Jon L Posted April 24 Share Posted April 24 (edited) Hi, For the past week, I've been having a lot of issues with Cakewalk. Half the time when I launch the playback, nothing happens for 4 or 5 seconds and the sounds comes in but it's not synced with the cursor anymore. And I regularly get Audio Engine Dropout (9) . According to this document, I should "Increase the Prepare using n Millisecond Buffers value in Edit > Preferences > MIDI - Playback and Recording", but I can't find that setting. I tried WASAPI shared and exclusive, increased the Playback Buffer Size, the DropoutMSec and disabled CPU Throttling but it doesn't fix the issue. For context I've been using Cakewalk for years on this computer. I upgrading it about 6 months ago (CPU, motherboard and RAM) and it was running really smoothly until very recently. Thanks! Edited April 25 by Jon L Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jorge Arias Posted April 24 Share Posted April 24 25 minutes ago, Jon L said: Hi, For the past week, I've been having a lot of issues with Cakewalk. Half the time when I launch the playback, nothing happens for 4 or 5 seconds and the sounds comes in but it's not synced with the cursor anymore. And I regularly get Audio Engine Dropout (9) . According to this document, I should "Increase the Prepare using n Millisecond Buffers value in Edit > Preferences > MIDI - Playback and Recording", but I can't find that setting. I tried WASAPI shared and exclusive, increased the Playback Buffer Size, the DropoutMSec and disabled CPU Throttling but it doesn't fix the issue. For context I've been using Cakewalk for years on this computer. I upgrading it about 6 months ago (CPU, motherboard and RAM) and it was running really smoothly until very recently. Thanks! Try a clean install https://help.cakewalk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360034066393-Clean-Install-Cakewalk-SONAR?fbclid=IwAR26KIPAYgQdt7LRtxV7tZ-WJdOIWZ-sutqF5qhqHP6URzdtX0yCN798LCA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bristol_Jonesey Posted April 24 Share Posted April 24 (edited) 1 hour ago, Jon L said: Hi, For the past week, I've been having a lot of issues with Cakewalk. Half the time when I launch the playback, nothing happens for 4 or 5 seconds and the sounds comes in but it's not synced with the cursor anymore. And I regularly get Audio Engine Dropout (9) . According to this document, I should "Increase the Prepare using n Millisecond Buffers value in Edit > Preferences > MIDI - Playback and Recording", but I can't find that setting. I tried WASAPI shared and exclusive, increased the Playback Buffer Size, the DropoutMSec and disabled CPU Throttling but it doesn't fix the issue. For context I've been using Cakewalk for years on this computer. I upgrading it about 6 months ago (CPU, motherboard and RAM) and it was running really smoothly until very recently. Thanks! The dialog box is here Edited April 24 by Bristol_Jonesey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon L Posted April 24 Author Share Posted April 24 (edited) Thanks Jorge and Bristol! I tried increasing the Playback Buffer to 1000ms but to no effect. I'll try the clean install next 🤞 EDIT: same problem after the clean install... Edited April 24 by Jon L 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Misha Posted April 24 Share Posted April 24 (edited) Jon, any plugins are a part of this equation? Simple way to check is press FX button on upper bar. It will turn blue, telling you that all FX are disabled. Try to play project again. I had some pretty interesting (not in a good way) experience with some plugins. --- What happens if you start a new project and try to record just a few seconds of test audio. Does it play? P.S. Almost forgot... You mentioned WASAPI. Anything audio active on background? A player, Youtube? Edited April 24 by Misha Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Starship Krupa Posted April 25 Share Posted April 25 Need current system specs. Not that we're looking to point fingers, but with performance issues like this, we need to know better what we're dealing with. OS, CPU, RAM, disk, video, make and model of audio interface is the minimum amount of info I need before I can take a guess or give suggestions. See my sig for an idea of a full list of pertinent system info. Download and install HWInfo64 and Latency Monitor, 'cause we're gonna be asking you to use them. Also, did anything else happen with your system around the time Cakewalk started acting up? System update, install new software (program or plug-in or utility)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon L Posted April 25 Author Share Posted April 25 I have dozens of effects on my tracks and busses but I tried bypassing them and ended up getting Audio Engine Dropout again. I thought it could be plugin related but I'm not using any plugin I haven't used in other projects before. It does seem to be project related, because I opened an older project that has even more tracks and effects and no problem there... I guess I need to figure out what's different about this new project (there is a new VST I just started using but these problems predate it). Regarding specs: i5-13600K, ASUS Z790-Plus, 32GB DDR5 RAM, 256GB SSD, GTX 2070 Super, Windows 10, DT 770 Pro, no audio interface And nothing else is running except Chrome but with no audio or video. HWInfo64 seems to show everything is ok (no disk issues) and Latency Monitor says my system appears to be suitable so far (not sure how long it's supposed to run). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Misha Posted April 25 Share Posted April 25 Frequency / bitrate mismatch? ------ "except Chrome" that might be a boo boo. For testing purposes I would try to avoid using any "browsers". Did you disable FX globally (FX button on upper bar) or individually? Some synths like Sonic (Halion) had given me headache in past few years because of it's license manager. Would hang Cakewalk completely. I believe they fixed it last year, as it was working OK since, but if you have older version... or similar synth in project that calls for "something" that might be issue too. I've given up on Waves plugins mainly for that reason. Make a copy of the project, so you can use it as a sandbox to pinpoint issue. I would start by deleting first 1/2 of the tracks with their FX straight down (on a copy of course). If project plays, do Undo, grab first 1/4 of the tracks.. delete, etc. Deduction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Resonant Serpent Posted April 25 Share Posted April 25 Definitely get an audio interface with ASIO drivers. It'll save you a lot of headaches. 4 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon L Posted April 25 Author Share Posted April 25 12 hours ago, Misha said: Make a copy of the project, so you can use it as a sandbox to pinpoint issue. I would start by deleting first 1/2 of the tracks with their FX straight down (on a copy of course). If project plays, do Undo, grab first 1/4 of the tracks.. delete, etc. Deduction. Yeah that's what I ended up doing, it took a while but I found the issue. Actually nothing to do with MIDI, it was one track that only had one sample (4MB WAV) playing only once, with a single automation lane on it and a single effect. Weird... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Misha Posted April 25 Share Posted April 25 15 hours ago, Resonant Serpent said: Definitely get an audio interface with ASIO drivers. It'll save you a lot of headaches. On 4/24/2024 at 11:33 AM, Jon L said: For context I've been using Cakewalk for years on this computer Seems OP was able to get away without ASIO for years. Hopefully this was just a glitch for him. Different Cakewalks for different folks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon L Posted April 25 Author Share Posted April 25 Yeah, getting an interface is definitely in my TODO! In the end I don't know what the issue was but I have a workaround so I'll mark this as resolved. Thanks for you help! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
msmcleod Posted Monday at 08:35 AM Share Posted Monday at 08:35 AM Just a FYI - when you start randomly getting dropouts you didn't get before, check the date... it could be Windows downloading updates in the background. Small updates don't really make much of a difference, but the feature updates can definitely slow the machine down significantly. I've been caught out by this more times than I'm prepared to admit, wasting hours troubleshooting only to find it automatically "fixes itself" later. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon L Posted Monday at 06:21 PM Author Share Posted Monday at 06:21 PM 9 hours ago, msmcleod said: Just a FYI - when you start randomly getting dropouts you didn't get before, check the date... it could be Windows downloading updates in the background. Small updates don't really make much of a difference, but the feature updates can definitely slow the machine down significantly. I've been caught out by this more times than I'm prepared to admit, wasting hours troubleshooting only to find it automatically "fixes itself" later. Thanks I'll keep that in mind! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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