Direct sound: Buffer 8 x 1024 samples (Latency 185 ms)

this is what i have by default in daw reaper

at what circumstances would someone say its ok to have latency?

if my laptop was faster would a different amount of latency be written there? or it would be the same?

 

Please what operating system and audio interface are you using?

What is latency in music production?

Audio latency is one of the things that you will pay more and more attention to, once you're getting more skilled at music production.

Latency is the time delay it takes for your hardware and software equipment to read the sound signal that's being played, process it, and play it into your speakers.

To be more in-depth, when an audio signal is being played on any device, let's say microphone or guitar, for example, that sound is in analog form and being delivered into your system. Your software then converts it into a digital signal in order to be processed, and then changes it back into an analog, for it to be played into your speakers/monitors.

This whole process, having low processing power in your machine, not having the correct settings and tools optimized for lowest latency output, and a couple of other factors, are all potential reasons that might cause a high latency.

Having a better setup will of course help in reducing latency, but there are other things you can do to improve your latency.

One of the most important things you need to do if you want to start producing music is to get an audio interface. Buying an audio interface is going to be a lot more reliable than using the cheap sound card your pc or laptop has built-in. It also allows zero-latency recording, with its built-in "direct monitor" option. Just remember to update all of the drivers for it first.

Buffer size is the amount of time spent for processing the audio, measured in ms. Installing an audio driver like Asio will give you the option to increase or decrease your sample rate. Having a lower sample rate is going to improve your buffer size, but it's a lot more taxing on your system.
Use the lowest sample rate when you are recording, and set it to a higher rate when mixing, this will spend less of your computer's resources, and allow you to use more plugins without stutters and errors.

https://transverseaudio.com/tip/what-is-latency-in-music-production

 

Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-8550U CPU @ 1.80GHz, 1992 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 8 Logical Processor(s)
i'm using just the laptop..i don't have external audio interface

 

You can of course try an ASIO4ALL driver. www.asio4all.org
Tutorials For Reaper | Asio4All setup | Latency | Monitoring | Buffer Settings

 

yes i tried that it indeed makes latency almost zero

so basically we need higher sample rate (thus latency) when mixing to hear things more clearly

 

That's why audio interfaces are usually the better choice, the best are PCI sound cards from RME, because the path, is much shorter, a USB audio interface with cable brings more latency, because the path is much longer.

If you have a good audio interface, the drivers, i.e. the interface between hardware and software, are better optimised than your ASIO4ALL, where you set, for example, 24 bit / 512 samples or 256 samples / 44.1 KHz - some swear by 24 bit - 48 KHz.
That's all you really need to know. At some point you will also upgrade your PC/notebook and buy a high-quality audio interface.

 

Cable latency, that's a good one!

 

Now that you say that, it strikes me too. I'm laughing my head off.
Actually, we have invented a new technical term " Cable latency ". ...Hahhaha