# Cubase Performance Issues



## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 20, 2015)

I'm having some weird asio issues with Cubase which I can't fix. If I move a region I get peaks and if I press alt so that the pencil tool in the sequence windows shows I also get peaks most of the time. My template only has VEP and EW Spaces in it. If I disable all of one but not the other I still have the issue so it isn't that one of those 2 is having issues with it. If I disable both completely I get no issues. 

Turning on asio guard helps somewhat with the peaks when pressing alt to get the pencil tool but doesn't help much for moving regions. Raising my RME Fireface UC buffer also doesn't make a different. I'm currently using 512. Latencymon isn't showing any issues. I've tried disabling network and audio cards and turning off firewall (and no antivirus installed). I've also tried moving USB devices to other ports and putting the Fireface on a USB 2 port.

Specs:
i7-5820
64GB
MSI Gaming7 X99 mobo
Everything except backup on SSD's
GTX750
Windows 10
Latest version of Cubase (officially supported for W10)

Any thoughts?


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## kdm (Nov 20, 2015)

Remove Spaces and see if the spikes happen. I had the same problem, not always as bad with editing, but opening and closing Explorer would cause a real time ASIO spike everytime. Removed Spaces, and ASIO is perfectly quiet. Moving the Spaces iLok around won't help (it didn't here).

This is a known issue from what I've heard from other Cubase/Spaces users. Steinberg has researched this I believe, but the resolution lies with East West. I know it isn't preferrable to give up Spaces, but that may be the only solution for now. Check out Reverberate 2 with their new FIR M7 impulses. You might not miss Spaces. It is heavier on cpu usage, but sounds amazing, and doesn't spike ASIO.

I have a suspicion that this is tied to either Spaces' multithreading (most likely), or on the outside, accessing iLok. I had random spikes as well, not tied to any specific action, and often just during playback at no particular point, which is what makes me somewhat suspicious of it's Pace use.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 20, 2015)

kdm said:


> Remove Spaces and see if the spikes happen. I had the same problem, not always as bad with editing, but opening and closing Explorer would cause a real time ASIO spike everytime. Removed Spaces, and ASIO is perfectly quiet. Moving the Spaces iLok around won't help (it didn't here).
> 
> This is a known issue from what I've heard from other Cubase/Spaces users. Steinberg has researched this I believe, but the resolution lies with East West. I know it isn't preferrable to give up Spaces, but that may be the only solution for now. Check out Reverberate 2 with their new FIR M7 impulses. You might not miss Spaces. It is heavier on cpu usage, but sounds amazing, and doesn't spike ASIO.
> 
> I have a suspicion that this is tied to either Spaces' multithreading (most likely), or on the outside, accessing iLok. I had random spikes as well, not tied to any specific action, and often just during playback at no particular point, which is what makes me somewhat suspicious of it's Pace use.



I never had this issue on my old computer. I had some peaking from Spaces with mouse clicks but turning on asio guard fixed it. 

I'm currently doing some testing on this and it appears that VEP might be at fault for the peaking when dragging and asio guard seems to fix Spaces's issue. Here are my notes so far:

Spaces off, asio guard on:

Peaks when moving. None on alt

Spaces off, asio guard off:

Peaks for everything

VEP instances disconnected, asio guard on:

Alt peaking, none on dragging

VEP instances disconnected, asio guard off:

Alt peaking, none on dragging, peak on blank clicks

VEP plugin out, asio guard off:

Alt peaking, none on dragging, peak on blank clicks

VEP plugin out, asio guard on:

No peaking



As you can see, VEP out and asio guard on results in no peaking so seems like it might be VEP. If Spaces does turn out to be an issue I can always run it in VEP.


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## kdm (Nov 20, 2015)

It isn't VEPro. I've been running VEP for several years with no issues. 

Removing Spaces solved all of the spikes for me and another composer I spoke with recently. Most likely what happens when you remove VEPro is you are lowering the overall ASIO load and that brings total loading down low enough you don't notice the spikes, but realtime ASIO loading will jump. VEPro connections require a noticeable amount of ASIO loading if you have a many. I also had to have 3-4 instances of Spaces for ASIO to actually hit 100% when spiking - based on the loading in the project I was testing. 

ASIO Guard had no affect here. Random spikes still happened - every few minutes. Remove all instances of Spaces and test with VEPro still active. If you still have spikes, there is likely a hardware conflict of some sort. If you try Spaces within VEPro, post back to let us know if that also eliminates the spikes.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 20, 2015)

The asio guard has a huge effect on VEP (with no Spaces) on this computer even though I know that it supposedly doesn't work well with VEP. Spaces seems to be causing some of the issues with the GUI spikes but VEP is cause the most annoying which is the spikes when dragging a region. Like you said, it probably is the asio load and not VEP specifically.

Running Spaces in VEP avoids some issues of the GUI but latency gets to be too much to be playable (input latency + VEP latency for instrument + VEP latency for Spaces + Asio Guard latency + output latency). Also have to consider that I need to use 512 on my RME to get VEP running properly. Running the Spaces instance with a buffer of 0 brings the problems back (I've never been able to use 0 on any computer).

Setting the audio priority to boost lowered the asio usage and I hardly getting the issues but when I started to play some patches my computer crashed and has now crashed 3 times. I think it's from the changes I made to the graphics card while trying to fix this. More troubleshooting...


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## kdm (Nov 20, 2015)

You should disable ASIO guard for the VEPro plugin in Cubase' plugin manager. It is in the lower section of plugin manager if you click on the configure/info button. There are known problems with ASIO Guard and VEPro that will cause sluggish response, delays when selecting VEPro-connected channels, etc. You might see higher ASIO loading, but Cubase will run more smoothly.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 20, 2015)

Had to roll back to a system image from a few days ago. I think it might have been the graphics card update that didn't install properly. Won't update it for a few versions now.

Like I said, it's running better with it on. When it's on I don't get a spike every time I move a region. Asio load isn't an issue - when I'm not clicking anything it stays less than half.


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## stigc56 (Nov 21, 2015)

Gerhard Westphalen said:


> I never had this issue on my old computer. I had some peaking from Spaces with mouse clicks but turning on asio guard fixed it.
> 
> I'm currently doing some testing on this and it appears that VEP might be at fault for the peaking when dragging and asio guard seems to fix Spaces's issue. Here are my notes so far:
> 
> ...


I know you are on Windows, but on Mac turning off Multi processor support and this goes together Asio Guard, stopped the cpu spikes on my system.


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## IFM (Nov 21, 2015)

kdm said:


> You should disable ASIO guard for the VEPro plugin in Cubase' plugin manager. It is in the lower section of plugin manager if you click on the configure/info button. There are known problems with ASIO Guard and VEPro that will cause sluggish response, delays when selecting VEPro-connected channels, etc. You might see higher ASIO loading, but Cubase will run more smoothly.



I'm having terrible issues now with VEP and Cubase. I did try this suggestion but my slave PC isn't fast enough to handle more than a couple legato tracks. I might be able to put a new CPU in it to help. 

My problem has been C8 hanging and the only way out is to force quit. I am running the high setting because apparently VI Pro also doesn't like it very much. On medium if I do two tracks I key cou spikes. On high it is smooth as butter. Grrr...


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 21, 2015)

It seems that setting the audio priority to boost helps a lot but I can't find what that does exactly so I'm not sure if it should be set to boot (the help button is greyed out for me and it's not mentioned in the manual)


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## Zelorkq (Nov 22, 2015)

One or two years back I also had *somewhat* similar spikes with Cubase upon moving my mouse in certain regions. (this might not help as it was Windows 7 and Cubase 7 back then)
But, the main culprit was Graphic drivers. What got things fixed in my case was:
1) using different Graphic driver versions. The latest aren't ALWAYS the best if you're having problems  - I absolutely hate auto-updating, no matter what software (because I'm a control freak when it comes to what's-installed-on-my-PC as a ton of unwanted software gets installed without the average user's knowledge/consent). Updating GPU drivers every few days is not necessary, even if you're a gamer; I manually update GPU drivers a few times a year at most.
2) alternatively, using a different PLAY version, that is, if you're using PLAY.

But it seems you already did a system restore and you're still having some issues... But hopefully you'll get it fixed soon


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 22, 2015)

I'm finding it strange that after a while of experimenting the issue seems to go away and it's somewhat stable but then if I reload the project it's back to as before.

The issue with the graphics card version is that I have no idea what version would work (if there is even one that would solve the issue). I can't sit here installing hundreds of versions of the driver. These sorts of issues are so individual to one's system that unfortunately there's no "one size fits all" solution. Perhaps I'll try a really old version to see if it fixes it although I have to be careful about when it started supporting Windows 10. 

I've gone through multiple versions of Cubase 8, Play, VEP, and Spaces since I've gotten the computer and it's never fixed the issue.

Can anyone confirm if this issue is 100% an issue with the graphics card? Can I rule out other causes? I'll try reaching out to Steinberg and see what they say.


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## Zelorkq (Nov 23, 2015)

Sorry I can't help much in this situation. I would've said try using the IGP, but the 5820k has no IGP. My system is running smoothly with Windows 7 and Cubase 8 but I've had my share of problems along the road


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## IFM (Nov 23, 2015)

Update to my earlier post. 

1) Split the network so that VEP runs on it's own router/switcher. I'll use WIFI for connecting to the internet when needed and can share the connection if I have to for the slave PC.
2) Discovered that I was only getting 100T on a gigabit port on the PC. Changed out the cable and that fixed the issue but still was having Cubase hang.
3) Discovered VIP was more of a problem than VEP. I disabled ASIO Guard for VIP and no C8 hangs when using Normal settings. 

I may just run my VIP instruments in VEP instance on the local machine.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 23, 2015)

Dragonwind said:


> Update to my earlier post.
> 
> 1) Split the network so that VEP runs on it's own router/switcher. I'll use WIFI for connecting to the internet when needed and can share the connection if I have to for the slave PC.
> 2) Discovered that I was only getting 100T on a gigabit port on the PC. Changed out the cable and that fixed the issue but still was having Cubase hang.
> ...



In my case I'm running everything on my master since this new computer can handle it all and in this case the asio guard is making the spikes less severe/less often. I've contacted Steinberg and they can't recommend a specific graphics card driver version so it seems that I'll be hunting on my own.


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## PhJ (Nov 23, 2015)

You might also have a look at this thread on Steinberg's forum:
http://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=226&t=81011

Disabling graphics acceleration for Cubase in the registry seems to cure many problems.
Worth trying (you can go back if it's not helping)


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 23, 2015)

PhJ said:


> You might also have a look at this thread on Steinberg's forum:
> http://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=226&t=81011
> 
> Disabling graphics acceleration for Cubase in the registry seems to cure many problems.
> Worth trying (you can go back if it's not helping)



Thanks for the suggestion but it didn't work. I tried making the registry change to both Cubase and Spaces. All it did was make Cubase take a while to open windows.

The person at Steinberg would like me to try using the Windows driver. I'll test that out later today. I'm always hesitant to mess with my monitor/graphics card configurations as I've always found it very temperamental.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 23, 2015)

Uninstalling the Nvidia driver seems to have made the peaks with dragging regions disappear but not with pressing alt. This was with asio guard on. With it off it was the same as before. When I reinstalled it, I installed an older version (353.30) and it didn't make a difference from before. With asio guard off it's completely unusable as I get peaks 100% of the time I drag a region or press alt over the main window.

Seems to me like it might not be the graphics card driver.

I looked at the VisionDAW systems and 1 of the 3 graphics card options they offer on their computer is the GTX750 so if the issue is the card there must be a way to get it working.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 26, 2015)

I've made a couple of big breakthroughs with the issue! The issue with pressing alt is caused by Spaces and having asio guard on pretty much eliminates that problem.

I went through connecting each of my 9 VEP instances on a blank project and found that 3 of them cause problems. If I have the other 6 connected I have no issues (asio guard on or off). 

The 3 problem instances are all EW Play so I think the issue might be with Play. Having said that, my Hollywood Strings and my Hollywood Brass instances don't cause the problems. Any thoughts? If the issue was Play itself, I imagine that all Play instances would have problems.


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