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Your solutions to mitigate cpu usage within AUM?

ejacul337ejacul337
in General App Discussion

Your solutions to mitigate cpu usage within AUM?

Please explain or post pics of process (bus setup, etc)

Comments

  • yellow_eyezyellow_eyez

    Speaking of which - did someone say AUM was getting multi threading ?

  • wimwim

    @yellow_eyez said:
    Speaking of which - did someone say AUM was getting multi threading ?

    I don't believe so.

  • SamuSamu

    @wim said:

    @yellow_eyez said:
    Speaking of which - did someone say AUM was getting multi threading ?

    I don't believe so.

    It's a long standing wish from many plug-in heavy users but I doubt it'll happen in any near future...

  • belldubelldu

    Firstly, you can easy see what's using the CPU / DSP by clicking on the 'Node Statistics' menu option that you get when you click on the DSP % at the top of the screen.

    Then the strategy is to either sample the resource draining synths and play them from a looper or as an audio file, or to ensure that they are bypassed (deactivated) when not used. AUM nowadays doesn't consume (many) resources for deactivated synths / effects plug-ins.

    Bypass can be controlled via MIDI messages so its fairly straight forward to have whole sections of instruments and effects bypass at the press of a single button.

  • mjm1138mjm1138

    @belldu said:
    Firstly, you can easy see what's using the CPU / DSP by clicking on the 'Node Statistics' menu option that you get when you click on the DSP % at the top of the screen.

    Then the strategy is to either sample the resource draining synths and play them from a looper or as an audio file, or to ensure that they are bypassed (deactivated) when not used. AUM nowadays doesn't consume (many) resources for deactivated synths / effects plug-ins.

    Bypass can be controlled via MIDI messages so its fairly straight forward to have whole sections of instruments and effects bypass at the press of a single button.

    Great information and great strategy @belldu! @ejacul337 I assume you know that you can take a recording of a channel and plop it into a new channel with a file player as a way of "bouncing" a track. I'd consider doing the recording with the effects chain disabled, duplicating the channel so it includes the FX chain, and replacing the input on the new channel with the file player. Then you can continue to tweak the effects.

  • wimwim

    I apologize for the non-answer, but here's what I found works the best...

    Loopy Pro.

    I love AUM. I appreciate the immediateness for just setting something up and jamming. But I had a woeful Air 2 up until December and only an iPad 9th gen now. With Loopy I can go essentially forever even on the Air 2. The key is the automatic idling of plugins when not in use and the ability to commit to audio in seconds when CPU use starts to get out of hand. The idled plugins take virtually no CPU, but they stay parked there with their current settings so that I can return to them to add parts or "unfreeze" things to tweak them. Yes you can bypass plugins in AUM to save CPU, but the process of replacing them with recorded audio is cumbersome.

    Also, Loopy has many some lesser noticed features that can be really helpful. For instance, AUM doesn't support controllers with relative encoders and it doesn't have "pickup mode", two features that Loopy handles well.

    Not to bash AUM at all! I'm just relating what has enabled me to work easily without restriction on totally inadequate hardware.

  • tom_wardtom_ward
    edited August 26

    @wim said:
    I apologize for the non-answer, but here's what I found works the best...

    Loopy Pro.

    I love AUM. I appreciate the immediateness for just setting something up and jamming. But I had a woeful Air 2 up until December and only an iPad 9th gen now. With Loopy I can go essentially forever even on the Air 2. The key is the automatic idling of plugins when not in use and the ability to commit to audio in seconds when CPU use starts to get out of hand. The idled plugins take virtually no CPU, but they stay parked there with their current settings so that I can return to them to add parts or "unfreeze" things to tweak them. Yes you can bypass plugins in AUM to save CPU, but the process of replacing them with recorded audio is cumbersome.

    Also, Loopy has many some lesser noticed features that can be really helpful. For instance, AUM doesn't support controllers with relative encoders and it doesn't have "pickup mode", two features that Loopy handles well.

    Not to bash AUM at all! I'm just relating what has enabled me to work easily without restriction on totally inadequate hardware.

    I've found, if one owns both AUM and Loopy Pro, that bringing Loopy in as an AUv3 is an OK middle ground here. It makes the bouncing-to-audio workflow a lot less cumbersome (after some setup and ideally templating), while straddling the benefits of both apps. It won't be the performance gains you're seeing by doing just Loopy Pro.

    An example:

    Phase Monkey output on channel 2 is bussed to input 2 in Loopy Pro. Channel 3 in AUM is the main output of Loopy Pro. Channel 4 is Loopy aux output 1, which is just part of my personal workflow and not needed if the goal is simply to bounce audio.

    Because Loopy Pro offers a lot of I/O this can be repeated for several instruments, which can all be bounced and mixed down based on CPU need or preference in Loopy.

    I use this kind of workflow for live looping, not explicitly to save CPU. It can be pushed further to save more CPU by sending the instrument output direct to a bus, and making that bus the input for the channel that has Loopy Pro as an effect. I find that's pretty limiting for my personal use, but there is room for experimentation.

  • PoppadocrockPoppadocrock

    You Can always record the audio of the heavy plugins, then remove the instrument, and use the file player.

  • PapaBPoppinPapaBPoppin

    @wim said:
    I apologize for the non-answer, but here's what I found works the best...

    Loopy Pro.

    I love AUM. I appreciate the immediateness for just setting something up and jamming. But I had a woeful Air 2 up until December and only an iPad 9th gen now. With Loopy I can go essentially forever even on the Air 2. The key is the automatic idling of plugins when not in use and the ability to commit to audio in seconds when CPU use starts to get out of hand. The idled plugins take virtually no CPU, but they stay parked there with their current settings so that I can return to them to add parts or "unfreeze" things to tweak them. Yes you can bypass plugins in AUM to save CPU, but the process of replacing them with recorded audio is cumbersome.

    Also, Loopy has many some lesser noticed features that can be really helpful. For instance, AUM doesn't support controllers with relative encoders and it doesn't have "pickup mode", two features that Loopy handles well.

    Not to bash AUM at all! I'm just relating what has enabled me to work easily without restriction on totally inadequate hardware.

    Got a question relating directly to this - I've faced a weird problem with a few auv3 instruments that, when about 10 or more instruments are loaded, pretty regularly apps like Buttersynth and Pure Upright (but not Pure Piano, weirdly) can take from a bit longer to initialize on opening the template, to needing repeated reloads after working for a little, to getting caught in an unbreakable init loop, to (in buttersynth's case) seemingly working, after a a 'reload' or two until selecting a random preset and crashing loopy fully

    All plugins are loaded in Off position (using knobs to select which one is on, all others are off), and on new templates with just a few auv3 instruments loaded, evertything runs smooth

    This a known thing?

    (iPad 10th gen if that matters)

  • wimwim

    @PapaBPoppin said:

    This a known thing?

    No. But that's a heavy load for any iPad. I'm not surprised.

    AUv3 apps have a limited amount of RAM that they're allowed to use. To make matters worse, when there are multiple instances of the same app, the amount of ram for all of them in total has to fit within that limitation. There are no mechanisms for a host to predict running out of this RAM pool and none to fail them gracefully either. Buttersynth is one that is known to be heavy on resources.

    Sounds to me like you're just pushing the envelope too far. You could do a comparative test in other hosts such as AUM though. If you don't get the same behavior, then perhaps there's something that can be looked at in Loopy Pro.

  • PapaBPoppinPapaBPoppin

    @wim said:

    @PapaBPoppin said:

    This a known thing?

    No. But that's a heavy load for any iPad. I'm not surprised.

    AUv3 apps have a limited amount of RAM that they're allowed to use. To make matters worse, when there are multiple instances of the same app, the amount of ram for all of them in total has to fit within that limitation. There are no mechanisms for a host to predict running out of this RAM pool and none to fail them gracefully either. Buttersynth is one that is known to be heavy on resources.

    Sounds to me like you're just pushing the envelope too far. You could do a comparative test in other hosts such as AUM though. If you don't get the same behavior, then perhaps there's something that can be looked at in Loopy Pro.

    Aaaaahhh ok cool cool that makes sense. I was only thinking cpu load.... Not about ram usage (and of course it has to take up resources somewhere, even when idle. My logical brain just seems to shut down when pretty donuts start spinning 😅)

    Unfortunately no AUM, nor have I messed with any other hosts to know where to begin. However if i do get to testing somehow, I'll certainly pass along any weirdness... If that IS the case

    I mean, Occam's razor leads me to believe it's a me thing, trying to have my cake and eat it too

    Thanks for that bit of clarity!

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