# M1 Max Mac - audio processing metre high



## NeonMediaKJT (Dec 14, 2022)

Hi,

To make this quick, I have a brand new Mac Studio with 64gb ram.

If I record a kontakt instrument, the cores in the audio processing metre in Logic Pro spikes to 75% on a single core. This is on a 1024 buffer size.
If I don’t record arm, it plays back with a much lower reading.

Can somebody who uses an m1 Mac confirm to me whether this is normal behaviour? 

I’m worried I won’t have much headroom for larger orchestral projects since I’m already using the highest buffer setting.

Thanks!


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## FrozenIcicle (Dec 15, 2022)

Lol ah i remember I sat on apple support for hours trying to work out why this happens on a brand new mac that has more processing power and ram than my old 2010 mac pro and still hit cpu limit.

Tbh they was no solution.

What i can suggest is - dont use bluetooth headphones cause for some reason that spiked it.

And 2ndly run it in Rosetta mode or inactivate incompatible plugins with M1


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## davidson (Dec 15, 2022)

Which kontakt library is it? Is it happening with all kontakt libraries? Also, I've read some people getting much higher CPU use with large buffer sizes (as backwards as that sounds). What's it looking like set at 128?

But no, unless it's a library which causes CPU spikes (some Slate and Ash presets for example), it's not normal or what I'm seeing on the same system here. Oh also, I avoid Rosetta at all costs - it's been completely unstable on two M1 systems for me.


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## NeonMediaKJT (Dec 15, 2022)

davidson said:


> Which kontakt library is it? Is it happening with all kontakt libraries? Also, I've read some people getting much higher CPU use with large buffer sizes (as backwards as that sounds). What's it looking like set at 128?
> 
> But no, unless it's a library which causes CPU spikes (some Slate and Ash presets for example), it's not normal or what I'm seeing on the same system here. Oh also, I avoid Rosetta at all costs - it's been completely unstable on two M1 systems for me.


infinite brass. It's a more CPU intensive library, but my windows machine (which was weaker) wasn't spiking like this. I'll try a lower buffer. I think it's running in native. is there a way to verify that?

Seems to be better when I turn off the record arm, but like I said, it's like there's not gonna be much headroom.


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## WandaS (Dec 23, 2022)

I'm using Infinite Brass on a Mac Studio and having no spike problems at all.
I never use Rosetta on Logic Pro 10.7.6.


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## NeonMediaKJT (Dec 23, 2022)

WandaS said:


> I'm using Infinite Brass on a Mac Studio and having no spike problems at all.
> I never use Rosetta on Logic Pro 10.7.6.


What about if you record a few instruments at once? Say, 4 horns together. Where does the metre spike to for you?


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## WandaS (Dec 24, 2022)

With 4 horn parts !'m at 25% on my first 2 processors.
But with the M1 my first 2 processors are always working somewhat.


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## Saxer (Dec 25, 2022)

I had problems like that but it somehow "healed" over time. On the first song I was working on my new MacStudioUltra (128 GIG RAM) I had CPU spikes and a randomly jumping song position line in Logic and even my RME audio interface stopped working a few times a day and could only be reanimated by restarting the Mac.
I didn't change any special settings but after a few days/weeks/month it's now working rather normal. There are still some plugins left that spikes the CPU from time to time (not Kontakt). Infinite Brass/WWs running smooth here. Buffer at 128.
I think there are index apps running in the background doing their whatever their job is and when they're done they're done. The rest might be incompatibilities between plugins and M1 and I hope that will change with later updates.


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## FrozenIcicle (Dec 25, 2022)

Saxer said:


> I had problems like that but it somehow "healed" over time. On the first song I was working on my new MacStudioUltra (128 GIG RAM) I had CPU spikes and a randomly jumping song position line in Logic and even my RME audio interface stopped working a few times a day and could only be reanimated by restarting the Mac.
> I didn't change any special settings but after a few days/weeks/month it's now working rather normal. There are still some plugins left that spikes the CPU from time to time (not Kontakt). Infinite Brass/WWs running smooth here. Buffer at 128.
> I think there are index apps running in the background doing their whatever their job is and when they're done they're done. The rest might be incompatibilities between plugins and M1 and I hope that will change with later updates.


Yep mine healed itself but running in rosetta definitely helped


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## NeonMediaKJT (Dec 25, 2022)

FrozenIcicle said:


> Yep mine healed itself but running in rosetta definitely helped


Running logic in Rosetta? Is it Better than running logic in native and loading Rosetta plugins?


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## NeonMediaKJT (Dec 25, 2022)

Saxer said:


> I had problems like that but it somehow "healed" over time. On the first song I was working on my new MacStudioUltra (128 GIG RAM) I had CPU spikes and a randomly jumping song position line in Logic and even my RME audio interface stopped working a few times a day and could only be reanimated by restarting the Mac.
> I didn't change any special settings but after a few days/weeks/month it's now working rather normal. There are still some plugins left that spikes the CPU from time to time (not Kontakt). Infinite Brass/WWs running smooth here. Buffer at 128.
> I think there are index apps running in the background doing their whatever their job is and when they're done they're done. The rest might be incompatibilities between plugins and M1 and I hope that will change with later updates.


Hmm… I sent to get immediate large spikes with infinite that then calm down and drop to the 25-30% range. Weird. Is there anyway I can troubleshoot my m1 cpu to make sure it’s working properly?


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## FrozenIcicle (Dec 25, 2022)

NeonMediaKJT said:


> Running logic in Rosetta? Is it Better than running logic in native and loading Rosetta plugins?


Try it. There could be one plugin not optimised for native and causing spikes


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## Pixelpoet1985 (Dec 26, 2022)

I still have an 2021 iMac. On Big Sur everything was smooth and fine. I only upgraded to Monterey, because of the new Logic Pro features. Since then I have many (CPU) problems with Kontakt and Opus.

So either it‘s Logic or macOS…? Don‘t know if Ventura would fix it. Still hesitating to upgrade.


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## WandaS (Dec 28, 2022)

Also, when I did my " Infinite Brass " test I was running at 64 samples.
I'm sure at 128 it would be less taxing.


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## NeonMediaKJT (Dec 28, 2022)

WandaS said:


> Also, when I did my " Infinite Brass " test I was running at 64 samples.
> I'm sure at 128 it would be less taxing.


I don’t think I could get away with 128 😕 something must’ve wrong


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## Jett Hitt (Dec 28, 2022)

I am having terrible CPU spikes with Berlin Studio (Ventura). It heals itself after a while, but as soon as I make any changes to the settings of a track, the problem comes rushing back. If I quit Logic and restart it, all of the problems have to work themselves out again. It pretty much makes it unusable. Berlin Studio works fine in Musescore, however, and I hear from others that it works fine in Studio One.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Dec 28, 2022)

NeonMediaKJT said:


> Running logic in Rosetta? Is it Better than running logic in native and loading Rosetta plugins?


You can still run Intel plug-ins with Logic in native mode. They run in a separate process.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Dec 28, 2022)

I wouldn't worry about the meters as long as you're not hearing anything bad. And 1024 samples isn't a serious setting. Try 64 samples.

Also, the Activity Monitor meters are a more useful indication of the processing load than Logic's. There was a thread about this about a month ago... and I forget what these words really mean, but Logic shows processing threads vs. what's actually going on with the CPU cores.


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