It is currently Fri Mar 29, 2024 3:58 am


Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pages!

Hauptwerk software technical support only. Please make sure you have read the manual, tutorials and FAQ pages before requesting support.
  • Author
  • Message
Offline

Organorak

Member

  • Posts: 685
  • Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2009 6:55 am

Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pages!

PostFri Aug 14, 2015 5:35 pm

As some users of this forum will know, I have a digital music display on my central monitor. Occasionally in the past but becoming a bit more frequent to the point of being a nuisance, I am experiencing brief but annoying static sounds when I turn the page.

I use Adobe Acrobat to display music fullscreen, two pages at a time. The MIDI signal from the page advance piston is converted by Bome's MIDI translator into a key stroke sequence which in turn triggers an Autohotkey command to bring Acrobat into focus (if it isn't already) then advance the page. The static sound coincides with when I hit the piston.

Initially I thought it must be something to do with the slightly convoluted way of turning pages digitally that I devised, since Hauptwerk can't yet display pdf files in one of its windows (is that an enhancement request I hear you say?)

However, I can recreate the static sound without the need to press any pistons by doing the following sequence:
(i) displaying the Hauptwerk window across both the centre screen and one other screen;
(ii) opening an Acrobat pdf music file to fullscreen on the centre screen (which has the effect of covering the part of Hauptwerk that is showing on the centre screen);
(iii) clicking on the bit of the Hauptwerk window that is on the side screen to bring Hauptwerk back into focus across both the size screen and the central screen too;
(iv) start playing something;
(v) whilst playing, click on the centre screen to bring the fullscreen Adobe music pdf back into focus.

I am playing with the performance window open that shows RAM ployphony and processing activity. Let's say I am playing Salisbury, full Great and Pedal so have about a third of the stops drawn. RAM is showing as about half full, polyphony and processing power are barely registering one green bar. But at the precise moment that I click on the centre screen to bring Acrobat into focus and turn the page the processor activity bar briefly shoots into the red and then back down to nothing again.

So it seems that something is massively overworking the processor to switch the screen from showing Hauptwerk to showing a pdf file. Both images are pretty static so I can't see why there shold be a massive demand on the graphics card. I haven't tried with alternative pdf viewers like Foxit, though I might need to. But before going down that root (and rewriting a number of Autohotkey macros) I wanted to share the problem having found a way of reproducing it purely with Hauptwerk and Acrobat running in case it's something that can be ameliorated by changing settings in one or other program.

For the record I am running Windows 7 Professional, whatever the latest version of Acrobat is, I have 24GB RAM, an SSD hard drive, a six core i7 processor and two graphics cards so it's a fairly heavy duty machine, and not your average netbook. I would therefore have expected that switching focus between Acrobat and Hauptwerk should be child's play for it but clearly not!

Thanks for any help.
Offline

jkinkennon

Member

  • Posts: 1208
  • Joined: Thu May 07, 2009 9:43 am
  • Location: Vancouver, WA

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostFri Aug 14, 2015 5:47 pm

This may or may not be related, but I've had problems with audio glitches whenever Adobe's Creative Cloud is running on my MAC mini. I no longer allow it to run at startup, and if I get the glitches I've had to reboot the MAC so that it once again shows no memory swapped or cached. I get flawless audio otherwise so long as I haven't run one of the Adobe apps.
Offline

murph

Member

  • Posts: 727
  • Joined: Fri Mar 02, 2012 5:45 pm

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostFri Aug 14, 2015 8:22 pm

Hi Organorak,
have a look at this thread:

viewtopic.php?f=16&t=14373

Follow the instructions (I found with win 7 that I have to first give both wispits normal priority before they accept low as an option. I then enter HW. I find it easier to exit HW and sleep the computer than re-do this when booting....)

Tony
Offline
User avatar

mdyde

Moderator

  • Posts: 15444
  • Joined: Fri Mar 14, 2003 1:19 pm
  • Location: UK

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostSat Aug 15, 2015 3:41 am

Hello Organorak,

If you haven't already done so, also check for DPC latency:

http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

... especially when the problem occurs. (E.g. perhaps the graphics card driver is causing the issue.)
Best regards, Martin.
Hauptwerk software designer/developer, Milan Digital Audio.
Offline

Organorak

Member

  • Posts: 685
  • Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2009 6:55 am

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostSat Aug 15, 2015 12:24 pm

Thanks to everyone.

This is not looking too good - I can't change the priorities of wisptis.exe as I get an "access denied" regardless of what setting I attempt to change it to (from high to normal or low). That's despite doing it as an administrator with nothing else running. And I can't delete it as it simply pops straight back again.

I tried creating a command prompt to turn it to low, with a shortcut to run it on logon. Again when I checked in task manager it was still set to high.

I tried installing an alternative pdf reader (nitro pdf) but that simply duplicated the audio glitches.

I tried lowering the CPU priority of Acrobat (four instances running when I open a file, so I havfe to do each one manually via Task manager, and each time I open a new music file I have to redo that. But even with Acrobat on low, I still get the sound glitches.

I haven't tried setting Hauptwerk's CPU priority to low (or maybe high) - would that risk anything bad?

I am fairly sure the problem has been getting worse, or more noticable recently - maybe there have been software updates to Acrobat or Win 7 that have caused it to deteriorate?

A couple of other observations. Firstly, in one of the posts referred to above superfetch had to be disabled - on my system it appears to be disabled and is greyed out, preumably because I have an SSD as my primary drive.

Secondly as some will know I use j-organ mainly for skins to Hauptwerk sample sets, but I have a few j-organ saple sets that I don't often use because Hauptwerk obviously sounds more realistic. But when I tried the above experiment with a j-organ sample set open rather than Hauptwerk, using the processor intensity monitor in Task Manager, I couldn't see any spikes or hear any glitches when I changed focus of Acrobat back and forward. Maybe this is a specific interaction between Hauptwerk and something else therefore?
Offline
User avatar

mdyde

Moderator

  • Posts: 15444
  • Joined: Fri Mar 14, 2003 1:19 pm
  • Location: UK

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostSun Aug 16, 2015 4:46 am

Organorak wrote:I haven't tried setting Hauptwerk's CPU priority to low (or maybe high) - would that risk anything bad?


Hello Organorak,

Definitely please don't change the priorities of the Hauptwerk process. Hauptwerk automatically sets its thread priorities to the appropriate levels for best performance, and trying to change them manually is likely to introduce other performance problems.

Organorak wrote:Secondly as some will know I use j-organ mainly for skins to Hauptwerk sample sets, but I have a few j-organ saple sets that I don't often use because Hauptwerk obviously sounds more realistic. But when I tried the above experiment with a j-organ sample set open rather than Hauptwerk, using the processor intensity monitor in Task Manager, I couldn't see any spikes or hear any glitches when I changed focus of Acrobat back and forward. Maybe this is a specific interaction between Hauptwerk and something else therefore?


I don't have experience with j-Organ, but perhaps it isn't using ASIO, or is configured to use larger buffer sizes (higher resilience to audio glitches at the expense of higher latency), or some other relevant difference like that.

If you haven't done so already, I still recommend checking for DPC latency issues when the glitches occur. If present, DPC latency spikes need to be eliminated before a PC can be used reliably for real-time low-latency audio.

If easily feasible, you could also try using a different ASIO audio interface (with latest drivers and firmware, etc.), to try to determine whether the issue is related to the specific audio interface/driver that you're currently using.

Another quick thought: make sure that Windows isn't set to use your audio interface as its default audio playback device, to try to prevent other applications accessing it at the same time as Hauptwerk. (Conceivably Acrobat tries to play a sound when you turn a page in it.)

Also check that you have:

- The latest BIOS version installed for your PC's motherboard.

- Where applicable, the latest firmware for all devices (especially audio/MIDI interfaces and your graphics card). (Check on their manufacturers' websites.)

- All current Windows updates installed.

- The latest versions of all drivers, especially for your audio/MIDI interface(s) and graphics cards. (Check on their manufacturers' websites.)

- The current version of the Hauptwerk USB key driver installed, which can always be found on our main downloads page: http://www.downloadhauptwerk.com/

Francois Ratte is a very helpful and knowledgeable gentleman who provides one-to-one consultancy services to troubleshoot PC performance/audio problems, including diagnosing and fixing them remotely: http://www.hauptwerkconsultant.com/

Organorak wrote:Secondly as some will know I use j-organ mainly for skins to Hauptwerk sample sets,


Just in case you're using any scripts or similar to launch Hauptwerk (which might prevent it running at the proper priorities, and thus introduce audio glitches), make sure that you still have the problem when nothing is running at all on the PC except for Hauptwerk (launched manually, from the desktop) and Acrobat reader.
Best regards, Martin.
Hauptwerk software designer/developer, Milan Digital Audio.
Offline

morgen

Member

  • Posts: 46
  • Joined: Wed Jun 03, 2015 4:54 pm

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostTue Aug 18, 2015 7:00 am

If all else fails, perhaps your page turning process could be simplified by using X-Keys rather than a MIDI-mediated piston and script emulator.
Offline

mumblecake

Member

  • Posts: 109
  • Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2015 10:03 am

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostTue Aug 18, 2015 1:39 pm

When programming I have encountered problems before when objects were overlapping. My bet is that it is a windows/graphics problem. You made a point out of the acrobat reader covering part of Hauptwerk.

That means that in return HW is covering part of the reader at the beginning of your test sequence. When you swap focus to a window which is partially covered, a lot more will happen than just changing the shade of the window border (I would expect even more so if some of the windows involved cross screens) ... I would expect a complete re-draw to be necessary at least.

Considering that fancy graphics is not the main purpose of HW I wouldn't expect it to be optimised for releasing ressources to deal with the arbitration of Graphics card access (though I made the suggestion to implement OpenGL rendering so that shiny and pretty consoles like the PAB could just be supplied as 3D Objects rather than 2D renders ... one may dream ;)).

Could you try the following please:

Rather than using acrobat reader you could use notepad in it's stead and see if you can reproduce the issue (you might need an application which is a bit more resource hungry than notepad). If I'm going in the right direction any kind of overlapping windows and focus swapping should do it.

edit: you should also try to remove all Hauptwerk windows from the centre screen (remove all HW/Acrobat overlaps ... I would be surprised if HW/HW overlaps would matter) and see if it makes a difference.
Offline

Organorak

Member

  • Posts: 685
  • Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2009 6:55 am

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostTue Aug 18, 2015 4:23 pm

morgen wrote:If all else fails, perhaps your page turning process could be simplified by using X-Keys rather than a MIDI-mediated piston and script emulator.


Except that I gathered that X-keys is an expensive piece of kit and only works with whichever program has "focus" already. Acrobat will only have focus if I haven't made any registration changes since the previous pageturn. Whereas the combination of MIDI signal conversion to Autohotkey script gets round that problem and doesn't cost anything to boot.

mumblecake wrote:When programming I have encountered problems before when objects were overlapping. My bet is that it is a windows/graphics problem. You made a point out of the acrobat reader covering part of Hauptwerk.

Rather than using acrobat reader you could use notepad in it's stead and see if you can reproduce the issue (you might need an application which is a bit more resource hungry than notepad). If I'm going in the right direction any kind of overlapping windows and focus swapping should do it.


Thanks - the only reason I set up HW traversing two screens with the Acrobat window overlapping was because I noticed that by clicking from one to the other it was sometimes (but not always) triggering a huge but shortlived CPU spike. When playing normally and pageturning in Acrobat the audio glitches also caused the spike but not with every page turn. So the point is that flicking focus from HW to Acrobat has been what has triggered the spike. I didn't think to try switching from HW to Notepad but it's a good suggestion.

I checked for DPC latency spikes but none occurred during the CPU spikes.

Yesterday I upgraded my HW from 4.0 to the latest 4.2 (and was relieved to find that I didn't need to reinstall all my organs as a result), updated the USB dongle and installed the latest graphics driver (somewhat cautiously as my graphics cards have proved glitchy in the past with updates that I've had to roll back). Initial findings are somewhat more promising in that I can no longer replicate the audio glitches when flicking between HW and Acrobat, though I'd like to play for several hours before I can declare the problem to be resolved. I wonder what if anything is different about 4.2 compared to 4.0 that prevents the CPU spikes?

More generally, if I find that my current set up is stable I'm sorely tempted to disable all further updates (to Windows, Acrobat, graphics card, HW etc) and only update my antivirus since if one thing updates there's always the risk that it might knock over something else. As my soundcard doesn't appear to be compatible with Windows 10 I don't expect I will be upgrading to Win10 any time soon. For a computer that is web-connected but only used for running Hauptwerk what advantages are there to continuing to do software updates once the system is found to be as stable as it can get, versus only keeping antivirus updated?
Offline

morgen

Member

  • Posts: 46
  • Joined: Wed Jun 03, 2015 4:54 pm

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostTue Aug 18, 2015 4:48 pm

The largest X-keys strip costs in the neighborhood of $100 US presently. Software included with it--one program for Windows and the other for Mac--allows the user to program the function for the various keys. The Mac software is reportedly the less intuitive, but I've nonetheless found an easy way to bring Adobe Reader into focus as the first step to any function for which I've programmed an individual key (page turns, display format...). The software facilitates emulation of any keyboard button press, with or without modifying keys; sundry other functions such as calling up applications in Finder (which is the bases for bringing Adobe Reader into focus); or strings of keypresses (e.g. bring into focus, then advance page). I'm not at all sure, but I'm wondering if, once programmed, the emulation occurs within the X-keys device itself (does anybody know?).

I'm still in the early learning and development phase of my "digital music rack", but I have programmed some X-keys buttons to open a file of PDF scores though which other buttons scroll and select. Once a score is opened, other buttons turn pages or move to the beginning or end of a file. Most of the display and navigation features in Adobe Reader have corresponding keyboard shortcuts which are the basis for access via X-keys.

I've tried MusicReader as an alternative to Adobe Reader, but so far have found the free Adobe reader more adept at rapid page turns despite the absence of MusicReader's many niceties. I haven't found any other promising music display software, or any more effective software for pdf display. If anyone has, I'd love to hear about it.
Offline

mumblecake

Member

  • Posts: 109
  • Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2015 10:03 am

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostWed Aug 19, 2015 1:54 am

Organorak wrote:Yesterday I upgraded my HW from 4.0 to the latest 4.2

Ahh, that was an important piece of the puzzle that was missing. I'm pretty sure the first thing Martin would have suggested would have been to update had he known that you were running a version more than a year old. There were huge performance optimisations from 4.1 to 4.2

Fingers crossed that it keeps working :)
Offline

mumblecake

Member

  • Posts: 109
  • Joined: Mon Feb 23, 2015 10:03 am

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostWed Aug 19, 2015 3:28 am

Organorak wrote:More generally, if I find that my current set up is stable I'm sorely tempted to disable all further updates (to Windows, Acrobat, graphics card, HW etc) and only update my antivirus since if one thing updates there's always the risk that it might knock over something else. As my soundcard doesn't appear to be compatible with Windows 10 I don't expect I will be upgrading to Win10 any time soon. For a computer that is web-connected but only used for running Hauptwerk what advantages are there to continuing to do software updates once the system is found to be as stable as it can get, versus only keeping antivirus updated?


As a programmer and someone that has to do with safety critical systems on a day to day basis I would strongly advise against disabling updates to windows and potentially also Acrobat reader if your computer is connected to the internet. Drivers yes, leave them when you have a working configuration. I'm doing that a lot but not software.

Security holes are found nearly on a daily basis which make your computer vulnerable to outside intrusion past your firewall and past your anti-virus. These security holes don't always need a wrong click of you to allow access. Critical Windows updates are essential, you can probably leave recommended and optional ones.

Acrobat reader: you can probably leave this if you can trust the sources of your pdf-sheet music. Acrobat reader did however have known security holes in the past which allowed a pdf with malicious code inside to infiltrate your PC. To be sure you can disable scripts in the settings.

If you really don't want any updates but still want internet you will need to think about a better firewall than the windows one. An enterprise grade firewall through a gateway server would do the job.

Best Regards,
Mathis
Offline
User avatar

mdyde

Moderator

  • Posts: 15444
  • Joined: Fri Mar 14, 2003 1:19 pm
  • Location: UK

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostWed Aug 19, 2015 5:23 am

Organorak wrote:Yesterday I upgraded my HW from 4.0 to the latest 4.2 (and was relieved to find that I didn't need to reinstall all my organs as a result), updated the USB dongle and installed the latest graphics driver (somewhat cautiously as my graphics cards have proved glitchy in the past with updates that I've had to roll back). Initial findings are somewhat more promising in that I can no longer replicate the audio glitches when flicking between HW and Acrobat, though I'd like to play for several hours before I can declare the problem to be resolved. I wonder what if anything is different about 4.2 compared to 4.0 that prevents the CPU spikes?


Hello Organorak,

I had assumed you were already using the current version of Hauptwerk (v4.2.1). We don't support old versions anyway, and new versions often have important performance improvements and fixes. There were many in both v4.1.x and v4.2.x, including major performance improvements in v4.2 relating to screen redrawing and audio and MIDI performance (especially if using VST for audio output, but also in other cases). Any driver updates (especially for the graphics card), or Windows updates, or firmware updates, could also easily have been relevant.

Organorak wrote:More generally, if I find that my current set up is stable I'm sorely tempted to disable all further updates (to Windows, Acrobat, graphics card, HW etc) and only update my antivirus since if one thing updates there's always the risk that it might knock over something else. As my soundcard doesn't appear to be compatible with Windows 10 I don't expect I will be upgrading to Win10 any time soon. For a computer that is web-connected but only used for running Hauptwerk what advantages are there to continuing to do software updates once the system is found to be as stable as it can get, versus only keeping antivirus updated?


If you need to contact us for support then you need to be using the current version of Hauptwerk.

If your computer is connected to the Internet then I'd regard it as extremely important for security purposes always to have all current Windows updates applied. As Mathis mentioned, application updates (and sometimes even driver and firmware updates) can be very important for security too (although Hauptwerk updates shouldn't have any security implications). Basically, if a computer is connected to the Internet (directly or indirectly) then you should always keep everything up to date.

Anyway, let's hope that your updated system performs well now, whatever the relevant update happened to have been.
Best regards, Martin.
Hauptwerk software designer/developer, Milan Digital Audio.
Offline

Bri

Member

  • Posts: 91
  • Joined: Tue Jan 09, 2007 9:25 am
  • Location: Worthing, Sussex, England

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostWed Aug 19, 2015 7:50 am

Morgen wrote:-

"I've tried MusicReader as an alternative to Adobe Reader, but so far have found the free Adobe reader more adept at rapid page turns despite the absence of MusicReader's many niceties. I haven't found any other promising music display software, or any more effective software for pdf display. If anyone has, I'd love to hear about it."

I find that very suprising - I have been using MusicReader (no connection) for quite a few years now and could not be more satisfied!
I find the page turns are so fast that I do not even notice it!!
Offline

Organorak

Member

  • Posts: 685
  • Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2009 6:55 am

Re: Processor maxing out with audio glitches when turning pa

PostThu Aug 20, 2015 1:10 pm

Oh dear, despite the software updates I just had another brief audio glitch after "turning" a pdf page! Much less frequent than before but still happening :(
Next

Return to Technical support

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: ludu and 4 guests