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That was so immersive and captivating. Great use of space. I'm on a new laptop and not used to the groove player so I'm sure not going to make any suggestions. It sounded Great here. Loved the way you let everything drop out and down near the end. Very much enjoyed it .. mark

For years in the early 2000s i recorded on a tascam device them mixed the wave files with cakewalk. It worked well. At one point i got a usb line 6 single channel interface and that helped. But the question was can you mix without an interface. The answer is yes. The switch to recording with cakewalk was actually very hard for me. Drop outs are upsetting. Once i got that sorted out, recording with the computer has made life nicer.

Cakewalk doesn't measure anything. It's reporting the setting by taking the buffer size and using the project's sample rate to compute the latency. RTL measures the actual round trip time of a generated audio signal (that you feed back into your inputs). This can vary from the setting because of how your audio interface works (and your computer and your OS and the drivers, etc). Important to point out that Cakewalk has no way of knowing if you can actually get that level of performance without drop outs or the audio engine stalling. It just reports the setting. RTL gives you a way to test and see if that rate can be actually used. But just because your audio interface/computer can run a low buffer rate that doesn't mean you won't have to increase it a lot when you start increasing the processing on the signal (plugins/soft synths/effects).

I'm still trying to track this one down, but I've been able to reproduce it twice. I'm going to start a new project and see if I can always repro it. But I wanted to bring it up. The details around this: Problem After extensive multi-track editing in Melodyne 5 Studio, during an Audible bounce of the project, it stops half-way through playback with no errors and no drop outs. It just stops playing. The bounce file is written to disk and contains audio up to the point of where Cakewalk stops (as you'd expect if Cakewalk dropped out during a bounce). Upon this point, nothing looks problematic. All tracks still have clips that show the waveforms and the clips all show melodyne is on them (RFX menu). however, The audio no longer plays on all the tracks that had melodyne running. Details Upon saving the project file, the project file size is MUCH smaller than before. IE: The project went from 9 MB with melodyne edits to now 1 MB. ^^^ These are the first time and second time reproductions of the issue. I had to re do about 4 hours of work, unfortunately. I'm fully aware of how to backup projects and as you can see, I have pretty good structure in my process. I have enabled additional auto save iterations every 15 minutes in case this happens again, but what is done is done. I'm still working to reproduce this in a new project, but I'm pretty sure I have a good idea what is happening, since I reproduced the issue in the same project. I believe that Cakewalk is doing some kind of plugin data size check and once it sees X amount of data for a plugin, it's assuming there was a problem and it's deleting all the data. This is purely a guess. But I think it's very coincidental that this point seems to be about 8 MB. How I got melodyne data so large: Melodyne studio 5 is an incredible piece of software. With the latest version, you have manual controls over de-essing, per note / syllable gain adjustments and so forth, in additional to pitch correction (so yeah, no shnarky comments about how you wouldn't need this with a good singer). In multitrack mode, you can also manually adjust stretching and timing of each word. It's a dream come true for adjusting vocals. And yes, there are things like vocal sync, but manually doing this in melodyne yields amazing results. And more importantly, this is what melo 5 studio was designed to do. So it's not like I'm demanding an odd use-case on this one. After talking to a bunch of people, they kept saying things like "you're supposed to bounce melodyne on each track or it does weird things". This is an unacceptable response. Again, the point of melodyne "studio" is multi-track editing in context. But I believe that maybe this is why they bounce each track. They may also be hitting this unknown limitation (assuming I'm correct about the cause. ) I'll be providing better repro steps for this. But I wanted to get this feedback started. If anyone else wants to do a repro, that'd be great too. I had about 7 tracks. On my last reproduction, I just started nudging and making random adjustments, saving and adding more until I saw the project size grow by about 8 MB. Then I did an audible bounce and hit this issue a second time. ❤️ bakers. Looking forward to resolving this. It was a rough weekend and I missed a deadline 😕 @msmcleod @Noel Borthwick

Since downloading this version the drop outs are consistent. When are the hot fixes coming out? I am using the Scarlett 3rd Gen interface.

Definitely has a cool noire swagger. Or rouge. Mix wise it was all very up front, for me each instrument is right up in the old face. My old face, anyway. Yet the vocals are delivered very well indeed, and are super clear. I may have made a similar comment on another song before? Everything is on the dry side. So it's all sort of up front that way. It's a mixing style and I'm not saying it doesn't work. Maybe my brain us just used to some smoky jazzy depth of field in a song such as this. As for the song itself, I think it's killer. Nice arrangement with a great vocal! I did notice towards the end, with the lead guitar solo, the drums drop out and are very hard to hear, but they are still there. Maybe don't lose so much of that snare when the lead guitar is soloing? I dunno. These are only suggestions, and you probably have an entirely different aesthetic on reverb and depth than I do. Still some awesome work on this, I appreciated getting to hear it. In contrast, you have a wood block thing getting hit on beat two, of almost every measure, and it is swamped in reverb. And of course, that would be something I'd want you to drop out ocassionally. So, go figure. Your saxes are very sweetly played, top quality lines. But they are so dry, have you put some room on them? They would sound sweet if they dripped with rvb, you'd put decent pre-delay on them so the attack shines through clearly. I'm thinking late 80's Dire Straits-type mix, "City of New Orleans" type stuff. Which you would probably not dig at all! I listened several times - cool tune, and your vocal gave me a Bobby Darin kind of vibe in spots. Really nicely done. cheers, -Tom

Good points Jim. I guess I really don't know how Apple plans to compete. If they totally dump Intel though, that only leaves a few more options especially given that they are planning all in house silicon. So far the towers are still on the Intel teat. My understanding was Apple plan an eventual total break from Intel silicon. In order to do that they would likely, as you say, be running into some of the same kinds of issues Ryzen and Intel run into. I guess anything could happen. Since Apple pretty much still command the small device market, even if only by a very small margin, they might simply drop out of or cut back on the large computer segment. If they continue to develop their ARM line and have a more streamed line instruction set they might be competitive in larger computers even though they run against the same multi core limitations Intel and Ryzen have. I'm not one of those to not have my laptop plugged in either so it usually isn't a concern for me. My i7 usually has at least 2 hours of battery in the event I would be forced to use battery power. So yeah, that benefit is missed on me as well. As I understand it, the architecture of the new ARM core layout will have capability if needed and throttle back if it isn't needed.....so if you only surf Amazon and Facebook it'll probably last quite awhile. OTOH if you're running complex programs more cores ramp up which I'm sure uses more energy. The hype is always tilted to the positive in any marketing plan it seems. The only things I know right now are - Apple is dumping Intel. -ARM computers will be out end part of this year sometime. The rest is "extrapolation" on my part I do wish we seen more of a game plan from Intel, especially some word on how they plan to break past the next computing barriers.

OK - so I did make some progress.. I had a heck of a time getting the ASIO drivers to work. Cakewalk would hang constantly - turns out I had to uninstall both ASIO4ALL and part of my soundcard (RealTek) drivers that had their own ASIO... once I did that I could select TD25 for both INPUT and OUTPUT devices and use ASIO as the driver mode... then when I play my audio file in cakewalk to play along with, the audio actual transmits back to the module through the USB - don't need audio out from the PC. The only tentative problem right now is as soon as I start turning buffer down, I get audio drop outs, playback stops or choppyness... so if in the end I can't get lower buffer/latency, I don't know if I gain anything, but it's seeming like maybe the latency is pretty low. Not sure where an audio interface fits still, also not sure how to capture drums in a midi and then route back to the EZDrummer instrument, without reating a new instrument and copying midi into that..

The instructions ask that the project and steps to create the drop out be mailed to support@cakewalk.com May want to include info about the OS, buffer settings from the mixing latency section of preferences, audio interface make and model, driver mode from preferences and driver version number

Ok @Noel Borthwick .. Im just replying here so all can see .. I just tried out this new ( not released as of yet ) Audient ASIO Driver that was sent to me by AUDIENT earlier. As per our remote session last monday, to work around the issue at hand, you had changed the DEFAULT FORMAT ( in windows SOUND SETTINGS playback driver properties ) to 44,100 Hz to coincide with the same setting in CW for the projects. meaning temp wise, if any tracks in CW were at say 48000 or 96000 then this manual trick would need to be applied each time. With the new driver installed I deliberately changed the DEFAULT FORMAT to 96,000 Hz as you can see in the image below & also DEFAULTED the EVO 4 for Windows rather than the built in REALTEK . I then loaded CW and loaded a few of the projects we were testing with. ALL PLAYED FINE, no more drop outs. It does look like they have resolved the issue with this driver. I will try the same thing on my LAPTOP later on and see if result is the same. As an aside I also noted that in CW prefs / Playback & Recording, with ASIO set as Driver Mode, it was also listing the FL Asio Driver. In fact when I launched CW it gave me an error about that FL Asio Driver .. I simply removed the FL Asio Driver in Programs and Features. Error gone. I have no doubt better off with that gone anyway, stick with the AUDIENT ASIO driver in all apps

I have beginning to get a bunch of the audio drop out message and my audio isn't playing. It feels like a 50/50 chance if my audio will play correctly. I click the spacebar once and it plays and if I do it again then it won't. I hope there is a way to fix my problem. If you need any specific info of my device then I will provide if that is the problem. I am very confused though because I have been using cakewalk for so long and this just started happening.

the 'bounce to clips' option in cakewalk has always been a little iffy and if over loaded can crash the system. I've recently obtaine bandlab and it is running alongside my original Sonar Platinum. Whereas the bounce to clips would baulk at a long multi clip track and crash in the bandlab system it crashes merely tasked to unite 2 short clips? why would this be. It actually completes the bounce to clips function followed immediately by an "audio drop out". I know there is a work around by saving before bouncing to clips but it still means closing cakewalk and opening it up again in order to continue with audio. I have a fairly well msi specced laptop which copes well in all other functions. I would very much welcome some advice as to how I might overcome this issue.

ok Noel point taken. however I'm still wondering if there is a way to avoid the audio drop out?

See GIF. The track expand drag tool seems to be more difficult to use and I believe that it's a new problem with this version but haven't verified by rolling back. When I try to drag down to expose more tracks controls getting the tool to pop up seems more difficult and then once I start dragging it seems very likely to drop out while I'm holding down left click.

what is the drop out error code that you're getting?

I'm not sure if I can educate you as you seem to know much more about Realtek than I. But as the OP has a very specific wish, to be able to draw such real time piano roll curves with 1/16th notes, it's not exactly just playback anymore. Could be the CPU or many other things that causes the audio drop out, but I would just pick a cheapo second hand audio interface to rule out any asio vs wasapi vs mme issues. A few years ago I bought a nice old M-audio interface for 30€ when I was undecided what to buy next. It worked great. If not anything else, you get a volume knob on your desk compared to an integrated audio chip. However, I started to be curious and must check how my Realtek sounds 😀 Edit. My Realtek sounds just fine. A lot different from my SPL card but absolutely usable when you let your ears to learn how it sounds. But not very powerful: with 80ohm cans they sound a bit quiet even with mastered material. Wasapi shared driver looks lighter and better balanced between cores on CPU than my soundcard (in Cakewalk). I feel now educated.

Hi, I use UAD hardware, a pretty extensive system, I'm constantly going back and forth altering buffers to deal with tracking latency and buffers to deal with mixing and plugins. Very frustrating to begin with, but now another issue. If I have a file with a good deal of tracks and plugins, I usually need to crank the UAD buffers to 2048, so it can handle the plugins and playback smoothly. Problem is, it seems I get dropped midi notes in the higher buffer settings (AAAAAAAAUGH!) How can it be this difficult to get a DAW to play files properly? Anyhow, is there a setting that might help the midi not drop out at this buffer size? I would think it would be easier to deal with the midi just like it is for the audio, to be using higher buffers. Thanks

Is it common the phenomenon the engine to load 100% and the audio processing to be lower or they usually go to the same level? Just downloaded reaper and insert the project of cakewalk there. I also insert the same plugins and the project did not drop out. I've insert twice the time the plugins of cakewalk and the cpu reached 65-70% and started to have some clicks and pops.

Hey Some Guy and Starise , thank you both for attempting to help me out . OK here's where we stand now . I sent in a ticket yesterday w Magix and to my surprise they got back to me in less than an hour . ( must be the hours I keep or I just get lucky ) I was advised to download the beta Acid Pro Version 9.0.3. ( Build 29 ) 64-bit . Having done so and going through the install all seems to be working out for the best now . I'm no longer getting the VST scan drop out, the program seems a little snappier and now I can play OGG files ... Speaking of the OGG files most of those I got came with a program called Mixcrat Pro . That was a program I had picked up when SONAR was no more before BandLab took over and brought us all Cakewalk as a sonic gift ... A couple of things OGG files do play nice in Acid Pro , ( this I know because my 3 Windows 10 64 bit computers have either Acid Pro 7 or Acid Pro 8 installed on them ) They are certainly good enough for a starting point when hit w a blank project . A personal favorite activity is I like to sit down during a practice session and learn how to play many of the loops I have note for note on my guitar I'm an equal opportunity lick Crook ...not only do I like to nab licks from the various OGG files I have . I love to nab licks from my Logic converted over from CAF to 24 bit Wave and every other loop library I have collected over the years 😎Oh Yeah .... As far as Why Windows 7 ? It was up until recently my only Win computer that didn't have Acid Pro installed . For a deal like this $20 bucks you better believe I'm gonna salivate at the dangling hook and JUMP ... Hey Starise ! I was also shocked at first wanting to know if the deal is or was legit ...it is legit man . Not only did Magix help me out with my Acid Pro 9 temporary set up woes , Acid Pro 9 is listed along with every purchase I have ever done w Magix in my Magix account ... all the best, Kenny

Hi chaps, has anyone bought and used this audio interface ? Ibve had mine for about eight months and its started to drop out and and crash I´m not using too many tracks (maybe as many14 )and some vst s I freeze to stop them from popping etc ......I wanted to use the buffering fader in the divises section but it wouldnt move any ideas ? cheers

Try bypass all effects. Drop outs are caused by you system bogging down. Make sure you have optimized your computer google optimizing for audio. Set the Scarletts buffer for 256. That is a very safe setting look for a possible VST plug in that is crapping out

In the bottom right of the toast message is a link to the help page providing information about drop out codes and what to do to resolve them.

@Noel BorthwickI always have virtual instruments because I always have drums in all of my projects. I'm going to create an audio only test project and post back my findings. EDIT: @Noel BorthwickI am running my audio interface in ASIO. I followed all of the tips from this forum on what to do after upgrading to W10. Disable fast start, no AV scanning of music related files, no indexing either, etc. I do get a drop out on another project that can be worked around if I bypass all of my FX, and then it acts the same as this new, small project in that it dropped out the first couple times, then it's fine. That's the other video sample I linked to. TESTED - I copied the new (problem) project and completely removed the drum sampler (kontakt) and there was no dropout. I closed CW and reopened and loaded my problem project that has a sampler (kontakt) and the dropout happened again, as usual. Do you know of any settings in CW that can help with the virtual instrument issue, or is that my audio interface drivers not playing nice with W10? There are several users in this forum that have the Echo Layla 3G with W10 and CW and said they have no issues--but it is an oldie. Thanks! EDIT 2: Just updated CW to the most current version. No effect. Issue remains.

Playback "stumbles" when changing screensets. Just noticed this behavior by accident. Playing a simple MIDI only project and changing Screensets causes playback to "stumble" or drop out momentarily. Can't say when this began, but I rolled back to last public release and the same thing occurs. Tried changing the MIDI playback buffers to "1000" with no change. Also experimented with Thread Scheduling models with no success there. Love the recent updates.......love Cakewalk as always since 1992. Regards to all the Bakers!

Did you click on the Help in the bottom right of the toast message and follow the instructions for drop out code 5?