Skip to main content ↑ ↓

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: Avoiding skips (Read 2211 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Avoiding skips

I'm helping a friend set up his system for transfering reel tapes and vinyl. I remember occassionally getting skips when I made similar transfers on my old northwood celeron system when minimising windows for example. His system would be roughly the same performane wise.
Is there any recording software thats light on recources and immune to getting intereupted by other processes?
Would just setting the process priority to high for the recording software be enough?

Avoiding skips

Reply #1 –
The proper procedure to assure good recordings is to optimize the system for recording. Analogue audio input cannot stand much competition. A multi-tasking system accommodates most kinds of processing without difficulties. You, the user, will not notice that the system has been busy for few milliseconds here and there with something else. A small wait for more involved activity is generally only mildly annoying; it may seem entirely normal.

However, audio keeps coming in at a constant rate, regardless of other activity. If something else has control for just a little too long, the data that came in then is lost. There are recording buffers to temporally accumulate incoming data while other activity occurs, but that is a limited solution that cannot be depended upon if Windows is allowed to have its own way, even on the most powerful hardware.

There are many system process that can be very intensive but are not really needed (in many set-ups) at all. Applications, such as automatic updates, mail and message checkers, anti-virus and other policing applications, can utilize CPU, RAM, and hard drive resources to a high degree. Some add-in devices, especially wire-less network cards and hyper video cards, can be a real pain. You may want a special hardware profile that disables or limits some of the other components while recording.

All of which is to say that your post indicates the wrong mind set. You are unlikely to be successful finding audio applications that are so efficient the rest of the system doesn’t matter. Instead, you have to optimize the computer system for audio. I do most of my recording on an 133MHz AMD K6 with memory and hard drives from the same era. 64 Meg of memory proved sufficient for smooth stereo recording at 24 bit , 96kHz (not that I recommend the higher sample rate). I just don’t have the computer doing anything else while I record.

The webs sites for many audio applications have system optimization guides to get the best out of that application. Here are some guides for various versions of the OS.
http://www.audioforums.com/resource_center.php

My recording example will not be valid for all modern soundcards. Some have much higher resource requirements, regardless of the recording being done.

Avoiding skips

Reply #2 –
If he is going to be doing a "bunch" of recording, I would suggest going the dual-boot route and set up that second boot specifically for recording. (minimal services/background tasks/device drivers.)

As Andy mentioned, vid drivers and networking drivers can be a PITA and constantly switching setups between "optimised for audio" and "normal" would be time consuming. A dual boot would give him the best of both worlds.

If he is only doing a tape or two, of course, this would be overkill.

I still do 90% of my recording on a 6-7 yo box running 98 Lite. With everything else not installed/turned off the system is an absolute screamer and 100% reliable. I have to do much of my post-production stuff on an XP boot (for software compatibility), but for recording (especially multitracking) the stripped down "old" system is hard to beat.

Avoiding skips

Reply #3 –
Quote from: markanini on
I'm helping a friend set up his system for transfering reel tapes and vinyl. I remember occassionally getting skips when I made similar transfers on my old northwood celeron system when minimising windows for example.
Did it have on board sound or on board graphics?

As the other posters have said, PCs have been capable of recording skip-free audio for a decade or more, if nothing interrupts it.

However, if the CPU is handling the graphics, or sound, or modem (you can't dial-up when recording!), it's not going to be reliable. So don't go that route.

With a more modern PC, you don't need two set-ups. Just kill the virus checker, Office find fast etc and have plenty of empty defraged hard disk space. Importantly, when recording, just record - nothing else.

Hope this helps.

Cheers,
David.