I've just joined the forum (how I didn't know about you guys in the past, God only knows!) - I'm hoping you can help me get to the bottom of an ongoing issue. I saw this in another post on this forum, so here goes...

OS: Windows 11 Home
DAW: Cubase 14 Pro
I/O: SSL 2+
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16-Core 3.4GHz
MOBO: ASRock X570 Taichi
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX2080Ti
RAM: 128GB 2667Mhz (4 x 32Gb Corsair Vengeance PRO DDR4 360)
Cooler: Be Quiet Dark Rock PRO4
C Drive: Samsung SSD 980 PRO 1TB
Project Drive: Samsung SSD 850 PRO 128GB
VST Drive: Samsung SSD 970 EVO 1TB

Despite what I realise is quite a hefty system, I regularly run out of performance when producing music. Cubase maxes out and glitches. I increased the buffer size to compensate, but I still reach the same issue quickly. I have added Vienna and AudioGridder to help... but alas.

I have always wondered if it was a hardware config issue, hence today's plea for help!

Bad combo of motherboard/GPU/CPU? Wrong settings?

Please help! As you can see, I have upgraded over time in a bid to resolve this ongoing issue (e.g. separate drives, etc), but only see small improvements each time.

Today, the system crashed on what is still a relatively small project (admittedly with quite a few plugins in play ...but surely, this system should withstand a fair workload!)

So, again, here's hoping you can help. Thank you in advance!

 

Better you use the following links to optimize your computer for music production.

0.) Don't let audio glitches ruin your performances! www.cantabilesoftware.com/glitchfree/

1.) The Ultimate Guide to Optimize your Windows PC for the Stage
https://gigperformer.com/docs/ultimate-guide-to-optimize-windows-for-stage/index.html

2.) LatencyMon 7.31
The LatencyMon software analyzes and identifies which device, which driver or which service is causing audio dropouts or malfunctions. Real-time audio suitability checker for Windows 10/8.1/8/7/2016/2012/2008 (x86 and x64)
Scroll Down to: System Monitoring Tools https://www.resplendence.com/downloads

3.) Windows Tuning Tips for Audio Processing
https://support.native-instruments....1729-Windows-Tuning-Tips-for-Audio-Processing

4.) PreSonus - Optimizing Your Computer for Audio - Windows 10
https://support.presonus.com/hc/en-...Optimizing-Your-Computer-for-Audio-Windows-10

5.) Ableton - Optimizing Windows for Audio
https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/articles/209071469-Optimizing-Windows-for-Audio

6.) FL Studio - Optimizing FL Studio performance
www.image-line.com/fl-studio-learning/fl-studio-online-manual/html/app_opt.htm

7.) Windows: How to set up and optimize a Digital Audio Workstation
https://helpcenter.steinberg.de/hc/...t-up-and-optimize-a-Digital-Audio-Workstation

8.) Focusrite - Optimising your PC for Audio on Windows 10
https://support.focusrite.com/hc/en-gb/articles/207355205-Optimising-your-PC-for-Audio-on-Windows-10

 

there's a lot to unpack,

1) SSL 2+ is USB audio interface - do you have it connected to an uninterrupted USB bus, preferably the one that goes directly to CPU and not via shared chipset bandwidth?
2) 5950X has tons of performance to offer - do you have Windows power plan AND power scheme configured for maximum performance? and BIOS configured to let Windows/OS determine the power management?
3) nVidia cards have tricky drivers when it comes to system latency spikes - are you using latest driver? I hope you're not using Windows generic driver?
4) lots of RAM - did you check (with something like CPU-Z) it's actually running at that rated speeds? is BIOS memory timing configured to the best RAM profile (EXPO I guess? or maybe XMP?)
5) good cooler - are CPU temps okay (to see with something like HWINFO) regardless of load, can it keep up quick enough?
6) you're using handful of SSDs - are they all running at reasonably low latency (to see in Windows Taskmanager) and not competing with each other for bandwidth from CPU?
7) did you install all the drivers correctly, and are there no significant system interruptions that would cause DPC latency spikes?
8) did you try to troubleshoot whether it's not a specific plugin causing the problems?
9) is Windows sound not interfering/clashing with your SSL+ASIO+Cubase audio stack?
10) do you have USB Selective Suspend disabled in your Windows power settings?

 

You left out some details about your audio interface(s). Correct driver? Just the one SSL or do you have another on the second computer you are using audiogridder connected with?

I really doubt it is your machine. That depends of course, maybe you are running some monster orchestral sessions in Cubase. But you should be able to have a considerable sized project open on that box.

 

Welcome to the forum Bamboozled..

Definitely your first port of call for troubleshooting.

Aside from the usual tweaks which are documented in every DAW tweaking guide there are a couple of lesser known ones that can also make a difference.

Processor CPMinCores - 100%

Processor CPMaxCores - 100%

Processor idle demote threshold - 100%

Processor idle promote threshold - 100%

Download this app to enable the additional settings. Don't be tempted to switch anything on in there that you dont 100% understand, most of it won't make any difference and some, when incorrectly implemented, can actually damage your PC.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/wt37sbsejk7iepm/PowerSettingsExplorer.zip

Additionally, disable C states in the BIOS and any settings for performance boosting/idling that there may be so the CPU and RAM run at a fixed speed. I've always found that running CPU clock and RAM at default speeds without any overclocking is best as that provides the most stable and consistent results, other people may have different results/opinions on that particular aspect.

If this is a dedicated audio PC then uninstall the NVIDIA drivers and use this app to repackage the NVIDIA installer to enable installation of the card in driver only mode and strip out all the telemetry and additional performance hogging drivers that are only relevant to gaming.

https://www.techpowerup.com/nvcleanstall/

You can still install the NVIDIA control center with the modified installer if you wish but I use this instead.

https://github.com/Orbmu2k/nvidiaProfileInspector

Modifying NVIDIA settings, as tzzmsk says, can be a tricky business so I won't recommend any specific settings at this point. I'd try all of the above first before going on to tweak the graphics as it may not be necessary once you've done a bare-bones installation.

Lastly, particular plugins can affect the performance HUGELY. Even different builds can introduce bugs that cause performance issues. I would pay particular attention to when your issues appear and note what plugins you're utilising at that point as this is often where the issue lies. If you're using cracked plugins, some of the badly cracked ones can cause massive memory leaks, which over time will slowly grind your system to a halt (regularly happens with legit plugins too), so you may not notice the problem immediately. It's a pain in the arse to constantly monitor resources when working but a necessary thing to do if you're to hunt down the cause(s) of your issue.

 

Last edited: Jun 7, 2025 at 2:32 PM

Download Reaper and run exactly the same Cubase project with same settings, see how it goes. One more thing.. what is your project sample rate and buffer? I mean, if you run heavy CPU usage plugins at 192khz sample rate at 64 or 128 buffer? what do you expect? Just saying..

 

Also plenty of group channels, side chaining and taxing chain of effects, mostly it goes to single core. Just checked, Cubase doesn't use multi core for those task's, especially if you use group inside of group, where you have large nesting effect chain on individual channels and then on the master/stereo out, so yeah, master/stereo out is summed on single core, that is enough to screw up your whole thing if you have stuff like Ozone or some hefty chain.

 

Last edited: Jun 7, 2025 at 3:06 PM

Wow! Thanks for the quick replies already! There's a stack of info to go through. Much appreciated.

As a quick few comments for now:

Welcome - Thank you! What a fab welcome to the forum!

NVIDIA - I'm running the card using the latest Studio Drivers (not gaming)

Project size - We're not talking about huge orchrestral stuff. For example, the latest project is a handful of Kontakt instances, two VST synths and EZDrummer 3 (with multiple outputs), most instruments/outputs have VST effects (Compressors, etc) ...and that's it.

Sample rate & Buffer - 48khz normally at 512 buffer... but as I mentioned, on previous examples of the issue I have increased 2048 and still get overload.

VSTs - No cracked plugins, all legit, all updated regularly. No unusual plugins (example suppliers are Arturia, Native Instruments, Lindell, Softube) and I have checked/researched other people's experiences and none suggest a specific VST issue.

Group channels - Interesting comment from @Melodic Reality ...yes, I use groups/busses a lot. Surely, I can't be the only one who does this on Cubase, that would be a huge oversight by Steinberg.

CPU/RAM - There is no overclocking.

And a quick question...

USB - How would I know which to use? My SSL 2+ is plugged in directly to the PC (no hub) but I'm not sure how to check what you are describing. Can you give me a steer on this?

(BTW, @tzzsmk, I'll go through each of your questions in turn over the weekend and double-check everything. I just wanted to clarify the USB one first.)

Thanks again folks - You guys are fab!

 

You aren't, quick search and you will see plenty of people on Steinberg forums talking about it, it's one of those things, like when we had PDC issues in Logic when using plugins with higher latency or folks with Live that don't have PDC for side chaining and so on, it's like minor, but serious flaw, doesn't affect everybody the same and etc... but you aren't really going to change the whole DAW because of it, but find some workaround and adopt to it in hope one day they will fix it... years goes by and you are still waiting, trying other DAW's, but those have their own issues, they all have issues, all of them, bugs, workflow, you name it, they have it.

 

I built many systems, unfortunately Steinbergs/Cubase still lags behind techonology so you might see only a small increase in performance in a modern CPU vs a CPU that is like 5-8 years old.
Single core power is still where most of the processing will go, once that hits the wall you will start to experience issues.
On paper things should fly but in reality things are now even less optimized on win 11.
You need to declutter and optimize your computer first, latency mon reveals a lot.
There are many websites and YT tutorials on how to do that ( power plans, unparking cores, bios tweaks ).
I had to spent a few days to get things optimized.
Also, nvidia/cubase combo is a no go.

 

Long term Cubase user here. You've not really talked about the VST/VSTi (instruments) you are using and which ones are using lots of % on the Performance Monitor. Many of Steinberg plugins don't use a lot of %. You can freeze any track or bounce to audio to save some % which at the mix stage it should be only audio tracks really anyway (with no VST instruments). Would be great if you could include a screenshot or a short video to show us what is going on including your Studio Setup...(settings)

 

AudioSex in action, extremely helpful as usual!

So I'm going to bring up something else.

After you've checked and tweaked everything, take a look at your workflow and try to optimise it for your CPU. Ask yourself "do I really need this and that CPU eating plugin on all the buses and master? Do I really need that sound to be polyphonic?" People often use only polyphonic sounds whilst there's no need for e.g. bass and drums at least. Learn how to save CPU from pegging it to 100%.

Cheers

 

it's not always easy to determine, usually there is some kind of schematic for ports in motherboard manual,
usually USB ports below ethernet are most direct, but not always,
you can start by simply trying different USB ports, because they aren't all equal frankly,
also, usually two ports share bandwidth/controller, so it's always better to plug mouse/keyboard and other stuff not into same USB pair as your audio interface

 

There is no real "plugin CPU distribution".
So a SINGLE crappy plugin can saturate a single core ... and ruin the whole game.

Take a look at separate cores :

 

Again, great suggestions folks and very much appreciated. Since my last comment, I have taken inspiration from your suggestions and educated myself on a few things, which has led to Lasso being installed and optimised. I've also downloaded and run CPU-Z (RAM speeds are all ok @tzzsmk), I also ran LatencyMon, and I'm now hoping you can help with interpreting the results...

System is suitable for audio, but do I need to concern myself with the reported ISRs (highest was "dxgkrnl.sys - DirectX Graphics Kernel, Microsoft Corporation") and DPCs (highest was "Wdf01000.sys - Kernel Mode Driver Framework Runtime, Microsoft Corporation")?

And...

Oh! - Can you give more detail? ...I thought Steinberg/NVIDIA had sorted that out with later releases.

Here's the graphs... CPU6/7/8/9 always seem busy. The step change you see across all graphs at the beginning was when I pressed "Play" on my Cubase project.

I'll have a play!

Thanks as always - I'll keep tinkering with the stuff you've given me already

 

Thanks @samsum, I'm a keyboard guy, so I use a lot of software synths (via Kontakt) or direct in Cubase. I realise bouncing down to audio will help - and I've done that in the past - but the difference was small. Audio-only tracks can still max out performance, which is what led me to try Vienna (both locally and on a separate high-powered laptop) and AudioGridder (so far, only locally). The workflow does become cumbersome, which is why I'm still hoping (perhaps with futility!) that I can find a workaround that allows me to work/compose smoothly.

Besides the 'latency indicator' on the Mixer window, is there a way I can see which plugins are affecting the performance monitor the most?

Thanks!

 

You're very welcome... Unfortunately I do not know of a better way than to just do it manually and disable each VSTi / VST seperatly and observe the meter. Would be a great feature to be added though in future. I saw on one forum FabFilter Saturn was using 25% with just one instance a couple of years ago but I'm sure you will find the big ones and then you can free up some % by bouncing that track or freezing it. I always found with latencymon my probelms in the past were my Network Card so I always disable Wi-Fi or Network Adaptor when creating music in DAW.

Edit: Apparently the feature to add each VST CPU % was requested over 10 years ago with other DAWs having this feature already, yet still not been added

 

Last edited: Jun 7, 2025 at 6:09 PM

Hi, welcome aboard. You probably already know some of these tips but you should watch Chris Selim's (experienced Cubase "specialist" ) video and try his tips, see for example the Asio-Guard, Multi Processing, etc.

 

That's perfectly normal, so your system should handle real-time audio just fine. I would suspect some kind of Cubase bug or bad optimization is the cause of your problems.

Btw, have you set Windows power plan to best/high performance?

 

Funnily enough, your first comment had me doing just that... and here's a weird observation: After disabling then re-enabling several tracks (one by one) but NOT changing anything, my performance meter dropped (for example, ASIO Guard went from 83% while idling, down to 52%).

Go figure?!?!

Love Chris's channel, I follow him and Dom regularly. I have been through that video before, but hey, your reply is a great reminder to watch the video again and double-check everything!

Yep, Max Performance as set via Lasso (I had it set high before Lasso too).

Thanks again folks - I'm blown away by how forthcoming you have all been ...and so quickly! YOU ROCK!