Are you on a Mac?

I recognize these problems and they occur whenever I try something in ProTools on my MacBook. When recording I cannot get a decent latency without these overloads. HW buffer and CPU usage limit, 2 processors all of that doesn't seem to matter much.

Asusming you are on a Mac, Did you try the simple tweaks?
1. Turn off software update
2. Turn off energy saver
3. Disable spotlight indexing
4. Disable spotlight shortcuts
5. Disable dashboard shortcuts

This is very strange. You should be able to do this surfing the web and waching a video on your machine.

Try to make another session and import session data from your current session and see if its the same.

I don't know about the OP but I tried that. It doesn't seem to matter. It also seems to get worse over time.

cfaalm wrote: Are you on a Mac?

I recognize these problems and they occur whenever I try something in ProTools on my MacBook. When recording I cannot get a decent latency without these overloads. HW buffer and CPU usage limit, 2 processors all of that doesn't seem to matter much.

Asusming you are on a Mac, Did you try the simple tweaks?
1. Turn off software update
2. Turn off energy saver
3. Disable spotlight indexing
4. Disable spotlight shortcuts
5. Disable dashboard shortcuts

Except for turning off sleep modes, there shoud be no need to disable anything else.

How much RAM do you have? Of course you ARE recording to a drive other than your system drive.

Because of the low track count of PTLE it should not be overloading resouses in that manner.

I use Logic Pro with sessions of 48+ tracks, never seen the cpu meters go above 30%.

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i was able to bounce when i brought the session into a new file 16/44k. I used audio suite instead of plugins. Still boggled. I tried putting my mac hard drive on the do not search area of spotlight but it would not go. WTF? also to note that I accidently deleted Grabber many moons ago, I'm not sure what that i'll cause? I've never seen the cpu usage in protools get to 30%, but yet theres a CPU overload.

Still sounds strange, if you have added 3rd party RAM try reseating it.

Also run the hardware test disk that came with your machine.

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this is bugging me out. It doesn't make any sense.

So this is a new problem and is happening globally on every other song of mine. I'm so frustrated I could cry. I have just cleaned out all the excess programs on my mac and the problem still exists. istat shows me using only 35% of memory and CPU is fine. GRRRRRR> Please help as digidesign prolly won't care to help.

Reinstall protools ?

I'm afraid to do that. I don't know why. I remember the first time I put it on and I had to verify everything and I don't want to go through that again.

This happened to me; it turns out that the RAM the company installed was mismatched. You might need to take it to a qualified Mac repair shop, expecially if it's under warrenty.

Mismatched RAM causing a CPU error? Can you elaborate?

If you run the hardware test disk it will detect and report any specific hardware problem. Do that First then you will know.

There is no need to erase apps of your HD OSX apps do not create conflicts with one another.

Trash your PTLE preferences and repair permissions.

I also suspect BAD or failing RAM.

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http://www.digidesign.com/index.cfm?langid=100&navid=54&itemid=23611

Set your DAE at the default level.

Go here and ask:

http://duc.digidesign.com/

everything except pro-tools runs great. I'm still a little worried about re-installing PT. Seems risky, is it?

gdoubleyou wrote:

Also run the hardware test disk that came with your machine.

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Is this any different than Apple/about this mac/more info? Also, I got 2 CDs with the MacBook. Which one is the test disk?

Yes it actually exercises certain hardware functions.

Depends on your specific machine what disk it's on.

On the install disk that came with my Mini the fist disk has labeling that says to depress the "D" key while booting.

8-) 8)

When is someone going to answer my question about reinstalling pro-tools?

Halifaxsoundguy wrote: When is someone going to answer my question about reinstalling pro-tools?

I've never had to reinstall any apps because of glitch in over a decade, that's more of a windows approach. Usually just trash the preferences and restart the app fixes most problems.

If I was going to do a re-install I would start with a clean install of the OS first.

I only do clean Install when a new major release of OSX occurs, then it's to an external drive for testing before I eventually move over to it full time.

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I have re-install PT on my pc and it's fine. I don't see why it would be any different with a mac..

back up your IO settings if you have made your own first..

What version of PT are you using?

Music_Junky wrote: I have re-install PT on my pc and it's fine. I don't see why it would be any different with a mac..

back up your IO settings if you have made your own first..

What version of PT are you using?

That's a drastic measure on a Mac usually trashing preferences and reparing permissions will remedy 99% of software glitches.

I still bet it's hardware, most likely failing or not recognized RAM, Macs are finicky with some brands of RAM.

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So my personal life has been turned upside down then shaken in the last 3 months that I had to backburner most of my life (which includes this problem). Now back to normal, I did an uninstall then re-install of protools (with updates). Still i'm flustered. I get the "increase h/w buffer size" about a minute into playback of a session. The session i'm using was one I made before all these issues using the exact same hardware. People in posts above are saying "trashing preferences and reparing permissions will remedy 99% of software glitches. " I don't understand how to do that.

I so badly want to be recording again :(

Go to your applications folder, then the utilities folder. In there is a program called Disc Utility.app. Run that by double clicking it. Highlight the correct disc volume (you may only have one, usually Macintosh HD) then hit the Repair Disk Permissions button.

Here's a link on how to trash your preferences.

http://aroundcny.com/technofile/texts/mac031704.html

Hope this fixes you up, but my money would be on flakey RAM. Try this anyway.

its factory ram, I've never touched it.

Apparently, even the good stuff can go bad once in a while.

But only PT is affected, wouldn't bad ram cause global terror on my machine?

I went to : MacintoshHD/Library/preferences . I have found a file called " com.digidesign.mbox2.prefpane.plist " is this a preference file. I've never done this so I just worry about losing stuff. I pretty good at f$*king up PC's.

VonRocK wrote: Go to your applications folder, then the utilities folder. In there is a program called Disc Utility.app. Run that by double clicking it. Highlight the correct disc volume (you may only have one, usually Macintosh HD) then hit the Repair Disk Permissions button.

I did this and I'm getting promissing results. Golly I hope this works. Still iffy on the trash the pref (lack of competence) thanks for everything thus far.

If you have updated your OSX to the latest version before Leopard, then fixing the pre-binding might also help. Actually, you should not update your OSX unless Digidesign tells you it is safe. You can find details on their site.

I will try what VonRock wrote too.

haven't got the new OS yet. Are you having a similar problem?

Halifaxsoundguy wrote: Still iffy on the trash the pref (lack of competence) thanks for everything thus far.

The article suggests that you MOVE (not copy) that file onto your desktop if you are unsure about this process.

You could just rename it by appending a letter or number to the file name, or changing the extension (that's the part after the . )

By trashing the preferences of a particular program, you will loose any of the 'out of the box' settings that you have changed. The program will remake the file when you start it up again, just like the first day you installed it.

I wimped out and called mac support, they helped me to "trash the prefs". I'm about to start work on a new song tonight so i'll know if PT is still acting up.

SWEET MERCYFUL F@%K!!!!!

It's still doing it. Lets reiterate shall we. I have one track in pro-tools with no plug-ins, when I play it back an error comes through saying to increase the hardware buffer even though the hardware buffer is set to its highest level. session is 24/44k. To remedy I've trashed the prefs, re-installed pro-tools and updates, passed tech-tool deluxe, repaired disk permissions on my HD. WTF, WTF??? I am so over-frustrated with this problem. Help me out what haven't I done. My whole setup is completely useless now (it sucks now because I have a ton of free time for recording now).

I lost my mac setup disks but new ones should arrive at the end of the week. I guess theres a setup utility that checks the RAM.

All my gear worked fantastic for a long time. WTF?

:(

Someone already asked you - do you write audio on extrernal drive ?
Or on your iMac internal HD ?

internal HD. Its all fucked today, h/w buffer is underflowing instead of overflowing, the clocks between the mbox and protools are out sync even though they are set to the same setting. I guess i'm not meant to have a nice recording setup.

internal HD.

If it is the system drive no wonder you get CPU errors. I don't want
to generalize, but all people I know to use ProTools use an external FireWire drives as "write" volumes.
So, how many internal HDs do you have in your iMac ? Not the
partitions, the physically separate HDs ?

Costy wrote:

internal HD.

If it is the system drive no wonder you get CPU errors. I don't want
to generalize, but all people I know to use ProTools use an external FireWire drives as "write" volumes.
So, how many internal HDs do you have in your iMac ? Not the
partitions, the physically separate HDs ?

none. I just bought a macbook thats slightly faster but less hard drive space so I will be getting a ext. HD.

Thanks costy for your observation, I have been learning so much stuff from this post.

I just a search in machelp about partitioning a HD. It is something I have to do when I first load the OS on the machine. This is not something I'm keen of doing again. I spent all last weekend reinstalling the os on my old iMac and new macbook, it was lengthy to get this new computer up and running with all my programs and settings.

So let me get this straight, having an external drive is similar to having a partitioned HD? And you would specify this in Protools preferences?

So let me get this straight, having an external drive is similar to having a partitioned HD?

No, partitioning a hard drive is really no different than having two really big folders on the same drive - it won't help your issue.

Don't bother partitioning it, get an external.

Edit> I haven't bothered partitioning in a few years. There are a few reasons to do it - a separate place to backup data, quicker defragmentation (which supposedly isn't a problem in Macs), security in the event of a virus, etc. But speaking from a DAW standpoint, doing so is not going to solve the issue of you writing to the system drive and bottlenecking the machine.

When you partition a hard drive you obviously aren't adding any more read / write heads, nor are you physically disconnecting it from the system folder. A hard drive reads chunks of data in a random fashion. The problem, even if it's partitioned, is that while you are telling it (in the DAW) to write chunks of audio, it also must occasionally read and write other chunks in the system folder (virtual memory, etc.).

Therefore, to sum up, it is far better to have one dedicated drive that is reading and writing to the system while another is dedicated to reading and writing your audio data chunks.

Gotta have an external drive, OSX will allways use part of your system drive for virtual memory, when you open PTLE more virtual memory is required.

Then if you attempt to record and playback tracks, your bottleneck will be the internal drive.

If the disk usage is heavy, OSX may delay PTLEs access to the drive, so it can do housekeeping.

Having a dedicated audio drive, will allow OSX to operate without interuption.

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