Dual Processors and Pulsar

valis · Post by **valis** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 1:56 am

I've now tried my Pulsar I on a dual p2-300, dual p3-600 and now a dual xeon 1.8 with a separate 64bit pci bus for my scsi drives. I'm unfortunately going to repeat what we already know, that a dual processor system is not a stable platform for the Pulsar. I'm really curious as to why...

I've used several methods for controlling cpu affinity and priority level for both my audio applications and the pulsar.exe program, and while there's some improvement
I still experience quite frequent copy protection violations and occasional pci errors. Let's deal with each of these independantly.

With copy protection violations, I've noticed that when first starting the app I will almost always get copy protection violations if I have *not* set cpu affinity to the pulsar.exe app. When I have set the affinity before starting, I would say I have about a 20-30% chance of failing on loading the first project. I occasionally even get a failure on the board itself. Sometimes even loading an insert without stopping playback in my sequencer can cause a copy protection error. I do write-protect the cset.ini file, and waiting for the pulsar app to finish it's current task before loading something else or manipulating anything seems to help prevent the errors.

The PCI errors I get, don't seem to directly correlate to what I've read here about pci bandwidth issues. I'm able to load up to my dsp limit in Masterverbs (4, 5 causes dsp overload error) when using the dynamic mixer with each channel of audio being driven as a 24bit asio stereo channel from within the sequencer, and leave this running for quite some time without experiencing any errors. And yet, when I'm pushing the system closer to 60% or higher cpu usage, and I'm doing a complex arrangement using say, the hummel bluesynth and the hummel miniscope with a few filters, and overdrive, a few compressor/limiters and 2 or 3 tracks of midi along with a few automated parameters, I will recieve pci errors. Notice I'm not using any of the samplers or reverbs in the pulsar at this point, although i'm not sure what other devices require a lot of access to main system memory. I have noticed, however, that midi automation seems to cause the pci errors more often than anything else I do. Changing a parameter even with the mouse seems to cause problems too occasionally, although overall the pulsar is a LOT more stable when running in the foreground rather than behind my sequencer.

All in all, I really don't want to give up my pulsar, and I am even considering stepping up to a Pulsar 2 to gain more dsp capacity (possibly retaining the pulsar 1 along with it if that proves to be stable enough), and yet I regret that the Pulsar.exe app is not written to properly take advantage of a multithreaded multitasking environment. I do understand that there is no benefit for the pulsar itself from this type of setup, but my own experiences in Cubase and Nuendo have shown that the additional cpu helps a great deal, something which I also know from my backgrounds as both a 3d animator and an application developer. At this point, I'm faced with needing another machine dedicated entirely to the Pulsar, which I know is a path that several people have taken. However, that effectively doubles the cost of a Pulsar 2. I am NOT sure that a Pulsar 2 wouldn't fix the problems entirely even on my current dual xeon, however. I have no idea whether they use the pci bus more efficiently as has been suggested by a few posters on this forum before.

Basically, I've found the pulsar to be extremely stable (once a project is loaded and has passed the copy-protection acid test) when used by itself or as the foreground app with very little interaction. But once I begin to multitask, loading or deleting modules when playing back audio, or even just turning knobs onscreen or driving them with midi automation, I run the risk of a pci error dialog asking for a reset of the pulsar's dsp's.

Havoc · Post by **Havoc** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 11:47 am

Hi Valis, I have given up Pulsar on duals. My opinion is that creamware does not want pulsar to work on a dual. I cannot believe they are unable to make it run on duals as they must understand multiprocessing very well considering each and every card of them is a multiprocessor system. Good luck.

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Wed Mar 20, 2002 12:58 pm

Hi Valis,

Once everything is loaded, it runs fine. But when loading registered devices, I sometimes get Copy Protection Violation Errors (CPVE). This is very annoying, but I now made a a template project which I load first, and once that is loaded, I only add freeware or not card registered devices.

Dual cpu runs very stable and powerfull, once it's loaded and running. I think CW's Copy protection system doesn't work w 2 S/N cpu's. Dunno. anywayz, I'm going to HammerFall or so for my dual CPu machine, and put the 3 Pulsars in a new single CPU P4...

I don't mind "CW not aking advantage of dual cpu", as the loading may be slow for me. Anywayz, looks like WinXP handles CPU loads best, I always leave it to XP. Even in Cubase w it's special user switch/option for multiprocessing.
_________________
1.000.000.000 people make it through the day with less than 1 dollar.

***will be back on dual soon***

[ This Message was edited by: at0mic on 2002-03-27 13:02 ]

brain1 · Post by **brain1** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 11:44 am

i have also given up on running a dual system - very unstable and not worth the hassle. i had better performance with a PIII 1000mhz and CUSL2.
my dual system specs:
win xp pro
supermicro p4dce
dual p4 xeon 1.7ghz
1 gig rdram
40 gig deskstars
i am now selling the mobo, cpu's and case. now i am buying a single P4 2.2ghz and ASUS p4t-e mobo- i bet i don't have anymore problems and i get better performance!

[ This Message was edited by: briank on 2002-03-21 11:45 ]

valis · Post by **valis** » Thu Mar 21, 2002 4:29 pm

It's unfortunately that creamware can't figure out how to properly multithread their stuff. I suspect they're eventually going to have to as in a few years hyperthreading will come down to the masses and god knows how many cores AMD/Intel are going to stuff into their consumer cores.

For the time being tho, a second machine does seem to be the way to go.

Or dual boot into an Xp installation that only is aware of one proc.

AndyW · Post by **AndyW** » Wed Mar 27, 2002 12:53 pm

I've got a dual Xeon 2.2GHz with hyperthreading enabled and I experience the same problems (at least the registration problem).

I guess one would need to disable hyperthreading and the second CPU in the BIOS to get things working as I have found no way to disable CPU:s in Windows XP. If anyone knows how to do this in XP, please speak up (or drop me a mail: Andreas@CognitionMan.com).

// Andreas

valis · Post by **valis** » Sat Mar 30, 2002 12:39 am

Well the easiest way to disable the bios would be to dual boot into an installation of xp pro that you've done with Standard PC as the computer type (rather than MPS/ACPI Multiprocessor PC). Or just run Xp home (no dual proc support). But that rather defeats the purpose of all that hard spent cash.

Also, aside from the registration dialog I get tons of pci errors, but I've discovered that 99.99% of the time they're caused by AUTOMATION data. If i don't automate anything in the creamware app or elsewhere I can do fine...kinda defeats half the purpose of midi tho (only leaves me with note info).

Even ONE channel of automation running by itself causes PCI errors...I'm considering buying a p4 or athlon machine to run the pulsar on exclusively (or perhaps with another softsynth as well) and running that through an RME hammerfall. I've seen posts here from other who've done the same. Although most of the Pulsar users I've known have since gotten rid of their cards, I may just do that too.

Havoc · Post by **Havoc** » Sat Mar 30, 2002 3:27 am

Well, I have delegated the pulsar to the old PC for use as extra i/o and routing. All the rest goes through a RME on a dual AMD. Also, the RME drivers let you use 24-bit MME in W2K, not like the Creamware drivers that are limited to 16-bit. Useful for Sonar and CEP.

BEWARE: RME support is even worse than Creamware!!!!!!!!! Yes, it is possible.

Post by **garyb** » Sat Mar 30, 2002 8:26 am

where was that post about that program to link computers via lan? i'll look...

here it is. http://www.musiclab.com/products/rpl_info.htm

sync via midi/lan

[ This Message was edited by: garyb on 2002-03-30 09:08 ]

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Sat Mar 30, 2002 9:09 am

Here's the midi-over-LAN topic

I have good hopes that dual cpu might be compatible w Pulsar 3.1. Finally. I'm not encouraging anyone to buy dual cpu for his CW system now, better wait till you get confirmation here

AndyW · Post by **AndyW** » Sun Mar 31, 2002 12:14 pm

I'm still getting the registrations pop-ups from time to time even with second CPU and hyperthreading disabled in the BIOS. Maybe it's the multiprocessing _SUPPORT_ in the OS that causes the problems for the CW software.

[ This Message was edited by: jernkoll on 2002-03-31 12:17 ]

Havoc · Post by **Havoc** » Mon Apr 01, 2002 11:01 am

Actually, it's the other way round. Creamware is playing fool with multiprocessing support.