Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

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Andy_D
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Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by Andy_D »

I am runnng Manjaro KDE Plasma, with Reaper a Focusrite Sapphire Pro 24,FFADO and Cadence. I have followed just about every tweak out there for my system.

My problem is xruns that cause the audio to completely cut out fora couple of seconds. These xruns seem to coincide with a spike in DSP workload from 2-3% to 50, 60, even 70% for a couple of seconds. I think that if I can find the source of this spike is DSP load I can probably solve my problem. Does anyone have any idea on how to sleuth this out. Ksysguard will show me the spikes but not the process as I guess it is too transient to register. does anyone know of a good process monitoring tool that might help. My machine is dual boot and everything works flawlessly under Win 7. This is very frustrating.
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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by sysrqer »

You can try 'top'.
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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by merlyn »

Is Cadence reporting Xruns? Xruns sound like a crackling or clicking, not silence.

If the DSP load is going up then the process involved is jackdbus or the audio app you are using.

From what you've said I'd look into FFADO configuration and see what options there are, and what the best configuration is.
Andy_D
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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by Andy_D »

Cadence is reporting Xruns and when this happens there is a transient DSP load spike. Simultaneously the Clock Source and Sample Rate on the FFADO mixer go from greyed out to enabled just like they are before Jack is started.

All of this would lead me to believe that some other process is pre-emting the Firewire. In watching the graph in KSysGuard this appears to happen at the same time a a network receive and the spike usually happens on cores 4 & 5 on my processor.. I get the part that some process seems to be bumping my Firewirewire audio interface offline for a couple of seconds. Finding out what it is however seems to be a real hair puller. Also FWIW this does not seem to change whether I try Jack, ALSA, Bridge, no Bridge. I'm stumped!
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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by bluebell »

Andy_D wrote:Cadence is reporting Xruns and when this happens there is a transient DSP load spike. Simultaneously the Clock Source and Sample Rate on the FFADO mixer go from greyed out to enabled just like they are before Jack is started.

All of this would lead me to believe that some other process is pre-emting the Firewire. In watching the graph in KSysGuard this appears to happen at the same time a a network receive and the spike usually happens on cores 4 & 5 on my processor.. I get the part that some process seems to be bumping my Firewirewire audio interface offline for a couple of seconds. Finding out what it is however seems to be a real hair puller. Also FWIW this does not seem to change whether I try Jack, ALSA, Bridge, no Bridge. I'm stumped!
WiFi drivers are a good candidate so some people disable the driver in a blacklist in /etc/modprobe.d. I disabled bluetooth and the builtin soundchip as well.

/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-audiotuning.conf

Code: Select all

blacklist bluetooth
blacklist btrtl
blacklist btintel
blacklist btbcm
blacklist btusb

blacklist uvcvideo

blacklist iwlwifi

blacklist snd_hda_intel
blacklist snd_hda_core
blacklist snd_hda_codec
blacklist snd_hda_codec_realtek
blacklist snd_hda_codec_hdmi
Since I need a network connection I set up a WiFi router as a bridge from Ethernet to WiFi.

Linux – MOTU UltraLite AVB – Qtractor – http://suedwestlicht.saar.de/

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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by funkmuscle »

Since the latest update of Reaper, I get crazy x-runs when trying to record DrumGizmo's beats from midi to individual track wave tracks.. I mean super crazy x-runs yet the audio never seems to be affected.
I figured it's Reaper. Manjaro is still basically Arch if I'm correct?? Well I'm on Arch running the RT Kernel and using OpenBox and I get those x-runs. KDE Plasma is a complete disaster for me and anything realtime(that's why I can't understand KXStudio using KDE as it's DE).

Maybe try another DE and another DAW. I'm fine with MixBus 32C, Ardour, Qtractor and MusE!
Andy_D
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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by Andy_D »

Thank you guys for the response.

It was the WiFi I figured it out myself rather found some mentions in searches elsewhere. I disabled the WiFi and the audio cutouts went away, and Xruns substantially reduced as well. I was just getting on here to post my results and solving of the problem so it would be there for others.

Thanks and all the best.
Axisential
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Re: Xrauns, Audio Cutout and DSP Workload

Post by Axisential »

Andy_D wrote:Thank you guys for the response.

It was the WiFi I figured it out myself rather found some mentions in searches elsewhere. I disabled the WiFi and the audio cutouts went away, and Xruns substantially reduced as well. I was just getting on here to post my results and solving of the problem so it would be there for others.

Thanks and all the best.
Did you disable your wifi by blacklisting, or just a software toggle? I'm having the same symptoms and want to give this a try...
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