Axe-fx Buffer Settings

mortega76

mortega76

Fractal Fanatic
I've never really messed with any of the settings under the Axe-fx's 'USB Audio Class Driver Control Panel' until today... some of you may have seen my requests for WDM drivers because under my current ASIO4ALL recording setup using the Creative 0404 USB device (connected to my monitors to allow me to monitor my guitar/bass tracks during recording and playback) along with the Axe-fx II set at 48KHz and 24-bit gives me clicks and dropouts at least once every 15-20 seconds (sometimes even quicker than that)... I have to admit that my struggles with these darn clips and dropouts has slowed down my recording since my Ultra days. I know I could have just as well recorded using the analog outs, but the anal retentive picky mutha effer in my feeble mind kept drilling it my head "don't record anything unless you can record the DI as well because if you don't you'll just have to re-record everything all over again if you end up not liking the guitar/bass tracks in the future," but that's another story all on it's own. Well, today I was reading about the USB adapter mode and it decided to open up the Axe-fx's 'USB Audio Class Driver Control Panel' and went through every setting and noticed that my Buffer Settings were as follows:

USB Streaming Mode: Safe
ASIO Buffer Size: 2048

I remember reading where the buffer size should left alone so I decided to change from Safe to Standard... now instead of my dropouts being every 15-20 seconds, they went up (down?) to randomly going every 30-60 seconds which is MUCH better... what should these settings be to avoid dropouts? Thanks!

P.S. With the setting at 'Safe' I would get dropouts during playback just as frequently... but since typing this out I have played a track I was re-recording at least three times (within Sonar) with only one dropout total. MUCH BETTER.

Edit: I have to add that the Axe has sounded better and better with every firmware that gets released... in a live setting I have no issues thus far... it has only been with my recording setup that I've had trouble with. Thanks.
 
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My settings are set like this:

USB Streaming Mode: Low Latency
ASIO Buffer Size: 2048

I haven't experienced any dropouts recently, but I'm not a "heavy" user of the interface at the moment. Keep in mind that ASIO audio performance is a function of your PC's cpu/RAM capabilities. You may have to adjust settings until you find what works on ur system.
 
Thanks for chiming in... I have a quad core i7 920 with 4GB of RAM on Win7. The install (including at least 4 re-installs) has always had the setting of Safe, I've never changed it. Just curious as to what it's normally on.
 
I just tried to change the settings to Low Latency and with a quick 30-second text it was clipping like crazy... Anyone know what the recommended settings should be?
 
What else do you have on the USB bus? It doesn't sound like a buffer problem, more like something else is interfering with your usb.
 
Does this apply only to PC users? I use a Mac and as far as I know there is no driver panel for us. Is the correct?
 
Your settings should be fine by default. My guess it's it's more about the resources on your PC, not any settings. All the *stuff* you're running will take up RAM, so windows will begin to swap. Depending on the speed of your disks, your bus speed, etc, you'll get latency.

My suggestion to try:

-Close EVERYTHING on the PC you have that isn't devoted to playback and/or recording.
-Windows does a decent job on dynamically deciding paging sizes, but if you're conversant, you can increase it and make it static (i.e. a fixed size...) Again, IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND WHAT I'M SAYING HERE...DON'T DO IT.
-In the end, pay a few dollars and increase your memory to whatever your PC will handle.

This is my guess.

Ron
 
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