Why do producers use old windows skin?

Discussion in 'PC' started by barah sherlock, Dec 19, 2016.

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  1. junh1024

    junh1024 Rock Star

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    W8 should actually be faster because it's tickless.

    This is setting dependant. Windows mini/maximizing animation is still possible on classic theme. And more annoying.

    True. The UI uses more ram, but OVERALL, the RAM footprint is Atucally less.
     
  2. SineWave

    SineWave Audiosexual

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    That's why PCs I make deserve the title "audio workstation" or "video workstation", because you make/edit audio and video with them, not hang out on Pornhub. :wink: And it is not advisable anyway because there's no antivirus and firewall, nothing to secure you from Internet rubbish, and pretty much no background tasks whatsoever.
     
  3. Qrchack

    Qrchack Rock Star

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    ...no life, no job etc... The 80s are gone, I can spare 200 MB of RAM on my 16 GB machine, really. On most projects I won't even go much above 4 GB RAM and 30% CPU used, so why bother.
     
  4. TW

    TW Guest

    Dont know what you are doing - but i can easily get my i7 6900 32 gig ram to its limits if i want in s1.
    Has nothing to do with 80s ...

    If you did not notice the demands of plugins and vstis have changed too since the 80s ;).

    And if you do a project on a notebook you can hit your systems borders super fast theese days.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 20, 2016
  5. ArticStorm

    ArticStorm Audiosexual

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    well if windows 8.1 had not removed the classic windows theme, i would still use it, because its less distracting as the newer themes(i had them aswell, it all looks like cheesy.)
    it also uses less GPU resources, its minor, but sometimes this brings it for a track.
     
  6. Andrew

    Andrew AudioSEX Maestro Staff Member

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    Using GPU cycles on simple UI drawing or DDraw is a bad idea IMHO, power-wise. It means constantly waking up the GPU chip from C6 and sleep modes. Such thing is better left for CPU, or better still, keep the visual theming to minimum.

    Also it's not just RAM and CPU, those visuals might affect interruption requests on CPU which in turn may cause ASIO dropouts, regardless of how powerful it is.
     
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  7. SineWave

    SineWave Audiosexual

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    I'll tell you why bother. Because your DAW and plugins will work more smoothly at high CPU consumption. It is not about how much RAM is being used as we all have plenty. Don't think you're the only one with 16 or 32GB. It is about what crap is using your CPU in the background instead of the plugins, and your projects starting to crackle at 50 or 60% CPU. All my computers can use CPU all the way to at least 80% without crackling because of all the optimisations and RME ASIO drivers. No matter what your CPU is and how much RAM you've got these optimisations and a good behaving ASIO driver help. :winker:

    However, if you're using your CPU only up to ~30%... then you can play games in the background almost... :hahaha: But it makes me wonder what your tracks sound like. Like Plastikman? :)
     
  8. Qrchack

    Qrchack Rock Star

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    Well, I often do. I often work in Pro Tools or FL Studio while having Chrome (with 30-ish tabs open, most of them being youtube), sometimes there's also a game minimized (recently, Assassin's Creed 3), I have Slack, Skype, Postbox (email client) and Flux running all the time... It's quite rare for me to see anything above 50-60% CPU. And to hear a crackle I need to really push it. This means either slapping Ozone 7 on master while the track is playing at 256 samples, or something similar. The reason? Well, I record and mix. I don't produce nearly as much as I used to, so while I have 20-ish tracks (usually), all of them are just audio. Sometimes there's a drum or piano VST. And then on each track there would be EQ and compression. Reverbs and delays on sends. Some master compression and EQ, maybe tape saturation or something similar. My plugins of choice would be: Waves - SSL E-Channel, CLA-2A and CLA-76 compressors, H-Delay, Valhalla Room, L1 Limiter, PuigTec EQP1A, then several picks from other companies like Arousor, FabFilter Pro-Q, NI Replika & Supercharger, UVI SparkVerb, T-RackS DeEsser and Stealth Limiter, Slate - Virtual Mix Rack and Tape Machines. And stock plugins.

    So, here's one of my sessions. SSL E-Channel, stock gate, T-Racks 1176 compressor, Pultec here and there. Working in audio feels really refreshing as you just use your ears and do what you feel like doing instead of watching over your performance all the time.

    [​IMG]

    Edit: as far as "what my tracks sound like"... well, like whatever I was given to mix that day. Outside of that I'm producing drum&bass and glitch hop on the side, but that's where the 50% CPU thing ends, pretty much. Once in a blue moon I do orchestral soundtracks as well.
     
    Last edited: Dec 23, 2016
  9. midi-man

    midi-man Audiosexual

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    You can not disable all the effects in windows with Cubase 8, you need arrow glass to run.
    This is what made me run to Reaper.

    I disable all the flashy stuff it's not need to make music. Just a burden on the pc.
    Reaper is far faster for me than Cubase 8 was on the same P.C.
     
  10. ddoctor

    ddoctor Kapellmeister

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    What do you think of win 7 basic theme? Is that cpu friendly?
     
  11. ddoctor

    ddoctor Kapellmeister

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    OK so now I've tried disabling themes and also win 7 basic, but incredible problems occurred; the most useful addon for firefox, minimize when close, cannot function anymore cause in both cases the close button is different and it shuts firefox down. Also some weird graphic glitches when scrolling through the webpages. Back to normal without even considering finding solutions!
     
  12. ( . ) ( . )

    ( . ) ( . ) Audiosexual

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    ironically the classic theme was actually slowing down my old pc... probably because of the contrast...

    there are some things i dislike about classic theme though which makes it inefficient, like when you drag a window around it doesnt drag it live, instead it creates a border and you need to choose to place it in a position and then the window pops into that position when you click off... not something I prefer since it messes with my mind plus no longer used to doing that...
     
  13. GreatJobChamp

    GreatJobChamp Producer

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    yeah... when I used PC, I used the classic theme cuz it freed up more resources
     
  14. fuziohm

    fuziohm Ultrasonic

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    No way!


    It's not about ram, because even with lots of ram and cpu without been used, the feel of the classic is much faster in my opinion, it's more modern than this Aero graphics. Is like cubase, the design of version 5 is solid, like Pro Tools UI, much more professional and modern than this new fancy shit. If they added all the new things with that solid UI would be amazing.
     
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  15. junh1024

    junh1024 Rock Star

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    What you can see, is discracting you from what you can't see.

    It's not about the UI, it's about the windows kernel. It was rewritten in W8. It makes everything run ~10-15% faster, because CPUs aren't forced to switch tasks unnecessarily.

    http://arstechnica.com/information-...-on-the-inside-under-the-hood-of-windows-8/2/
    https://randomascii.wordpress.com/2013/07/08/windows-timer-resolution-megawatts-wasted/

    in fact, the 15% figure might be a bit conservative depending on what you're doing

    http://blog.cakewalk.com/windows-8-a-benchmark-for-music-production-applications/
     
  16. fuziohm

    fuziohm Ultrasonic

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    Well, i have a i7 3930k extreme with 24gb ram, i think is still a good config for what i do, but i always use my pc on it's limit and i tested win 8 and win 10 like two times and back two win 7. My projects just don't open on this systems because of performance and when they open, i can't open video window properly. This is tested with, cubase(all versions), ableton, reaper, studio one and fl studio. the performance is pretty bad.
    But when people have small projects, any system will work, and then the only thing you need to analyze is if you like the system or not, but here the primordial thing ever for using a daw or system is always the performance.
     
  17. Real men use Windows 95.

     
  18. Evorax

    Evorax Rock Star

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  19. n0xin

    n0xin Rock Star

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  20. Beth

    Beth Guest

    @Evorax here you go. try them on and if they fit and you like keep them free of charge :)

    [​IMG]
     
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