DAW trouble - few questions

[DAW_Needed]

Hi All,

I've been troubleshooting a crippling DAW problem (ASIO) for over a week now on a new system, so I decided to try the Burn-In and Performance Tests to see if they showed any problems. The test results appear OK, but I noticed a few small things I wanted to ask about:

1) On the Performance Test "System" tab, the Bus Speed and Front Side Bus Speed are listed as "N/A".

2) In the notes on the Burn In Test, it says "CPU, SSE4.1 SSE4.2 test(s) selected, but CPU feature not detected".


My CPU is a Phenom II x4 (810), and I'm running Vista 64-bit. Motherboard is a Gigabyte MA790X-UD4P.

Should I be concerned about either of the items above?

Thanks for any help!

[David (PassMark)]

I don't know what a DAW is.
ASIO I know as, Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. But it doesn't make sense in the context.

Neither of the above items are errors. We can't detect all system information on all systems. This is not a fault, just a limitation in the software.

[DAW_Needed]

Howdy - thanks for the info!

DAW = Digital Audio Workstation
ASIO (in the DAW world) = Audio Stream Input/Output

Thanks again.

[VooD]

DAW applications and AMD are not a good idea.

The problems mosts users have are related to the usb controllers and the way IRQ's are created in AMD motherboards.

If you are using an USB audio interface, probably your only chance to get proper audio is getting a Firewire or PCI based card.

Some USB audio interfaces doesn't seem to suffer the problem as much as other does, but, in my experience, most of them will fail in creating a constant audio output with no clicks, or sudden audio engine stops.

About the lack of SSEx extensions...I'm sorry but it's real. Nowadays AMD cpu's doesn't have that kind of cpu extensions. And the ones they have use to be a lot slower than their intel counterparts.

To sum up. You broke #1 rule to build a DAW system.

INTEL, INTEL, INTEL, INTEL, INTEL

Just in case you ever decide to build a new rig, here are some advices:

Intel CPU
Intel CHIPSET (ICHxR suggested, so you can have native AHCI)
Asus/Gigabyte mobo
Absolutly no wifi (or at least completly disable it while you are working with audio)
Disable non crucial controllers (legacy ata, parallel / serial port, disk drive controller, etc)
Low latency and fast ram.

[Ray (PassMark)]

A quiet machine would also be important, if the computer is to be anywhere near either your live room (recording area) or your monitoring area.

Passive heatsinks are a good idea (for CPU and GPU), although you would want to stay away from overclocking or doing anything else which might increase average temperature.

Regarding the ASIO issue, there are a variety of drivers out there to choose from and try, if you suspect you are having problems with one particular driver. I've had issues in the past that were solved by switching over to ASIO4ALL.