I was hoping that someone may be able to point me in the right direction here..  I think I may be asking a lot (too much) of my CPU but I want to make sure before I go breaking down my scores, etc.

What I would like:
Full scores for marching band [Winds / Brass / Battery / Front Ensemble] in one file which will play back together in real time using Garritan Marching Band and VDL 2.5.  I would like to be able to write my 6 1/2 minute show all within 1 score (file) and use rehearsal letters from beginning to end. 

What is happening:
Playback becomes distorted / choppy / glitchy.  Sometimes spin wheels after start/stop.  Sometimes freezes.  Sometimes crashes.

I am wondering if my settings are wrong, or if I could tweak something within Kontakt? 

My system details:
Sib 5.2
VDL 2.5
Mac OS 10.5.7
17"; MacBook Pro: 2.16 Ghz Intel Core Duo
2 GB 667 Mhz DDR2 SdRam
All Kontakt sounds are stored on my external FW400HD

Any recommendations?

Thanks!

-Chris

Try setting your latency a bit higher. Sounds like your processor isn't able to keep up with the load you're giving it. 

Thanks, Bryan.

A 2.16 isn't strong enough?  I thought this MBP was pretty souped up and would be able to handle it?

Where in Sibelius / Kontakt do I go to set the latency?

What about ";purged mode";?  Are there any settings I should be looking into other then latency?

Thanks again,
Chris

What is the data transfer rate to and from your external hard drive? Is it fast enough to handle the DFD properly?

Good call, Hugh. I'll bet that's it. If it's not at least 7200rpm, that's probably the issue. Also, make sure you try experimenting with different DFD settings.

I think it's a RAM issue.  I have a MacBook Pro and I went from 2 to 4 GB RAM and it helped a lot with large projects.

Three things:

#1- increase the buffer size

[img]http://img.skitch.com/20090811-emw252r1g8qab4p53h95k4uqqw.jpg[/img]

#2- change DFD settings to use the RAM more.  (I'm not sure what the other settings do)

[img]http://img.skitch.com/20090811-b73yak427g8srybpjp65n3r84h.jpg[/img]

#3- reboot, then don't run any other programs while you're working.

[quote author=Bryan Harmsen link=topic=3262.msg17274#msg17274 date=1250020322]
Good call, Hugh. I'll bet that's it. If it's not at least 7200rpm, that's probably the issue. Also, make sure you try experimenting with different DFD settings.

[/quote]

Yup, definitely want a 7200rpm drive, even more-so if external.


The other thought I had earlier was about how the external drive is connected to the computer. USB 2.0, Firewire, eSata through PCMCIA card bus (or whatever the Mac equivalent is??)? These various transfer methods don't run at the same speeds.

Sometimes it's fun trying to find the (hopefully only) one bottleneck that can slow everything down.

I haven't tried it yet myself, but someone last year some time posted that he was able to get satisfactory results by putting the samples on a USB flash drive.

currently this is the only 500 GB 7,200 rpm laptop hard drive out right now, and it's pretty cheap at $120.  It's also about as fast as you can get without getting a very expensive SSD.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148374

Thanks for the help, everyone.

What I have is an external HD called the g-drive mini.  It's 250gb and is running 400mbs via firewire or 480mbs thru high speed USB.  It is (ugh) 5400rpm.

So my next question would be whether or not I should move the library back onto my internal HD? 

My internal drive is a FUJITSU MHV2120BHPL and is also only 5400rpm?  I pushed all of the files to the external because I figured it would help me save some drive space.

BTW: G drive does make 7200rpm (i'm pretty sure I don't own it) externals..  How would I check to make sure of my drive specs? 

http://www.google.com/products/catalog?client=safari&rls=en-us&q=g+drive+mini&oe=UTF-8&um=1&ie=UTF-8&cid=14107692227072275446&ei=A9GCSqH1O4faNvT4mKML&sa=X&oi=product_catalog_result&ct=result&resnum=6#ps-sellers

You would probably benefit from having your library on your primary drive.

I just wrote up a little explanation since a lot of people ask this.  [url=https://www.tapspace.com/forums/index.php?topic=3265.0]Click here[/url]