Cubase 5 - ASIO Overloads

Hi everyone,

I use Cubase 5 on a Mac desktop, two years old, has 4 GB of RAM and a 2.66 GHz processor. Whenever I make a project and play it, it gets to a certain point where the ASIO Time bar on the left of the transport panel spikes, the red light above it comes on and it locks up. The project continues to play, but with no sound coming out of it, until suddenly all of the notes that should have played in the time that it froze come out at once, which certainly isn’t good for my hearing! (although whenever it happens, I pause it or mute my speakers/earphones). It is still very annoying though, and I can’t really make any decent-sized project without this happening (I make orchestral music, and can’t get to an appreciable level of content without the overload problem occurring. It seems as though it only takes about seven or eight tracks to cause this to happen, even less with faster pieces).

Earlier on I had it running with the activity monitor in the background (nothing else) and the CPU usage on it was actually going to more than 100%. The green section of the chart showing memory usage, which represents the free portion, was very small.

Now, I am considering getting some more RAM for my machine, but it is a significant investment and I want to be sure that it will produce an improvement, as 4 GB is perfectly adequate otherwise. Should I get more RAM, and if so, how much would people recommend?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

1st of all, you need to give more info.
What bit version of CB and what bit environment. What kind of tracks, audio or midi. If midi, what type of plug. Are all tracks separate instances of the plug. What you card latency is set at.

Ah ok. Sorry my technical knowledge isn’t great!

I’m not sure how I find out whether it’s 32 or 64 bit. The tracks are MIDI, using either Halion One, or Halion Symphonic Orchestra. I think they are separate instances, which might have something to do with it? Where can I find card latency?

Edit: It’s version 5.0.0, so maybe an update is in order. Will do that as well. Also, it’s 32 bit.

Your audio card should have a control panel. In that , you can adjust your audio latency. If it is set too low, it will cause pops, stutters and glitches. CB 32 bit is only going to allow you to use about 3G of ram. It will use more if you get Jbridge. Several instances of Halion Symphonic will eat up processing power pretty quickly, especially if your latency is set too low. Checking your latency should be your first concern.
There are several updates for your 5.0.0 version. I would suggest updating to the latest if you still have problems after you address the other concerns.
If you let us know what OS you have, a Mac user might be able to tell you what bit environment you are running.

OK will try this out, thank you. Sorry for the delay in replying, have been finishing my last week of term at uni and have been really busy.

Edit: Mac OSX Version 10.5.8

I probably ought to look into ways to make my projects more efficient, by the looks of it.