# Cubase Major Performance issues when running Instrument Track vs Instrument Rack?



## JT3_Jon (Apr 30, 2015)

I'm doing a project in Cubase 7.5 and I’m running into major VST performance issues when running VSTI’s in instrument tracks vs instrument racks. If I load a full omnisphere in an instrument track for example, a single note maxes out my VST performance and I get clicks and pops, where if I load the exact same instrument in VE-Pro in an instrument rack, it runs at roughly 1/10 as much VST performance. 

I made a video demonstrating the behavior here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SN3W6R3kEi8


Breakdown of setup: 
8-core nehalem Mac pro w/ 32 Gb Ram OS 10.9.5, SSD system drive
Cubase 7.5.40 64 bit

VST Audio System: 
UA Apollo running at 512 sample buffer
Input latency: 19.250
Output Latency 12.562
AISO Guard Latency 0.000ms
Sample Rate: 48K
Audio Priority: Normal
Multi Processing: yes
ASIO-Guard: No
Disk Preload: 2 seconds

Any help would be greatly appreciated as this is driving me bonkers!


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## JT3_Jon (Apr 30, 2015)

bump in the hopes someone might help this poor soul out!


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## JT3_Jon (Apr 30, 2015)

I have created a new empty cubase file at 44.1 sample rate (instead of 48K) and I have loaded just omnisphere (no ve pro) and tried one as a track instrument and one as a rack instrument and they both are using the same VST resources / peaking. So I guess thats not the issue. If I then move the instrument to VE pro (track or rack) and I do not have any issues and VST performance drops 10 fold. Again the CPU usage on my machine is hardly moving, yet I'm getting real-time peaks and average load is very high in the VST performance window when loading instruments directly in Cubase. Does this mean I simply cannot load VST instruments in Cubase? I must have something setup wrong as this does not seem right to me. How are you fellow Cubase users able to do this?

I've tested this with multiple synths (omnisphere, Absynth, Massive, Alchemy) and they all exhibit similar behavior where running them as track instruments use WAY more VST performance resources than loading them in VE pro. This makes zero sense to me as its all running on the same computer. Again, maybe I have something setup wrong or need to purge preferences or something?

edit: I just now tried the same multi in Logic and it seems it peaks in Logic as well. However if I load it into VE pro the CPU goes down as well (in fact in Logic it goes down so much its not even registering on its CPU meter!) So I'm staring to think maybe VE pro uses multiple cores in real time, while DAWS like Logic and cubase are using only one CPU in their program? I'm still confused as to why that doest show up in activity monitor though. The major difference I'm seeing though is unlike Cubase, when I'm not playing the instrument in Logic the CPU usage is barely registering, while in Cubase it seems just having the instrument loaded causes it to use major VST performance resources! Any ideas why this could be or how to reduce performance resources of VSTI's?

I guess the moral of the story is load everything in VE pro as for whatever reason it saves CPU in your DAW. But any further information anyone can provide me with to optimize performance of VSTI's would be greatly appreciated.


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## soundmasterlee (Apr 30, 2015)

So I just did the same thing and had the same result Imagine that just to be clear on what your doing your running Omisphere in a multi with all 8 channels running at once and the sound is coming out 1 channel ? Have you check your system limit to see what it is mines 3 gb and only reads 175mb used when I load all of them up. I haven't had any clipping but it does seem to put quite a load on the VST maybe email the PLuginguru.com and John may know how to fix something like this that guy know Omnisphere inside and out or call Spectrasonics there very helpful Good luck Kevin


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## apessino (Apr 30, 2015)

The CPU meter in Cubase is not reflecting the global use of the CPU, just the relative load of the ASIO system. Obviously transferring the instrument to an external program (VE Pro) is going to lower the load on the internal ASIO.

Check your machine's OS level CPU monitoring system (not sure how you do that on a Mac, on Windows it would be using Task Manager) and you will find that your CPUs are doing more or less the same work, just outside of Cubase.


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