Cubase 7 vs 6.5 OS X performance: get in touch with us!

Cubase 7 OS X performance is …

  • … better than 6 / 6.5
  • … not different compared to 6 / 6.5
  • … worse than 6 / 6.5

0 voters

Update:

Please have a look here:

Hi all OS X Cubase Users,

I closed the Poll by now and would like to thank everyone for participating so far!

We would like to get in touch with some of you who are experiencing a cut back in performance when running Cubase 7 in comparison to Cubase 6.5.

If you are willing to invest some time then please drop me a PM with the following information:

1) Your exact computer configuration (OS version, RAM, CPU, HD type)

2) Your audio / MIDI hardware and driver version.

3) Your ASIO settings: block buffer size, ASIO Guard setting

4) Are you running in 32-bit or 64-bit mode? If in 64-bit mode: does your projects contain any 32-bit plug-ins which are bit-bridged?

5) A small description on how you mainly use Cubase. For example: you record a band with 64 audio tracks or you are mainly working with instruments. Please let us know which instruments and effect plug-ins you use most often.

6) Anything else you think we should know or you always wanted to let us know :wink:



Important:

For best chances to track down potential performance issues, the following helps a lot:

a) Please provide complete information as requested above.

b) It is very important that the behavior you are experiencing in Cubase 7 is actually different compared to Cubase 6.5, otherwise it doesn’t help us to solve a possible performance degradation issue compared to Cubase 6.5.

c) We need project files and these projects should be as small as possible to better isolate potential issues. Small means: as few 3rd party plug-ins as possible, as few tracks as possible, as few instruments as possible. As you now understand we only require a small amount of information that clearly shows the degraded performance compared to Cubase 6.5.

d) If you are using Cubase in 64-bit mode, please double check in 32-bit mode if the issue is still present. We would like to concentrate on 32-bit mode first to ensure no plug-in bit-bridging is going on. In case your project uses 64-bit plug-ins only it is fine as well.

Our plan would be to pick about five persons to collaborate with us more closely and in-depth researching.

All the best,
Helge

Here is something that may help troubleshoot if there turns out to be a problem. If I view the CPU Performance Device in Cubase it looks normal, even low. The problem is that I and others seem to be getting spikes. When I get a spike the meter pegs out and there is a 1 to 2 sec audio drop. They can happen every 3 to 5 minutes and they can happen with just 1 plugin enabled. Hopefully this will help.

I vote for worse. But I also need to add a comment on that.
I see it on larger projects. Lots of third parties plugins etc. And the new ASIO guard ratio
on fast-path/big-chunk is to little to be effective. 5 ms vs 10 ms. And a other
observation is that the project with performance problems / underruns also are the ones with
lot of crashes.

There is no CPU Performance meter in Cubase, it’s and ASIO meter. :confused:

I vote worse than 6.5 if we speak about performance cpu, expecially when songs are very busy and full of plugs Cubase 7 stops when bounce in realtime even cpu meter show about 60%. I dont have that problem under 6.5 on 32bit mode. Im working on now with Cubase 7 64bit mode under osx 10.7.5, the 32bit version works very very bad about plugins. Also asio guard put latency on double than before. I can suggest to turn off all the new features in a some kind of menu, just give the cubase 5 performace for the people does not use the new features every time. Im speaking about vari audio or other when we dont need it on mix the song, maybe are useful during the arrangments process of course but not in the mix process. Will be very very useful and we can push more during the mix as was in cubase 5 in the same machine.

thanks, i hope you will appreciate my suggestions. :stuck_out_tongue:

I found Cubase 7 to be a much better performer on 10.8.2 than on 10.7.5. Unfortunately there are a couple OS os issues that prevent me from staying in 10.8 for now. Haven’t looked at the 10.8.3 beta 10 yet.

I have tested running a projekt on both 6.5 and 7. Performance was better on C7. Not a lot. C7 used less CPU, used more RAM and applied more threads. That’s great.

So I voted “way better” but the answer is “better” :slight_smile:

I think could be what kind of user make with Cubase at this poit.
I’m a professional user and I work on arrangments with more than 200 tracks midi instruments and audio tracks involved, with 12 sub groups for effects, filters, I/O external effects routing with Maselec machines compressors, Urei EQ, Avalon Channlestrip, all on 48kHz 24bit and mastering operation at 96kHz 32bit floating. Cubase 6.5 works much better in 32bit mode under 10.7.5 than Cubase 7 in 64bit mode under 10.7.5 or 10.8.2. For me depends what kind of use, maybe only the mix operations could be same. Just test only with a lot of Instruments and external routing effects. I suggest to make test with Native instruments Kontakt stuff with orchestra midi tracks, multiprocessing enable on the preferences, Ozone and Tracks on the master bus. Just use a big stressing song to test better. That’s my suggestions for users.

unfortunately, this isn’t just a problem with mac users. I have had to roll back to CA6 as the regular spike/dropouts made 7 unusuable :frowning:

On 10.6.8 I dont notice any great difference on CPU-usage between 6.5 and 7.
How about 10.7.5 or 10.8.2, any experiences?

Thanks, Mike

Using the Cubase demo cpr “Cubase 6 - Live Forever Cubase 7.cpr”

With the video window closed they are about the same.

With the video window open, even at a small size, Cubase 7.0.1 uses much more resources than Cubase 6.0.7.

In 7 the larger you make the video window the bigger the hit.

Did this with 2048 sample buffer, Cubase in 64 bit.

You wanted input, you got it.

Cubase 7 has been a CPU nightmare and Cubase 6.5 wasn’t all that great either. Digital Performer 7.24, Digital Performer 8 (which I am seriously considering an upgrade to because of the C7 BS), Studio One V2 and Reaper 4 all run efficiently on OS X; almost on par with Logic Pro 9. Even the Steinberg plugins such as Padshop Pro and Retrologue run horribly under C7, but in the other aforementioned DAW’s they run at about half the CPU (as C7).

What is it that makes it so difficult to find the flaw in C7 where it becomes such a CPU hog on OS X? If Steinberg has really been researching this phenomena for years, and they are still hard pressed to find it, then maybe a total re-write or hire seasoned, experienced OS X programmers is in order?

Time to hit Yamaha up for money for R&D.

EDIT: OS X 10.8.2/Intel C2D i7

Cubase 7.0.1 is working fine and stable on my system, I use it 80% compared to 20% Logic Pro 9.
But what is the reason for this higher CPU load?

Mike

Hi. I can not use my cubase 7. It freeze up all the time. Maybe 3- 4 times during a song. And when it freece, it stops for ca 3- 10 sec. So i am very glad thar i still have my cubase 6, which is running perfectly. I have a Macbook Pro, 10,8,2 osx, Intel Core 2 Duo 3,06 GHz, 8gb ram. :cry:

Same here, cubase 7 freezes every time I use it on my Mac Pro (not supported :cry: :cry: :cry: ) 10.6.8

Something is wrong that’s for sure.

I NEVER experienced crashes until 7 was released,

now I get the message ‘‘Cubase quit unexpectedly’’

every other session, spikes etc - also Retrolouge, Padshop

and other Cubase plugs seem to eat my resources alive
to put it nicely

When you say “Freezes” do you mean you computer completely freezes or just audio drops/performance spike? Mine does it 3 or 4 times a song as well but when it does it my mouse still works etc … just Cubase freezes with the audio dropping. If I’m using midi it sometimes causes a midi lock and I have to hit the “reset”.

In Cubase 6.5 I kept my buffers below 512 and only set it to 512 when I was working on a large project. With 7 I keep it on 1024 and I still get the spikes.

In my case, everything jest stops (freezes), like a picture.

It freeze everything… :cry:

When I read this poll, why do steinberg still think we dont need a subforum for osx and windows? They should be equal right?