Specifications

Pro Tools Reference Guide12
Playback Engine Dialog
Pro Tools takes advantage of your computer’s
host processor for certain tasks and optional
host-based DSP processing.
Pro Tools LE uses host (CPU) processing to pro-
vide audio track recording, playback, mixing,
and effects processing. Pro Tools TDM can also
use host processing to run RTAS plug-ins for ef-
fects processing. Performance is determined by
your system and its Playback Engine settings.
The Playback Engine dialog lets you set a hard-
ware buffer size and allocate a percentage of
CPU resources for these tasks. For more informa-
tion, see “Configuring Pro Tools System Settings
(in the Playback System Engine)” on page 37.
From the Playback Engine dialog, you can also
select the number of voices and voiceable tracks
for your system and its sessions. Voice count
choices in the dialog are based on how much
DSP processing you want to allocate for voicing.
For more information, see “Configuring
Pro Tools System Settings (in the Playback Sys-
tem Engine)” on page 37.
The Playback Engine dialog is also where you
dedicate DSP resources for Delay Compensa-
tion.
Pro Tools Sessions
When you start a project in Pro Tools, you create
a session. Some basic elements of sessions are ex-
plained in this section.
Session File
A session file is the document that Pro Tools cre-
ates when you start a new project. The session
file contains maps of all elements associated
with a project, including audio files, MIDI data,
and all your edit and mix information. You can
make changes to a session and save those
changes in a new session file. This lets you cre-
ate multiple versions of a project or back up
your editing and mixing work.
Audio File
When you record audio into a Pro Tools session,
audio files are created.
Audio files for each session are stored in a folder
named “Audio Files.” Audio files are listed in
Pro Tools’ Audio Regions List and can appear in
a track. A section of an audio file can be defined
as a region. See “Regions (or Loops)” on page 13.
Playback Engine dialog for Pro Tools TDM system
See also “System Resources” on page 16.
Pro Tools session file icon, Pro Tools 6.x
Audio file icon, Pro Tools 6.x