Hauptwerk Virtual Pipe Organ

At the time of the HW V release, I purchased a new iMac Pro (running the current version of Catalina), with the following specs:

2.3GHz 18-core Intel Xeon W processor, Turbo Boost up to 4.3GHz
256GB 2666MHz DDR4 ECC Memory
Radeon Pro Vega 64X with 16GB of HBM2 memory
4TB SSD storag

It replaces a rebuilt Mac Pro (running HW 4). Audio interface (used before and after switch to new computer) is a PreSonus Audiobox 22VSL; I use headphones only (they haven’t exhibited any problems when used with other gear).

I’m now experiencing intermittent audio dropouts (at least on SonusParadisi sets...not sure about others)... completely unpredictable, usually about 1 second long; the audio quits completely. It can be hours between dropouts, or a shorter period of time. It can happen with many or few stops drawn. This never happened on the previous computer.

I’ve tried a variety of cures; WiFi is off, virus protection disabled, screen saver disabled, all other programs on the computer are off; bought a surge protector, updated the PreSonus’ drivers, and also tried loading only one group on each organ (eg front ranks only). I also experimented with different levels of polyphony, to no avail. Checked that all plugs are secure. Tried moving the USBs to different positions. As a last resort, I replaced the PreSonus interface with a Motu M4. The problem persists.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.
David

Good evening David,

You did a pretty good job so far... drivers updated, usb switch, antivirus disabled etc. When you display Hauptwerk Audio and midi performance Windows, does one of the meters peak prior or during the dropouts?

You have a "monster" as a Hauptwerk computer... when you say Turbo Boost up to 4.3, did you tweaked the CPU or is it running at 2.3GHz.

Have you check the background tasks running on your computer - https://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/mac/ ... c-3635406/

I've seen glitches generated by something turning on/off in the house. Try to pay attention the next time that you have a glitches if something just turned on in the house.

If you're "techky" you may want to check some of the settings in your BIOS (Intel Turbo Boost, Intellistep, C-state and others options related to CPU power management and try to disable them).

Of course, if you can try with another audio interface and don't have the glitches, then it would point to your Presonus.

Regards

Thanks! I already replaced the PreSonus with a Motu M4, thinking the problem might be there...but it persists. You’ve given a lot of good ideas; I’m very appreciative.

David

Oh, and I’m not even sure what Turbo Boost is; I just pasted in the computer’s specs as given by Apple.

Two other things to try, make sure computer is set not to all asleep or turn off hard drives (also power nap off). Second thing, your computer may be plagued by the T2 audio glitch. if the audio interfaces are connected by USB, that may be the problem. Try getting a thunderbolt 3 hub . It has to be an expensive one that has an on board USB chip.

Thanks! This site tells how to disable the T2; it’s worth a try! https://www.thurrott.com/apple/199773/a ... -audio-bug

The result of this testing will be interesting. Apple supposedly fixed the audio issues related to the T2 a while back. I've been running HWV on two different machines with 10.15.2 and the T2, and have had no audio related issues.

Really at the end of my rope with this issue, even after trying to implement many of the suggestions above. Martin Dyde, any thoughts?

David

I am also experiencing audio dropouts, but on a Windows machine. When playing the organ, the sounds just stops momentarily as described by the original poster.

Dell XPS-8920, 64GB, Intel i7-7700, 4 cores, 8 logical processors, 3.6Ghz. Hauptwerk V is the only application running. I have used this computer to run Hauptwerk for many years without problems.

I opened the Audio, Midi and Performance control panel and see that the CPU spikes all the way to the right-most red segment. Audio is -14DB, Polyphony is set to 1984, Sound delay is 22.2ms, Free GB is 20.6.

I ran LatencyMon at the same time, but nothing showed up there. Only 35GB out of 64GB is currently is use. Also used DriverEasy to check and all drivers are up-to-date.

Can anyone suggest a way to identify the cause? I did notice that Hauptwerk V uses 12-15% cpu even when idle. Is that normal?

Thanks!

For a Windows machine you may find http://forum.hauptwerk.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=17448&p=130544&hilit=Sysmain#p130544 helps (you may have already done this...)
Iain

Hello Chuck,

In case you're using Windows 10 and your computer is misbehaving due to the amount of memory Hauptwerk v5 requests, I'll also send you a forum P.M. with a temporary work-around that should avoid that.

If that doesn't solve it, please also see whether you also experience the problem when using St. Anne's (since that uses only a little memory, in case the problem was due to the relevant sample set over-filling the computer's memory).

Also, please check your audio driver buffer settings on the 'General settings | Audio device and channels' screen (especially if you're using the Hauptwerk VST Link for audio output, since v5 defaults to different buffer sizes in that case -- see the release notice for details).

Edit: P.S. If not using VST, then please also make sure that you're (still) using your audio interface's ASIO driver (not DirectSound), since DirectSound drivers often give poor performance.

Martin, and thoughts on my Mac situation?

David

Hello David,

My suggestions would be first to check these:

mdyde wrote:please also see whether you also experience the problem when using St. Anne's (since that uses only a little memory, in case the problem was due to the relevant sample set over-filling the computer's memory).

Also, please check your audio driver buffer settings on the 'General settings | Audio device and channels' screen (especially if you're using the Hauptwerk VST Link for audio output, since v5 defaults to different buffer sizes in that case -- see the release notice for details).

Also try disabling the Mac's T2 chip, as others have mentioned, since that was a known hardware/firmware issue on some recent Macs.

Also perhaps see whether you can reproduce the problem using just the Mac's built-in audio output.

If those things don't solve it, there are no known bugs or issues in Hauptwerk v5.0.0 that could cause audio glitches on Macs, so I think you would almost certainly have had the same issue had you been running v4 on the computer, and it must be some kind of hardware/system issue. (I'll send you a P.M. to test with anyway, in case that helps for any other reason.)

Martin,

Thanks for your thoughts. It does indeed seem the the problem is on the computer end of things. I think it’s time for me to bring it up on an Apple forum.

David

A couple more observations- the dropout happens only once per playing session, fairly early- so maybe the computer has some process causing the glitch. And it seems to happen only on large sample sets, eg the SP Zutphen set.

David