# Anybody using a PCIe NVMe SSD?



## acicero (Aug 20, 2015)

If you don't know what they are, look up the Intel 750 SSD series. They are basically the fastest SSD's around and blow traditional SATA speeds out of the water.

I just found out about these and I am tempted to shell out the money and have superior performance. Is anybody using one to load samples? I'd love to hear from somebody who uses it in music production.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Aug 20, 2015)

As great as they are, I'm not sure how necessary that much speed is in comparison to the rather small size of the drives (at least the affordable ones). You can only get so many samples into 400GB. Sure, some libraries like some Eastwest can be very disk intensive but for 400GB I don't think anything more than perhaps 1GBps is necessary. With a 1TB drive then it would be nice to perhaps have 2GBps or more but considering how expensive something like that is today, having a couple of smaller SSDs will give you all the performance you need. I find 250GB to be a good size for what 6 gpbs sata can provide for samples that you regularly use.


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## acicero (Aug 20, 2015)

Gerhard Westphalen said:


> As great as they are, I'm not sure how necessary that much speed is in comparison to the rather small size of the drives (at least the affordable ones). You can only get so many samples into 400GB. Sure, some libraries like some Eastwest can be very disk intensive but for 400GB I don't think anything more than perhaps 1GBps is necessary. With a 1TB drive then it would be nice to perhaps have 2GBps or more but considering how expensive something like that is today, having a couple of smaller SSDs will give you all the performance you need. I find 250GB to be a good size for what 6 gpbs sata can provide for samples that you regularly use.


Intel has a 400gb and a 1TB version - with a 800gb coming soon. As far as I have read, this is going to be the new standard for SSD's. In a year from now the price will probably be significantly lower. I'm just weighing my options whether to get a 1TB SSD today or for double the price, get a way better future-proof solution (PCIe SSD).


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Aug 20, 2015)

I'd say if you're having most of the libraries you use regularly on a single 1TB sata 3 SSD then you might hit the limit of it and so you should get the PCIe or multiple smaller SSDs. If it's for less used libraries or libraries that you rarely simultaneously use then I don't think it's worth the cost of the PCIe.


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## chimuelo (Aug 20, 2015)

I use a pair of Intel 750 400GB devices on a Z97 and a pair of SATA 3 SSDs. 
The 750s are for samples and there is a huge difference in performance.
Load times are non existant and allow me to load templates live now instead of having all instruments loaded and switching between various set ups.

But as far as getting more polyphony and using massive templates I believe a redesigned audio protocol or a new OS designed for audio is needed.

If you want 35 different templates in a live performance you will want a pair of these.
Otherwise several 2TB SSDs on SATA 3 is fine.


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## acicero (Aug 26, 2015)

chimuelo said:


> I use a pair of Intel 750 400GB devices on a Z97 and a pair of SATA 3 SSDs.
> The 750s are for samples and there is a huge difference in performance.
> Load times are non existant and allow me to load templates live now instead of having all instruments loaded and switching between various set ups.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the info. I'm looking to be able to load my template quickly and have fantastic playback performance. It seems like loading an Intel PCIe SSD with samples is the way to go. What libraries are you using in particular with the Intel 750?


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## chimuelo (Aug 27, 2015)

PLAY HS will load quicker
Kontakt amd Omni become fast enough to change while performing.


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## Dracarys (Aug 24, 2016)

This, you won't see a difference other than the reasons he listed. I have a handful of samsung 840 pros and it feels like software is still the bottleneck, and will be for a while. I can load 50gb sessions with tons of condensed voices, simultaneously.

I'm still getting this piano roll lag when I hit 20gb for some reason, and I'd like that spin wheel go to away when when I hit stop sometimes, seems more software related. Can't wait to try out VE6, for a 3930k I feel like I should be able to load more FX plugins, task manager never goes above 50%.

I also think an internal sound card like RME/Apollo will give me great results versus my 2i2 usb 2.0. Many composers/engineers say this is not that important unless recording which is theoretically true, but I've seen the difference from stock, to Asio4all, to Mbox 2, and now the Scrlett 2i2. They also claimed having your DAW/OS on a SSD does not matter, and the results have been phenomenal, even sample load times.

90% of the time I can load/replace samples during playback without crshing, is 100% of the time worth a $1200 pcie ssd?



chimuelo said:


> I use a pair of Intel 750 400GB devices on a Z97 and a pair of SATA 3 SSDs.
> The 750s are for samples and there is a huge difference in performance.
> Load times are non existant and allow me to load templates live now instead of having all instruments loaded and switching between various set ups.
> 
> ...


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## Reaktor (Nov 9, 2016)

Old thread, but I'm wondering about my hardware update. I have 1 TB SSD with ~500-600mb/s readspeed and an template with around 10GB of samples within six Kontakt instances. Most of my samples are purged and loaded during playback. I have 16GB of ram and I5-2500k CPU.

Loading up my template takes around 45-60 seconds, but I'm not certain if this is due to Kontakt initializing individual instruments slowly or the fact that samples are still preloaded to certain point from SSD drive.

The question: is the bottleneck (for slow preloading / loading the template) my CPU or my SSD? Would I really benefit more by updating CPU to I7-6700k or by moving to NVME drive?

I'm just afraid that if the bottleneck is actually CPU heavy preinitalization of single patches rather than how fast Kontakt can access the samples?


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## ZeroZero (Nov 10, 2016)

I have said this on other threads, expensive but 7 times faster than other SSDs. comes in 500, Itb and TB = the Samsung 960


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## Reaktor (Nov 10, 2016)

Exactly what I'm looking for, but I wonder what is the real bottleneck when you use purged libraried on template - is it CPU ("how fast many instances can be initiated), or SSD ("how fast instance samples can be loaded up"). I already have 1TB SSD, but it takes a while to load even 10gb template... so which brings better performance update - NVME SSD or high performance CPU?


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## ZeroZero (Nov 10, 2016)

Reaktor: I don't know what is your DAW but if it's Cubase then its disabling tracks that you need to do - gone in a flash (no overheads in CPU or RAM, and no sign in mixer), then back in a flash when you need them. If not Cubase then a lot of folks are using Vepro.


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## colony nofi (Nov 10, 2016)

And now there are 2TB versions of the 960!
http://www.samsung.com/us/computing...state-drives/ssd-960-pro-m-2-2tb-mz-v6p2t0bw/


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## jononotbono (Nov 10, 2016)

Gerhard Westphalen said:


> I'd say if you're having most of the libraries you use regularly on a single 1TB sata 3 SSD then you might hit the limit of it and so you should get the PCIe or multiple smaller SSDs. If it's for less used libraries or libraries that you rarely simultaneously use then I don't think it's worth the cost of the PCIe.



At the minute I have most of my Sample on 1 x 1tb Samsung 850 Evo (plugged into Sata 3 6gbs) in my Slave PC (I do have many on a mechanical HDD but waiting to upgrade more SSDs) and I max the 32gb RAM limit way before using the capacity of the SSD. I have upgraded my Mac Pro 5,1 with 64gb of RAM and purely waiting till Black Friday to buy another SSD for the Mac Pro. I have 1 PCIe slot left so was going to buy an adapter card and get either 2 x M.2 SSDs or an Adapter that takes dual Sata 3 SSDs. Was even thinking about putting them in Raid 0. Is getting M.2 excessive for the 5,1? I'm not sure what to buy at the minute. And now reading what you have just said, perhaps getting 500gb SSDs would be better although they would be going through the same PCIe port. Sorry if I'm missing something obvious.


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## jononotbono (Nov 10, 2016)

Sorry, I now realise M.2 may not be the same as PCIe NVMe SSD. Don't want to deliberately derail anything here.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Nov 10, 2016)

jononotbono said:


> At the minute I have most of my Sample on 1 x 1tb Samsung 850 Evo (plugged into Sata 3 6gbs) in my Slave PC (I do have many on a mechanical HDD but waiting to upgrade more SSDs) and I max the 32gb RAM limit way before using the capacity of the SSD. I have upgraded my Mac Pro 5,1 with 64gb of RAM and purely waiting till Black Friday to buy another SSD for the Mac Pro. I have 1 PCIe slot left so was going to buy an adapter card and get either 2 x M.2 SSDs or an Adapter that takes dual Sata 3 SSDs. Was even thinking about putting them in Raid 0. Is getting M.2 excessive for the 5,1? I'm not sure what to buy at the minute. And now reading what you have just said, perhaps getting 500gb SSDs would be better although they would be going through the same PCIe port. Sorry if I'm missing something obvious.



What's your preload buffer at? If you put it on the lowest setting you'll most likely hit the limit of the SSD using only a couple of GB loaded.


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## jononotbono (Nov 10, 2016)

Ok, well this explains a lot. I have it set to 6kb. I'll have a play about and see what the happy medium is! Thanks


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## tack (Nov 10, 2016)

jononotbono said:


> Sorry, I now realise M.2 may not be the same as PCIe NVMe SSD. Don't want to deliberately derail anything here.


M.2 is a form factor, which could be either NVMe or SATA, depending on the slot. My motherboard, for example, comes with one of each. Generally a SATA M.2 will cannibalize a SATA port, and an NVMe M.2 will cannibalize a PCIe slot.


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## Reaktor (Nov 10, 2016)

My question still remains unanswered : Where does the Kontakt loading bottleneck reside when initializing (6) instances with 16 patches - on CPU (how fast it can process initialization) or SSD transfer-rate (how fast it can feed something to be initialized).

This would be clear as day if Kontakt wouldn't load anything when samples are purged, but as far as I know this is not the case - there most likely is some caching done to samples, even if patches are purged.

I'm on hard point with upgrade-path, as I need to overhaul everything except GPU and SSD's. I can live with current core parts & 16GB of ram for a while, so I would love to just get nvme drive IF it really benefits loading times for songs, but if the bottleneck isn't 600mb/s SSD then I would rather upgrade all the main parts (Motherboard + CPU + Ram) and save the nvme price, as it's most likely the one getting cheaper next spring.

I just don't have any idea if nvme really benefits ANYTHING if CPU isn't able to process patches any faster than what SSD already feeds.

Simply having 3000MBps readspeed doesn't benefit anyone if other parts are limiting the usage.

Additional question on NVME / M.2. :

If I understood correctly by reading articles, the motherboards which don't have native NVME support are limited to PCI-E slot via adapter, and PCIE 4X is limited to 2GBps lane? So for an example Samsung 960 pro won't be able to read at full 3GBps ?

ZeroZero:

Your tip was pure gold if it works as I wish it would. I had already thought about this kind of mechanism for Cubase / FL Studio, but I hadn't had time to check if it was implemented. This would make it possible to make huge sets of smaller Kontakt instances for specific purposes and enable 'em per need, without hitting ram limit too fast. My current template is already good for generic writing, but I can't preinitialize specific articulations (harmony, tremolos etc) as that would triple the ram usage within template, and afterall I need those articulations only at times... if there really isn't any overhaul, you sir deserve a drink on me!

I'm bit vary on how well this feature really works on saving, hoping just that it wouldn't easily lose all the presets for patches loaded when instances are disabled, but this most likely is the case and needs to be resolved somehow.... (meaning = there probably isn't "freeze & save & disable" <-> "unfreeze & restore settings & enable").


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## ZeroZero (Nov 11, 2016)

Reaktor said:


> My question still remains unanswered : Where does the Kontakt loading bottleneck reside when initializing (6) instances with 16 patches - on CPU (how fast it can process initialization) or SSD transfer-rate (how fast it can feed something to be initialized).
> 
> This would be clear as day if Kontakt wouldn't load anything when samples are purged, but as far as I know this is not the case - there most likely is some caching done to samples, even if patches are purged.
> 
> ...



I think your right to say that the M2's top specs depend on a decent PCIe bus speed. Once they hit the streets people will be able to post speeds - perhaps here. The much vaunted 3.5 gig per second, is the headline grabber, but reality will strike. However, 3.5 gig per second is seven times the speed of a typical ssd, and roughly 17 times as fast as a HHD. Even if these figures are drastically cut back by slower bus lanes, then you may still be on a winner, and as far as future proofing goes then your on a winner.

Bear in mind that this is my new wanna have  for the Studio, they are even winking at me.

http://www.trustedreviews.com/news/samsung-960-evo-960-pro-speeds-price-specs

I am no techy, but there is a bit of info on buffer sizes in this article which has made me think that the EVO version of the 960 would NOT be the way to go for this community, even though the buffer sizes are massive.

Do people know that if your SSD/M2 is very fasst you can reduce the size of your headers in Kontakt?

Concerning disabling tracks, I am working up a huge template here, I have not tested it all yet but I will say that the disabling tracks function works great as far as I can see. I am using one instant of Kontakt, EW, etc per instrument (loading Keyswitched instruments where I can). As soon as the disable button is hit you see the instrument unload from the rack and there seems to be no impact at all on the PC.
I just loaded my DAW, with 300 or so instances, without the template loaded, but with Cubase up, the RAM reads 4.3gb, with the template it reads 4.9 gig. some of this is taken by activating Cubase of course, and there are no tracks running, but even so, these are really good figures.

Z


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## CACKLAND (Nov 11, 2016)

Here is a benchmark review http://www.storagereview.com/samsung_960_pro_m2_nvme_ssd_review


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## Reaktor (Nov 11, 2016)

Thanks ZeroZero, this tip you gave was amazing.

It seems that Cubase 8.5 still has bug which makes it harder to keep midi outs in touch with Kontakt instance it's controlling. I decided to try alternative approach: I initiate *every* instrument to own kontakt track, which usually is impossible, but this way I might be able to handle ~10-20 instances in realtime which should be more than enought. 

Basically I will have around ~200-300 kontakt instances which all are disabled. When I write, say CSS violin 1 harmonic, I enable just that instance, record, and then either freeze or bounce it (depending on how Cubase can handle both disabling and freezing at the same time... it would be great to have freezed track which would disable VST but enable freezed audio record).

This way a single enabled track takes minimal time to load, as it doesn't enable ~15 additional tracks which I don't need (and thus saving also memory, time and CPU).

If anyone has experience with trying this method (without using midi outs) please let me know if you succeeded.


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## ZeroZero (Nov 11, 2016)

I hope this works for you too, looks good so far here, not sure about mixer routings, group tracks etc. Have not got that far yet. Also, remember you can use the visibility function to hide tracks as they build up in numbers


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## Phryq (Apr 19, 2017)

Gerhard Westphalen said:


> What's your preload buffer at? If you put it on the lowest setting you'll most likely hit the limit of the SSD using only a couple of GB loaded.



I want to buy a Samsung 960 Pro, maybe even 2.

Are you saying I'll be able to keep my buffers low enough that RAM will be less of an issue?

Can I get 2 960 Pros and keep my 32gb ram, rather than upgrading to 64 or 128?


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Apr 19, 2017)

Phryq said:


> I want to buy a Samsung 960 Pro, maybe even 2.
> 
> Are you saying I'll be able to keep my buffers low enough that RAM will be less of an issue?
> 
> Can I get 2 960 Pros and keep my 32gb ram, rather than upgrading to 64 or 128?



Are you currently using HDD's? If so then you can probably cut the amount from samples by about half with SSD's. Depending on the kind of writing you do and then number of SSD's, you can go even lower. 

If you're going from one SSD to another (m.2, PCIe, or whatnot) then you likely won't be able to lower the preload buffer by much (if any at all). In this case doubling the ram is definitely the way to go if you're maxing it out.


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## Symfoniq (Apr 19, 2017)

I'm running two 1 TB Samsung 960 Pros NVMe drives in a Lenovo ThinkPad P50. They are absurdly fast. No problems whatsoever running Linux, and no problems with Windows since Samsung released version 2.2 of their NVMe driver.

I don't know to what extent these drives will allow you to decrease the preload buffer. They're fast, but they're also more expensive than RAM.


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## OleJoergensen (Apr 19, 2017)

I have a 400 GB Intel 750 (slot use on the motherboard), I use for Hollywood strings diamond.
My PC is able to reach 2364 MB/s read speed with Intel 750 (test app CrystalDiskmark).
When I load samples in Play/ Ve-Pro the max read speed is appox. 140 MB/s (task manager high view performance) quite disappointing. It takes 2 min 10 sec to load 27.5 GB samples (appox. 210 MB/s) which is quite fast.


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## chimuelo (Apr 19, 2017)

Slot use or U2 w/ 2.5" device?


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## OleJoergensen (Apr 19, 2017)

chimuelo said:


> Slot use or U2 w/ 2.5" device?


Its a slot use on the motherboard.


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## jononotbono (Apr 19, 2017)

I was thinking about using my last PCIe slot in my Mac Pro 5,1 (I have a Sata 3 2tb Samsung 850 Evo plugged into one of the Data bays) and using a PCIe adapter. Turns out, the 2tb SSD is fast enough for loading Samples and I think I'd rather use the PCIe slot for my first UAD Octo Card. It has a read speed of about 400mbs and my whole template with nearly 1700 tracks (and counting) takes about 6 minutes to load. I just make myself a coffee whilst I turn it on!


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## chimuelo (Apr 19, 2017)

OleJoergensen said:


> Its a slot use on the motherboard.



That's odd, I had driver issues at first but even then they were lightning fast.
I still have them but removed them and only use 1 x NVMe now.
Dual NVMe M.2 or dual 400gb 750s went south after I upgraded from Windows 7 to 8.1.
I had issues with PCI-e Overflow messages.
Weird stuff as I would complete a gig and my screen was frozen.
I don't need to access QWERTY/Mouse during gigs but I couldn't even close my apps.
Complete power down only.

Will test them out when U2 adapters for AMD Build become available.
Mine were better than any M.2 I had or still use.

FWIW Manufacturers are using in house software that benches really well.
Samsung Magician is one that comes to mind.
The very best test is how fast instruments load.
I have Omnisphere/Keyscape on NVMe M.2 right now and loads aren't even showing up in the progress bar. At 2x speeds it's fast but I can see the progress bar in Dual Live Mode.

Tell me more about your board and attached devices, maybe I can recall my hit and misses I had and help.


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## leggylangdon (Apr 19, 2017)

I did have one in my Mac Pro tower but it died on me a week after install and freaked me out. I use Angelbird SSD in the sata bay now and that's working great!


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## OleJoergensen (Apr 19, 2017)

chimuelo said:


> That's odd, I had driver issues at first but even then they were lightning fast.
> I still have them but removed them and only use 1 x NVMe now.
> Dual NVMe M.2 or dual 400gb 750s went south after I upgraded from Windows 7 to 8.1.
> I had issues with PCI-e Overflow messages.
> ...


Thank you Chimuelo. But i dont think it is slow, its just Play engine there are not yet able to take advance of the super fast NVME drives.


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## chimuelo (Apr 20, 2017)

I stopped using PLAY for that reason.
I wouldn't mind waiting for load times if I'm going to record but way too many resources needed to justify for live work.
Their 16bit versions load quick, but 24bit is an entirely different story.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Apr 20, 2017)

Chim, the current version of Play loads like a bat out of hell and is very efficient.

It's totally different from what you're talking about, in fact I suspect it's a total rewrite. The Quantum Leap Bosendorfer loads in 8 seconds on my machine, for example.


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## OleJoergensen (Apr 20, 2017)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> Chim, the current version of Play loads like a bat out of hell and is very efficient.
> 
> It's totally different from what you're talking about, in fact I suspect it's a total rewrite. The Quantum Leap Bosendorfer loads in 8 seconds on my machine, for example.


Yes, Play 5 is fast compared to the old Play.


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## Phryq (Apr 20, 2017)

Gerhard Westphalen said:


> Are you currently using HDD's? If so then you can probably cut the amount from samples by about half with SSD's. Depending on the kind of writing you do and then number of SSD's, you can go even lower.
> 
> If you're going from one SSD to another (m.2, PCIe, or whatnot) then you likely won't be able to lower the preload buffer by much (if any at all). In this case doubling the ram is definitely the way to go if you're maxing it out.



But the Samsung 960 m.2 has a continuous read of 3500, about 7x as fast as my current SSD.

Random reads have an even higher increase.

So in theory, shouldn't I be able to lower by buffers even more? Or keep all samples entirely purged and DFD everything?


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Apr 21, 2017)

Phryq said:


> But the Samsung 960 m.2 has a continuous read of 3500, about 7x as fast as my current SSD.
> 
> Random reads have an even higher increase.
> 
> So in theory, shouldn't I be able to lower by buffers even more? Or keep all samples entirely purged and DFD everything?



Not really. You're never gonna actually get all of that performance increase. I think a lot of it has to do with latency between all of the components. Even ram is pretty slow and the distance between it and the processor is big enough for it to have an impact on the system's performance. Even with all my samples on SSD's, if I try to play a single patch that has samples purged, I normally have to wait for it to load before I stop getting glitches. There's just too much latency for it to be able to instantly fetch. 

You won't be able to DFD everything anytime soon. You'd need something close to the performance of ram which these drives don't have and the PCIe bus can't handle. FYI continuous reads are pretty irrelevant for samples. Random is what you should be comparing (which I know you mentioned). 

I have not idea was sort of performance increase you'd actually get and am really curious to see. I don't care about loading times. The best test would probably be to compare the number of voices from the same libraries at various DFD settings for each drive.

I doubt you'd get even 2x the performance of a normal SSD. Again, this is for streaming samples. Not project load times, OS speed, or large file transfer speed.


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## OleJoergensen (Apr 21, 2017)

Ram is not slow. In the past I tested my Orchestra PC. I think the Ram speed was 15 GB/s.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Apr 21, 2017)

OleJoergensen said:


> Ram is not slow. In the past I tested my Orchestra PC. I think the Ram speed was 15 GB/s.



A 4GHz clock will have a period of 0.25ns. Even the fastest ram we use has a latency of more than 10ns. That's extremely slow. On the average computer it's likely at least 100x slower than the processor. There's a reason why bigger caches on processors are a fantastic thing.

If you compare the time that it takes the electricity to travel between the processor and ram on the average mobo to the speed of processors nowadays, just the distance itself posses a significant delay.


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## Phryq (Apr 21, 2017)

Interesting... so having for example, a CPU with RAM/SSD built into it, in order to reduce distances, would be faster.

So the Samsung 960 Pro seems to have about 2 or 3 times the random reads of a standard SSD. My computer *does* 'crackle' while DFDing, and I'm using a 48w laptop CPU from 3 years ago with and an old Crucial SSD. So I imagine a 7700k and 3 960 Pros could do it without those pops. (I *feel* like my CPU is the problem here, as once it stutters once, my computer will keep stuttering unless I stop playback and give it a break.)



The reason I'm so interested is that I want to build a computer with a thin ITX or STX motherboard, and they only support a maximum of 32gb ram, so I'm looking for a workaround.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Apr 21, 2017)

Another thing to be careful of is that Kontakt itself and the Kontakt patches themselves (without samples) can take up quite a bit of ram. So if you're just looking at the task manager and lower the DFD by 50%, the usage won't go down by 50% which means that even if you do get twice the performance from the 960 and can halve the DFD, it won't let you load twice as much. 

IMO 32GB isn't enough for running a full orchestral template with SSD's and newer libraries (like Spitfire and Orchestral Tools). If I remember correctly, my core orchestral template which is all on SSD's with the DFD set individually for each patch to get the lowest usable setting, takes up around 40GB (that's VEP alone, no OS or anything else). It's all Spitfire with 3 mic positions loaded on everything. I'd try to find something that can do 4 x 16GB.


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## chimuelo (Apr 21, 2017)

There's software that tricks the OS into seeing an SSD as RAM.
Intels Optane 4800 PCI-e SSD is a product that will use this.
Seems like coders have patches that can trick the OS into doing many things.
Tests show the latency of Intels new technology is so low it has to be measured by permissions and instructions.
I'm thinking any problems seen with large templates might get a boost from such coding.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/11209...-dive-into-3d-xpoint-enterprise-performance/2


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## Phryq (Apr 21, 2017)

Shoot. Big problem for me, as I then need to get a MicoATX, meaning bigger, but also need a powersupply / cables, and my entire cooling concept goes out the window.


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## Phryq (Apr 21, 2017)

I just did a test, loading 27 instruments. I'm using 13066MB of ram. If I put each instrument in it's own Kontakt instance, I use 1 gb more.

If I only use 1 mic per instrument, instead of 2, I use 11,633MB.

So I'm guessing I could comfortably use 50 instruments at lowest buffer without issue, and if I pushed things, 75.

Increasing the preload buffer from 6kb to 12kb in theory should make my RAM use almost double. In practice it doesn't change at all. Am I misunderstanding something? The preload buffer is how much of the sample is held in ram, yes? So now I have loaded the first 12kb of each sample in RAM, instead of only 6kb? If I slide it all the way to 240kb then my DAW crashes.

So if my simple SSD is able to handle a preload buffer of 6kb (2048 buffer), couldn't a PCIe handle 3kb (though there's no option for this in Kontakt)?


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Apr 21, 2017)

Phryq said:


> Increasing the preload buffer from 6kb to 12kb in theory should make my RAM use almost double. In practice it doesn't change at all. Am I misunderstanding something? The preload buffer is how much of the sample is held in ram, yes? So now I have loaded the first 12kb of each sample in RAM, instead of only 6kb? If I slide it all the way to 240kb then my DAW crashes.



That's correct. You might need to close and reopen to make sure that it clears all of the ram. 



Phryq said:


> So if my simple SSD is able to handle a preload buffer of 6kb (2048 buffer), couldn't a PCIe handle 3kb (though there's no option for this in Kontakt)?



On SSD's I'm typically at 12kb for lighter patches and a bit higher for legato patches. I'd be careful of going lower because you'll easily max out the disk with dense passages. I had to do a lot of adjusting when I mocked up "Test Drive" and basically raised it and have to unload a lot of my template to make it fit in ram.


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## Dracarys (May 2, 2017)

I have a handfull of sata 3, 500gb samsung pros, takes me roughly the same amount to load a session that size, either play or kontakt. Glad to know upgrading to pcie is useless except for the reasons CHIM listen.

But Im wondering, less dropout/sustained notes with these ssds? How's performance in terms of not crashing and seamlessly switching switching samples?



OleJoergensen said:


> I have a 400 GB Intel 750 (slot use on the motherboard), I use for Hollywood strings diamond.
> My PC is able to reach 2364 MB/s read speed with Intel 750 (test app CrystalDiskmark).
> When I load samples in Play/ Ve-Pro the max read speed is appox. 140 MB/s (task manager high view performance) quite disappointing. It takes 2 min 10 sec to load 27.5 GB samples (appox. 210 MB/s) which is quite fast.


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## Phryq (May 2, 2017)

Gerhard Westphalen said:


> That's correct. You might need to close and reopen to make sure that it clears all of the ram.
> 
> On SSD's I'm typically at 12kb for lighter patches and a bit higher for legato patches. I'd be careful of going lower because you'll easily max out the disk with dense passages. I had to do a lot of adjusting when I mocked up "Test Drive" and basically raised it and have to unload a lot of my template to make it fit in ram.



But a Samsung 960 Pro can read 7x as fast as your SSD.


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## Dracarys (Jun 2, 2017)

Any other performance gains from these? Should I get two 1tb pcie 850 Evos, and sell my 8 ssds and just keep one for DAW/OS? Is the performance worth it or not? Like I stated I load 40gb sessions in under 2 minutes.

I'm moving to windows 10 after a couple projects so I'm debating what to SSD wise.

Current setup:

Win7 Ultimate
RME Hammerfall 9632
cpu: 3930k
mobo: GA UD5 x79
64 gb ddr3 1600
OS and DAW: 500 pro ssd
SAMPLES: 2 500gb 840 pros, one 500gb Crucial m4, two 250gb Evo 850, two 250gb Evo 840.

My Mobo only has two sata 3 ports, which I use for my OS and DAW, and the SSD with most intense samples. The rest of the SSDs are using this:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-IT-Mode-LSI-9211-8i-SAS-SATA-8-port-PCI-E-6Gb-s-Controller-Card-/252344098349?
https://www.newegg.ca/Product/Produ...&cm_mmc=TEMC-RMA-Approvel-_-Content-_-text-_-

That LSI is not the greatest, IOPs are bottlenecked to around 40-50k, sometimes 30k which is a bit annoying, but the read's are as advertised. However had to update my damn BIOS.

Also, I hate the fact a 2016 6 core is less that 5% better than my current 6 core, except for intricate benches that don't matter in music daw performance. If I get massive PCIe ssds, I don't see myself upgrading my entire rig just for a better motherboard.

Things I'm looking for:

1. Switching between huge samples without hitting stop, and without crashes (I can do this 90% of the time)
2. Zero sticky keys or sustained notes (80-90% good atm)

Thanks!



chimuelo said:


> I use a pair of Intel 750 400GB devices on a Z97 and a pair of SATA 3 SSDs.
> The 750s are for samples and there is a huge difference in performance.
> Load times are non existant and allow me to load templates live now instead of having all instruments loaded and switching between various set ups.
> 
> ...


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## EvilDragon (Jun 3, 2017)

Dracarys said:


> That LSI is not the greatest, IOPs are bottlenecked to around 40-50k, sometimes 30k which is a bit annoying, but the read's are as advertised. However had to update my damn BIOS.



I have that same card - it's working great for DFD streaming. Currently connected 4x 1 TB 850 Evos to it and one 250 GB for DAW projects.

IOPS being bottlenecked didn't seem to be a problem over here. A bit of a negative is that TRIM is not working with 850 Evos when they're connected to the LSI. However, since I'm not installing/uninstalling sample libraries all the time, that is not a huge deal. If I worked in, say, video editing, it would have been a huge deal.


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## chimuelo (Jun 3, 2017)

Well I better hook up some parts I picked up before the return time expires.
6 x 850 Evo 1TB SSDs and a Microsemi 8500 RAID Card.
Video editing/DAW for my son. Was going to use a Z97 suggested by TonyMac x86 for Hackintosh but decided to go with Windows 10 based apps.

Haven't tested these but was going to use RAID 10 with Acronis Cloud.
Microsemi creates a large cache algo similar to what Optane or other apps do for maximum throughput.

Mario, why do you need a multi breakout cable/card?
I use custom sleeved/angled cables to access 8-10 ports on the PCB.


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## EvilDragon (Jun 3, 2017)

chimuelo said:


> Mario, why do you need a multi breakout cable/card?
> I use custom sleeved/angled cables to access 8-10 ports on the PCB.



Because my mobo doesn't have enough SATA ports (M.2 eats 2 of them, and I have, ohhhh I dunno, 9 hard drives total, and I planned for SSD expansion via 2x5.25" bays in front?), plus this SAS-to-4xSATA breakout cable looks much nicer to me 

So, all my SSDs go into two 5.25" bays in front of the case, each receiving 4 2.5" SSDs, I got two breakout cables that go straight to the LSI SAS card. Everything is well cable managed inside the case because the breakout is slim and bendable. 2 out of my 4 rust drives are going straight into mobo since I only have one more SATA port available (the other one is used for the DVD drive, and another 2 are stolen by M.2). That's all.


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## chimuelo (Jun 3, 2017)

I see, said the blind man.
Please tell me random IOps of the EVOs is higher straight into the Ports..
I've not opened them yet.

This will be the first RAID build since the Supermicro P4SCT+II in RAID 5 I wasted 3 grand on in 2005.
Gigastudio loved it until we simulated a crash.
During the rebuild I couldn't even play GigaPiano.

Nice tower btw.


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## chimuelo (Jun 3, 2017)

I'm stopping the use of M.2s on my live builds.
They're nice and improve load times and OS chores.
But no matter how much I cool them with thermal pads or direct air they throttle down.
Still fast but just don't like half functioning Heat issues.
At what point will they stop working?
Don't want to find out.

Still the best performers I have are the 750 U.2s.
Great for polyphony/orchestral.
Overkill for live work...


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## EvilDragon (Jun 3, 2017)

chimuelo said:


> Please tell me random IOps of the EVOs is higher straight into the Ports.



It's pretty much the same over here according to Crystal Disk Mark. The card is using PCIe x4 so that's plenty enough bandwidth for a bunch of SATAIII SSDs.


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## Phryq (Jun 3, 2017)

So overheatink really is an issue here? I guess they'll need heatsinks *and* a case fan?


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## Dracarys (Jun 3, 2017)

Did you see a drastic jump in kontakt voices?



chimuelo said:


> I'm stopping the use of M.2s on my live builds.
> They're nice and improve load times and OS chores.
> But no matter how much I cool them with thermal pads or direct air they throttle down.
> Still fast but just don't like half functioning Heat issues.
> ...



Interesting, my 840 pros get around 40-50k IOPs. I also have HSFT+ installed because I used to have a hackintosh, haven't had time between projects to reformat everything back to NTFS. Mac Journaled performs same as NTFS in Cubase and Vienna, Exfat was terrible. But, I wonder if the LSI doesn't like these mac journaled formatted drives?

I'll test it out in September with Win 10 and all NTFS



EvilDragon said:


> Because my mobo doesn't have enough SATA ports (M.2 eats 2 of them, and I have, ohhhh I dunno, 9 hard drives total, and I planned for SSD expansion via 2x5.25" bays in front?), plus this SAS-to-4xSATA breakout cable looks much nicer to me
> 
> So, all my SSDs go into two 5.25" bays in front of the case, each receiving 4 2.5" SSDs, I got two breakout cables that go straight to the LSI SAS card. Everything is well cable managed inside the case because the breakout is slim and bendable. 2 out of my 4 rust drives are going straight into mobo since I only have one more SATA port available (the other one is used for the DVD drive, and another 2 are stolen by M.2). That's all.


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## EvilDragon (Jun 4, 2017)

Always, always, ALWAYS use NTFS with Windows. It's a better performing filesystem than Mac Journaled any time of day or night.


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## Michael Antrum (Jun 4, 2017)

I recently decided to use my Mac Pro 4,1 (f/w upgraded to 5,1) as a slave until I can build/buy a dedicated box.

I got this SATA 3 PCI adapter from Amazon for £ 30......



It's certainly a step up from the internal SATA interface, but I thought it was a bargain quite frankly. I have a 1TB SSD plugged into it - but I'm thinking of getting another for my other SSD drive.


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## JohnG (Jun 4, 2017)

I have an older OCZ PCIe SSD array that definitely performs better for Hollywood Strings than even my SSDs did. I don't remember the exact specs so I can't say whether it's slower than the newer ones, though presumably it is.

But for that particular library it was a noticeable boost, as I was able to get my buffer down years back.

Fast forward to today and I wonder, given all the other comments, whether it is HS in particular, and the original version (since improved many times) that made the PCIe particularly needed? The conception of HS at its inception was that technology would improve over time and it would gradually become more and more playable by a "regular" setup.

So what I'm saying is that, while the PCIe was great when HS was released (and still is), I'm not sure it's 100% necessary today.

Kind regards,

John


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## chimuelo (Jun 4, 2017)

JG IIRC Your PCI-e Card was using built in RAID 0.
Pretty much doubling random IOps.
Right now the performance of that sits in between NVMe 4X and SSD at PCI-e 2X.
Better than SSD and as good as it gets since NVMe 4X speeds ALWAYS throttle down to 2X speeds.


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## Dracarys (Aug 21, 2017)

Just came back to tell you that our LSI bottlenecks quite a bit with IOPs and sequencial write speeds. Are you using Crystal Disk Mark? There is no built in Cache which is the reason, the LSI is a cheap non-JBOD version. I have formatted my mac journaled rives back to NTFS GPT, uninstalled mac drive - no change. The writes speeds are very random, and the Write IOPs are extremely low, less than 10k sometimes. However, the most important thing is random reads/iops, which are not bottlenecked too bad.

Might be time for a new motherboard and PCIe SSD for OS. And a 1tb 960 why not 

Still can't justify a new CPU and RAM that is barely a performance gain, I have friends with the newest 8 and 10 cores that don't notice a difference coming from x79.



EvilDragon said:


> I have that same card - it's working great for DFD streaming. Currently connected 4x 1 TB 850 Evos to it and one 250 GB for DAW projects.
> 
> IOPS being bottlenecked didn't seem to be a problem over here. A bit of a negative is that TRIM is not working with 850 Evos when they're connected to the LSI. However, since I'm not installing/uninstalling sample libraries all the time, that is not a huge deal. If I worked in, say, video editing, it would have been a huge deal.


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## EvilDragon (Aug 22, 2017)

I don't really care about sequential write speeds (although I will say that all of my Samsung 850 EVOs that are connected to the LSI card, do get their max specified write speeds, which is close to 500 MB/s, so I'd say there are no bottlenecks). Might be the mobo chipset as well... I'm using Z170.


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## niven (Aug 22, 2017)

Hi,
completely new to all of this! I'm seriously thinking of building my own system. I'm a complete beginner re computer building..but Ive tracked down every do it yourself You Tube video there is to see! And so far I'm not daunted by the prospect....it "appears" to be a straight forward process and will save me £656 as well! If things do go wrong I' ll be in deep...!!??*

However, I was thinking of using 2x M.2 Nvme drives instead of SSDs....now I'm wondering whether they're worth the spend, re performance value.
I intend on running Berlin Strings, Brass, Woodwind,Perc, Runs and Sphere..also Hollywood Strings, Brass and Woodwind (Gold only) and VSL Special editions..Cubase, Sibelius, Komplete10 and VEP6
my build will be:

Core i7 7800X 3gb 6 core
"be quiet" Dark Rock Pro 3 67.8 CFM fluid dynamic bearing CPU cooler.
Asus Prime X299A
Corsair Vengance LPX DDR4 3000 (128gb)
1x Samsung 960 Evo 500gb Nvme M2.2280 ssd and 1x1tb 960 M2.2280 Nvme
2 extra be quiet Silent Wings fans pwm 140mm...
The board has 2 dedicated m.2 drives....one is vertical!...If I want to run these with some "normal"
SSDs drives as well , will there be any bandwidth problems....as you see I dont know v much....
and could do with some seasoned advise.
regards
niven.
Ps
my other old computer is only capable of holding 24gb of ram and mechanical HHDs..(2x 1.5TB)
and is very early i7 with one pci card slot left...the other three PCie cards are being used by 2 UAD cards..and an old RME Multiface card.


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## Shad0wLandsUK (Aug 23, 2017)

niven said:


> Hi,
> completely new to all of this! I'm seriously thinking of building my own system. I'm a complete beginner re computer building..but Ive tracked down every do it yourself You Tube video there is to see! And so far I'm not daunted by the prospect....it "appears" to be a straight forward process and will save me £656 as well! If things do go wrong I' ll be in deep...!!??*
> 
> However, I was thinking of using 2x M.2 Nvme drives instead of SSDs....now I'm wondering whether they're worth the spend, re performance value.
> ...


Hi, PM me and I will share what I know about computer building if you like.
I have built 6 computers and been into tech since birth almost 

Just putting it out there, if you would like some advice 

The first very important question to ask yourself and plan out is: what purpose does this system need to serve?


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## Dracarys (Sep 7, 2017)

Sorry what I was trying to say is the 4KB Random Reads (iops), which are most important, are bottlenecked quite a bit. Sequencials are fine. I get 40-60k iops instead of 90-100k in SATA 3 ports. Sometimes less depending on work load. Regardless I can still run pretty huge sessions with VePro as I'm sure you can.

Anyway after my next few gigs I'm calling it quits on x79 and moving to Kabylake X with a couple 1tb M.2 Samsung Pros and an 8-10 core. Maybe PCIe for boot drive? Not sure what distribution is best these days across motherboards. Also not looking forward to windows 10 




EvilDragon said:


> I don't really care about sequential write speeds (although I will say that all of my Samsung 850 EVOs that are connected to the LSI card, do get their max specified write speeds, which is close to 500 MB/s, so I'd say there are no bottlenecks). Might be the mobo chipset as well... I'm using Z170.


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