daveohiggins Posted June 20, 2022 Share Posted June 20, 2022 (edited) Hi Guys Running an iMac with spec as below Model Name: iMac, Quad-Core Intel Core i7, 4 GHz, Total Number of Cores: 4, L3 cache 8MB. Recently upgraded from Mojave to Big Sur. Haven't had any issues with cores/ thread etc for years now. And yet when I imported 60 audio file stems from a project into Logic just now, the track can't play for more than 5 seconds before crashing. The CPU cores are not even registering as being used significantly- yet the I/O disk is maxed out to the very top the whole time. (See screenshots 1 and 2) Not a single plugin in sight, by the way - just dry tracks. No busses, no processing, nada. Just audio files. To be clear - I know all about the buffer size / audio prefs issues and have tried them all. I've rebooted several times, I've even tried different projects - with way more plugins, and similar amounts of audio files - and the threads are all divided beautifully amongst themselves, with the I/O disk not even registering, except on hitting 'start' or 'stop'. And all those other projects work perfectly. (Also see screenshot 3) Also all other apps are closed and I've reset preferences so that's not the issue. As I said, it only happoens with this project and these 60 audio files. i've also tried importing the files into new projects and still the same issue. Totally mystified with this one. Ideas? Thanks! DoH Edited June 20, 2022 by daveohiggins changed title Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atlas007 Posted June 20, 2022 Share Posted June 20, 2022 8MB of RAM may not suffice to hold that project in RAM… In such a case Logic may try to use virtual RAM on your HD. If that is the situation, either your HD isn’t fast enough to handle all the streaming/swapping that represents and/or the free space on your HD isn’t enough for same. Normally one should keep the HD free space to higher than 15% of its total capacity (providing also that free space is large enough in terms of GB for the job at hand…). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted June 20, 2022 Author Share Posted June 20, 2022 Hey Atlas, Thanks for the quick reply. I take your point - except that other projects these last two years - some of which have just as many audio files AND loads of open plugins / busses etc, with CPU intensive reverbs and delays etc - have worked absolutely perfectly, with all 4 threads humming nicely? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polanoid Posted June 20, 2022 Share Posted June 20, 2022 (edited) Just guessing here, but maybe Logic does some (level? tempo? pitch?) analysis on the imported files in the background? So, what happens if you let Logic do its thing for an hour or so after importing the files? Does the I/O activity get back to normal at some point? Also, are the files on a slow disk drive (i.e. not an SSD)? Edited June 20, 2022 by polanoid Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted June 20, 2022 Author Share Posted June 20, 2022 10 minutes ago, polanoid said: Just guessing here, but maybe Logic does some (level? tempo? pitch?) analysis on the imported files in the background? So, what happens if you let Logic do its thing for an hour or so after importing the files? Does the I/O activity get back to normal at some point? Also, are the files on a slow disk drive (i.e. not an SSD)? Great points! Thanks Polaroid. As to the second one, the files are on the main iMac drive so it's not an SSD issue. Re the first, I wenmt out for a couple of hours, came back, still the same. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
des99 Posted June 20, 2022 Share Posted June 20, 2022 Is this an iMac with a proper SSD, or a Fusion drive? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zplane Posted June 22, 2022 Share Posted June 22, 2022 Just wondering if disk I/O meter overloads when the main/arrange window shows the playhead is scrolling and hits the start of the audio file regions (which may not be at the very beginning or measure 1 in the project). One test would be to copy the entire project to an external drive and see if the overload happens the same way. You may have already done so, but I would try maximum audio buffer size, large process buffer, processing threads set to automatic, multithreading set to playback only and summing set to 32 bit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted June 22, 2022 Author Share Posted June 22, 2022 Hi guys thanks for the suggestions and questions. @des99, it's a fusion drive 16GB memory installed. And@zplane, tried all that re buffer / threads, 32 bit summing early on, but no dice. Update - I had to get the project done, so I froze as many tracks as I could (even though none had a single plugin on them!) and managed to get some workflow, unfreezing those I needed to process. This will remain a mystery - never seen anything like it before or since . Thanks again everyone, DoH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
des99 Posted June 22, 2022 Share Posted June 22, 2022 (edited) 30 minutes ago, daveohiggins said: @des99, it's a fusion drive Ok, there's likely the source of your problem - you're drive bandwidth is maxed out, the audio files are likely coming from the spinning rust part of the drive. Put them on a proper SSD, and you'll likely get your disk I/O bandwidth back. Fusion SSD drives are not a good fit for audio purposes, generally. They are less predictable because you have no idea what it's going to shuttle between the SSD and the slower drive, and have a history of performance problems... Edited June 22, 2022 by des99 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted July 11, 2022 Author Share Posted July 11, 2022 On 6/22/2022 at 5:15 PM, des99 said: Ok, there's likely the source of your problem - you're drive bandwidth is maxed out, the audio files are likely coming from the spinning rust part of the drive. Put them on a proper SSD, and you'll likely get your disk I/O bandwidth back. Fusion SSD drives are not a good fit for audio purposes, generally. They are less predictable because you have no idea what it's going to shuttle between the SSD and the slower drive, and have a history of performance problems... Hi des99, Normally i'd agree with you but if you were right, all other projects - most of which have way more data plugz / audio files in them than this particular one - would also have problems, even more serious. But they all run absolutely fine despite them being off the same drive.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
des99 Posted July 11, 2022 Share Posted July 11, 2022 All I can do is surmise from the info you provide - I can't compare with your other projects to make those determinations. I also don't know what files your OS puts in the SSD and in the spinning part of the drive, or how it swaps those things around, or how your various projects may or may not stress this. In those other projects, have you also "frozen as many tracks as you could" in them? Frozen tracks are 32f files, not 24-bit audio, and so require more disk throughput/bandwidth per track. As you are exhausting your disk throughput, you'll need to take steps to reduce this - unfreezing tracks would be an obvious test to see whether performance improves. If you can't unfreeze them properly because the projects are so large and CPU heavy that you can't run the projects otherwise, then instead bounce them to disk as 24-bit audio files, which will reduce both CPU load of plugins, and disk bandwidth. The bottom line is, your disk meter clearly shows you are close to maxing out the available drive bandwith, so you'll need to take steps to reduce this for this particular project. Very few people would recommend running DAW projects off a Fusion drive, they have had notoriously poor performance. If it's been OK for you to date, then great, but it seems you are now hitting those performance limits, that you probably wouldn't if you were running of a straight SSD. That's all I can suggest. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted July 12, 2022 Author Share Posted July 12, 2022 Thanks. No, I didn't need to freeze any tracks ever on any other project. It may be an issue of having to read this partyicular project's files from a different location, who knows. Anyhow thanks a lot for all the input! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted October 20, 2022 Author Share Posted October 20, 2022 (edited) On 7/11/2022 at 4:10 PM, des99 said: All I can do is surmise from the info you provide - I can't compare with your other projects to make those determinations. I also don't know what files your OS puts in the SSD and in the spinning part of the drive, or how it swaps those things around, or how your various projects may or may not stress this. In those other projects, have you also "frozen as many tracks as you could" in them? Frozen tracks are 32f files, not 24-bit audio, and so require more disk throughput/bandwidth per track. As you are exhausting your disk throughput, you'll need to take steps to reduce this - unfreezing tracks would be an obvious test to see whether performance improves. If you can't unfreeze them properly because the projects are so large and CPU heavy that you can't run the projects otherwise, then instead bounce them to disk as 24-bit audio files, which will reduce both CPU load of plugins, and disk bandwidth. The bottom line is, your disk meter clearly shows you are close to maxing out the available drive bandwith, so you'll need to take steps to reduce this for this particular project. Very few people would recommend running DAW projects off a Fusion drive, they have had notoriously poor performance. If it's been OK for you to date, then great, but it seems you are now hitting those performance limits, that you probably wouldn't if you were running of a straight SSD. That's all I can suggest. Hi Des99 and all, Circling back here as this issue has reared its head again. When I posted the problem a few months back I had 16GB of RAM. I took advice and upgraded to 32GB of RAM but this pesky issue keeps happening on large projects and it's SOOOO frustrating. More spec details are below APPLE SSD SM0128G: Capacity: 121.33 GB (121,332,826,112 bytes) Model: APPLE SSD SM0128G Revision: BXW1PA0 Native Command Queuing: Yes Queue Depth: 32 Removable Media: No Detachable Drive: No BSD Name: disk0 Medium Type: Solid State TRIM Support: Yes Bay Name: SSD Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table) SMART status: Verified Question: Am I right in saying this is an SSD fusion drive? Should I be thinking of buying an external SSD, and if so, what minimum spec should i be looking for? It's been mentioned that an SSD with 1TB and a transfer rate of 560MB per second will sort all my problems. Also should I be connecting it with my iMac via USB C or Thunderbolt? And finally - should I be running the whole Logic project off this external drive - i.e. the song file itself, along with all the associated audio files? Or Logic song on the iMac, but accessing the associated audio files off the external SSD? Thanks for any help here, would dearly love to sort this issue once and for all 😉 DoH Edited October 20, 2022 by daveohiggins Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
des99 Posted October 20, 2022 Share Posted October 20, 2022 (edited) Yes, it's a Fusion drive (from a quick Googling), and as was said above, is probably the root of your performance problems. Ideally, you want your system running of an SSD, rather than a spinning drive, so if you can replace it with a proper SSD, so much the better, as your system will benefit from it. For an external SSD, the spec doesn't really matter that much, a good SSD will outperform your existing drive. Use whatever interface you have available, as longs as it's fast and modern, it shouldn't matter that much. I'd keep the project and audio files together in the same folder/package for ease of archiving, so keep the projects and assets on the SSD. Edited October 31, 2022 by des99 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveohiggins Posted October 31, 2022 Author Share Posted October 31, 2022 @des99, Thanks so much for this insight. Really helpful! Any SSD favourite picks / recommendations? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
des99 Posted October 31, 2022 Share Posted October 31, 2022 No recommendations, it would depend on your needs, budget, where you can buy from and what part of the world you're in. When I bought an SSD for my previous Mac, I bought it from Crucial, and it's been fine for my needs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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