Hi! First of all, I would like to say that Sonic Pi is a good initiative! Thanks to the creators!
My pc configuration:
OS: Windows 10 professional (original)
CPU: 7820X (AVX-512 support) fixed 4.8 ghz BCLK overlocking.
Sound card: Soundblaster Z90 (ASIO)
Ram: 64 GB 2800 mhz DDR4 (75 Gb/s speed)
Some data:
Problem:
I try to run technomachine…
And all “vanilla code” low sampler / sec and low CPU usage (5% max 9%)…
An example of many:
“Runtime Error: [buffer 0, line 138] - SonicPi::Lang::Core::TimingError
Thread death ±-> :live_loop_synth
Timing Exception: thread got too far behind time”
How to boost Sonic Pi more CPU usage?
How to on / off AVX FPU ability?
How to disable timing error?
Ruby space there is no other Sonic Pi frame system that would have better performance? (Ruby is one of the slowest interpreter languages…)
I hope someone can help, thank you in advance!
(Sorry my English is not the best!)
I can’t say for sure whether it is the whole issue, but the loop that is halting has one thing that is likely a problem - a short loop time combined with a :reverb fx. The :reverb fx is fairly resource intensive when running on SuperCollider, (Sonic Pi’s sound engine), and when one is placed in a tight loop, multiple reverbs get created because each one does not have time to complete before the next is created. The offending loop here, :synth, has a :reverb fx in it, and a total duration of 1 beat.
In general, the solutions here would be to either increase the time between each :reverb being created, remove them altogether from this loop, or move the reverb fx so that it wraps the entire :synth live_loop. (though that solution comes with a few side-effects of its own).
Have a go at changing the use of that reverb fx, and see if it improves things
Why should I remove anything when I have CPU capacity? CPU usage of 5% remained at 95%. The essence of a music editing program is not to close barriers, but to give freedom. I have resources, I just can’t use them … The solution is not to take them out …
Questions / problems:
How to boost Sonic Pi more CPU usage?
How to on / off AVX FPU ability?
How to disable timing error?
Ruby space there is no other Sonic Pi frame system that would have better performance?
This is an excellent question and one that’s wroth answering fully.
The problem is that your CPU capacity actually means a few things thrown together. Firstly, it’s going to be the aggregated sum of all your CPUs. Sonic Pi has a number of different components all which can run independently on different CPUs. However the sound synthesiser which generates the audio can only run on one of them. Therefore, if you have 8 CPUs offering 16 logical threads, then the max that the synthesis part of Sonic Pi can use is 100 / 16 = 6.25% of your capacity.
Sadly, things get even more tricky than this.
Typically that 6.25% maxing out is with respect to fully throughput. If the work was a stream, it would be about how much water flows through per unit of time. However, music is not about throughput, it’s about timing. If the CPU gets stuck for a small amount of time working on a burst of work, then that delay typically doesn’t matter too much to you. However, for music that means that the next bit of work (e.g. playing a drum) will be late and out of time.
This means that if a sudden chunk of CPU work blocks the program from working for a bit this can cause timing issues. Note that this chunk of activity might not even register much on a CPU monitor because it might have been in a fairly small period of time - yet still long enough to interfere with timing.
Also, different CPUs and firmware options can be very aggressive about saving energy. This is often achieved by switching CPUs on and off and doing short bursts of work. This might be fine for achieving a decent throughput of activity but doesn’t play well at all with sensitive timing systems like Sonic Pi. This affects laptop users particularly and we’ve noticed people getting better results by disabling any energy saving preferences whilst using the app.
Bios, and windows speed step, speed shift OFF. Maximum performance. Overclocking. My CPU and configuration maximum performance. Another music editor (fruity, reason) highest sample level per second with high precission multiple effect and VST plugins same time!
My CPU FP capacity is high. Normal and AVX computing…
Check benchmark first comment.
I honestly don’t know why it might not be working on your machine. I do know that the same source code works just fine on an old raspberry pi, so it must be something odd conflicting.
An interesting thing to know.
I was planning to build a small dedicated system for audio programming (Sonic Pi, Csound) and i was just thinking to aim for a cpu with a good single core performance!
Just out of curiosity, do you think there are differences to consider between an Intel or AMD processor?
Slow interpreter languages due to mixing absolutely inefficient software!
Mindegy
It doesn’t matter from a point what the CPU and sound card are like. The pipeline is weak, slow.
It is already a known phenomenon in the world of games. PUBG, Tarkov, etc … The speed increases minimally with increasing clock speeds, although neither the VGA nor the CPU works, up to 50%.
