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Optimizing
Optimizing Audio Performance
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System Factors That Affect Performance
RAM
The more RAM is installed in your computer, the better.
IMPORTANTIMPORTANTIMPORTANTIMPORTANT
On computers running a Windows 32-bit operating system, a running application
can address a maximum of 2 GB of RAM. On a Macintosh computer running 32-bit
Mac OS X, this limit is 4 GB. The 64-bit versions of Windows and Mac OS X are
able to assign considerably more than 4 GB of RAM to a running 64-bit application.
The RAM limitation is imposed by the operating system, and it is independent of the
amount of RAM that you may have installed in your computer.
Some program functions may use all the available memory, for example, recording,
the use of effect plug-ins, and the pre-loading of samples.
IMPORTANTIMPORTANTIMPORTANTIMPORTANT
When a function has used up all the memory made available by the operating
system, the computer will crash.
Always keep in mind the RAM limitation of your operating system when setting up
your projects.
RELATED LINKS
RAM Requirements for Recording on page 153
Smart Plug-In Processing on page 241
CPU and Processor Cache
The faster the computer processor, the better. But there are a number of factors that
affect the apparent speed of a computer: the bus speed and type (PCI is strongly
recommended), the processor cache size and of course, the processor type and
brand. Cubase relies heavily on floating point calculations. When shopping for a
processor, make sure that you get one that is powerful in calculating floating point
arithmetics.
Cubase features full support for multi-processor systems. If you own a computer
system with more than one processor, Cubase can take advantage of the total
capacity and evenly distribute the processing load to all available processors.
RELATED LINKS
Multi Processing on page 642