic - but same problem appears, and everything is a bit slower as well of course. So it's something to do either with Logic or the audio interface.

 

Now I suppose I don't need this clone on the HDD anymore and can delete it, right?

Yes, you can delete the clone if you like.

So now that you have excluded the SSD itself you can continue trouble shooting.

 

Has spotlight indexed everything on your disk yet?

Have you tried using the supplied demo project to see if you encounter the same behaviour?

Thanks for your help Eric.

 

Spotlight doesn't seem to be indexing anything anymore.

I can't seem to find the demo, weird. But actually, it happens even if no project is loaded.

 

For example: Let's assume no project is open, and I would like to quit Logic. So I press CMD + Q, and the menu "Logic Pro X" would light up in dark blue logically. Usually this happens very quickly, in this case however, the menu stays blue for a while, the beach ball appears. Only after 10 seconds or so, Logic quits.

 

If the core audio in the Logic preferences isn't activated, this doesn't happen. But obviously I can't use Logic if the core audio is deactivated. So this seems to be completely independent of any plugins or projects.

But obviously I can't use Logic if the core audio is deactivated. So this seems to be completely independent of any plugins or projects.

 

Hello ,

 

maybe the issue is related to a plugin that is trying to search for updates or new content .

I had similar issues with AUDIOEASE Altiverb7 , when in its preferences the checkbox for updates was enabled.

Disabling this checkbox solved the issue.

 

You might check all your installed plugins for similar options in their particular preferences.

 

After disabling this option in the plugins quit Logic , then do "repair Diskpermission" and restart your computer.

 

Further , when the installed PlugIns on your system can be opened outside the DAW in standalone mode , you might

also deactivate its "App Nap" function.

 

 

Best wishes

Gerd

Hi Gerd,

 

thanks for those tips. Since I have Altiverb 7 as well, I immediately checked if updates were enabled. And in fact they were, so I switched them off. I also switched off AppNap on pretty much every other application installed got on this Mac.

 

I repaired permissions, and I also did a PRAM reset. Nothing changed sadly.

 

I did the PRAM reset because quite often, the volume would become laggy on my Mac. This usually happens at some point when I take off the headphones of the Mac for example. Most users manage to solve this problem by doing a kill audio core terminal command, for me this didn't work any of the times it happened. The only thing that helped was resetting the PRAM.

 

But if I have the headphones plugged in, the volume works normally. It really seems as if it was the Mac. Remember I bought this Mac used (from a seller, so I still have warranty) and anything could have had happened with it. I actually already sent the Mac back twice because of something else, and I also told them - since the Mac will be there already - to check the audio output for weird artifacts. I asked them so because I heard, and still hear, weird artifacts and blips. These are really hard to hear, the best way is to have headphones and the headphones turned to maximum. Perhaps I could record this somehow. They checked this and said everything was okay, no artifacts. So maybe it's really just the Cinema Display and other stuff around making these artifacts (note that it isn't a buzz or some noise, but really inconsistent, small, random artifacts and blip-sounds).

 

What I also noticed: When the sound is coming out of the Cinema Display (it's the 27" one), it makes a weird white noise sound. This isn't the case the whole time, but only when a sound is played. This could for example be the volume controls. You know, OS X makes those small sounds when you change the volume. At this point, the white noise would appear out of the Cinema Display, and this process would last around 30 seconds or more.

 

I noticed it also does that when I start Logic, yet there's no sound being played. I guess it's sort of like, the core audio getting activated or something. But I think that's the Cinema Display because I can't hear this in headphones, on a different monitor, or even from the Mac Pro.

 

It's all a big catastrophe basically.

Hey , sorry to hear that you still encounter the issues.

Is there any chance for you to get an external (USB) AUDIO interface ?

Just to check if the issues still exist when using a different Audio Driver than Core Audio .

 

 

Maybe MAVERICKS itself is also part of the equation. I remember that some users ( MacBook Pro / iMac) reported CoreAudio issues with OS Mavericks ( ... suddenly loosing AUDIO when playing back Videos, etc. ... )

 

Two other thoughts:

 

1. Turn Off Wifi completely

2. Do you use any external Harddrives via Firewire800 connection ?

Unplug all FW800 devices , then start your mac and see if the issues are gone.

 

Well , good luck.

 

Best

Gerd

Hey, no I do not use an external audio interface at the moment, but I am planing to get one. I would like to get the RME Babyface, but I can't afford a new one sadly. So I am looking out for a second hand one. I found one for a good price, so I might be able to test it with the Mac soon.

 

Hmm… I don't think that Mavericks is the problem, I have been using it with Logic Pro since it came out. Even if this specific version of Logic Pro X had problems with this specific version of OS X Mavericks, I believe I wouldn't be alone with this issue?

 

But who knows, perhaps I need to reinstall audio drivers for Mavericks? It would be weird, however, because I basically downloaded the latest Mavericks version from the App Store, made a bootable USB drive and installed it. There's little that can go wrong here I think.

 

Other than that, I turned off Wifi, disconnected a FireWire 800 connected external HD, and also disconnected all licenser keys and my KORG keyboard. Repaired permissions once again (you never know), did a PRAM reset once again, but the issue is still here.

 

Since I don't have an audio interface yet, I decided to connect the Mac to a TV. (Panasonic Viera) From what I understood (and from my logical thinking), the TV acts as its own audio interface, since it must have one as well. So I selected the sound output, etc. as the Panasonic, but the problem persists. I think this is the sign it can't be my built-in sound card, can it?

Hello guys,

 

today I updated Logic to version 10.1.0 – the issue is still there. Can I completely exclude Logic as the culprit?

 

Thanks a lot!

Not sure if this has anything to do with your issue but I heard you have to have a trim enabler on mac if you upgrade the hd to ssd.

Yup I enabled trim. I don't know exactly how trim works, so who knows, but I don't think its the SSD. I should change the title.

Trim should not impact things at all to that degree.

It's something else on your system that seems off.

 

I would check the Console and see if there is something logged at the time stamp when you encounter these problems.

What happens if you lower the amount of cores in Logic's preferences to 4 or something.

 

Are these projects all created in Logic Pro X or are they imports from older LP9 projects?

What kind of 3rd party plug-ins do you use?

How is the computer configured? Other drives? Samples???

No, they are new projects, and like I said, it also happens if no projects are open at all (if Logic is open (without any open project) and I want to quit it, the beach ball appears and it takes a while to quit).

 

Everything stays the same if I set it to 4 cores/8 threads. It was set to "auto" before, I've now set it to 24 threads. I noticed that not all cores are being used:

 

 

I am not sure if that is normal, I believe it would be more consistent throughout all the cores? If it's set to 4cores/8 threads, all of them will be used.

 

The plugins I use are those by FabFilter, Spectrasonics Trilian, Nexus, ANA Synth, Spire Synth, lots of small stuff…

The computer has two drives: An SSD with Logic Pro X, Mac OS X installed on it, and an HDD, with almost nothing on it at the moment.

 

As for the console:

 

When I start Logic, I get a mDNSResponder error. This has something to do with the internet. I also get another message at the same time which is the same as in this thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=102462&start=20

09-12-13 14:52:27,872 Logic Pro X[1485]: 14:52:27.871 WARNING: [0x7fff749a9310] >compload> AudioComponentPluginLoader.cpp:662: RegisterComponentsFromArray:

But the user there seems it's nothing to worry about.

 

I turned Wifi off, but the errors still appear. I thought maybe it has to do with eLicenser and iLok?

 

EDIT

Also got different errors in the console now:

 

22.01.15 22:19:57,652 WindowServer[105]: disable_update_timeout: UI updates were forcibly disabled by application "Logic Pro X" for over 1.00 seconds. Server has re-enabled them.

 

22.01.15 01:52:01,742 Logic Pro X[758]: Invalid color System, labelColor (warning given only once)

 

EDIT 2

The mDNS responder error seems to be gone after repairing permissions of the SSD.

Another small update, i think this could perhaps tell if it's a hardware or software issue.

 

I was working on a project, when suddenly, all virtual instruments started distorting when I was playing them on the MIDI keyboard. There's around 30 virtual instruments. I hit play and everything worked again, I can also play them normally again without distortion. This happens here and there it seems.

 

But I remember when I first installed the SSD, I wanted to try out the Logic Benchmark Test Project, to see if my score was higher than without SSD. (in fact it was much lower)

 

I noticed that at this point, there was a lot of distortion going on. As if the internal sound card couldn't handle it.

 

I think it's broken, right? I'm still searching for an interface, but this will take some time. The Mac is still under warranty.

 

Thanks!!

I can't understand why you are still on mavericks?, if i was you i would remove all 3rd party software from your machine then update to the newest yosemite OS then just use logic 10.1 by itself to see how it runs, then if its working good install your 3rd party stuff one by one checking to see which ones cause issues.., i use an old 2008 MacBook Pro and she runs fantastic!.. i use all sorts of 3rd party plugins and have no issues and if i do start having troubles i remove the au components to find the culprits.., but then again maybe its just your ssd thats the problem!?.

 

 

Another small update, i think this could perhaps tell if it's a hardware or software issue.

 

I was working on a project, when suddenly, all virtual instruments started distorting when I was playing them on the MIDI keyboard. There's around 30 virtual instruments. I hit play and everything worked again, I can also play them normally again without distortion. This happens here and there it seems.

 

But I remember when I first installed the SSD, I wanted to try out the Logic Benchmark Test Project, to see if my score was higher than without SSD. (in fact it was much lower)

 

I noticed that at this point, there was a lot of distortion going on. As if the internal sound card couldn't handle it.

 

I think it's broken, right? I'm still searching for an interface, but this will take some time. The Mac is still under warranty.

 

Thanks!!

Pretty sure it isn't a software issue. Yosemite is unstable and ugly, that's why I won't use it. Mavericks is the most advanced Apple OS right now and the most stable at that.

Have you tried Yosemite yet?.. how can you possibly say that when you haven't even tried yosemite on your machine yet?.. just make backups give yosemite a go and you never know you might just have to eat those words!.. if it doesn't work out go back to mavericks then!.. what do you have to lose when your machine sounds stuffed anyways!.

 

 

Pretty sure it isn't a software issue. Yosemite is unstable and ugly, that's why I won't use it. Mavericks is the most advanced Apple OS right now and the most stable at that.

Well, did you read the thread? It worked for long enough before on Mavericks. For over a year to be precise. This is either a logic issue, plugin issue maybe/iLok issue, or a hardware issue.

Yes and In your signature its says Logic Pro 10.1.0 which has been optimised for yosemite not mavericks.

 

 

Well, did you read the thread? It worked for long enough before on Mavericks. For over a year to be precise. This is either a logic issue, plugin issue maybe/iLok issue, or a hardware issue.

But the thread also says it's been happening before which means updating did not change anything…

Hello,

 

 

It's been quite a while now, but I still have this problem. Perhaps someone knows a solution.

 

I have deleted everything from my boot drive, I've made a clean install of OS X, and a clean install of Logic. Everything is fresh and new.

Yet, the problem still occurs. Can this be real?

 

The problem is that Logic behaves weirdly. Some other audio stuff behaves weirdly as well. Here's how Logic behaves:

 

The app (Logic Pro X) opens up instantly. When loading projects, the beach ball appears and it takes a while to load. (longer than it should!) As if Logic was frozen for a short time. Projects close instantly as well. Quitting Logic however takes quite a while - again, the beach ball appears, everything seems to freeze, only after 30 seconds it quits successfully. I never needed to force quit Logic. When changing the audio output by ALT-clicking the volume icon in the menu bar (for example between the speakers of my Cinema Display, and my BabyFace), the beach ball appears again and it takes a while to change this setting. The beach ball issue with Logic also happens when the BabyFace is not connected, nor any drivers installed. The Mac is freshly set up now. It's a catastrophe.

 

Superman, where are you?

This is really strange and must be very frustrating. I think you've come this far, it is worth trying a system update to Yosemite and all the latest versions to rule it out. You can always roll back if it doesn't fix the problem. Other than that, the only thing I can think of is a hardware problem. If the problem remains I'd have Apple run an extended hardware scan on your machine overnight and see what turns up.