MIR PRO on a slave?

[clemenshaas]

First things first: great product, i will buy it within the next two weeks.

However, when doing the demo-test, i easily maxed out my computer (mac pro 8x2.8 24 gb ram), so a slave computer will be necessary for me.

I guess it is recommended to run MIR PRO on the host computer, but the slave (pc) i´m intending to buy will most probably outperform my old mac, so from this point of view, as MIR PRO is the most cpu-consuming application, it would make sense to run MIR PRO on the pc. is this a problem? if yes, which is it?

or will my mac be powerful enough to handle, say, herb´s teldex template? plus some instances of kontakt?

[Dietz]

Hi Clemens,

thanks for the friendly words!

MIR Pro will happily run on a LAN-connected slave. But your Mac Pro should be able to handle quite some load. It will depend a lot on your latency settings, though. 

You can easily test this yourself (you don't need Herb's Teldex Preset for that): Just add 40 or 50 "Icons" to a MIR Venue step by step (the Trial Roompack will be sufficient) and see what's possible.

HTH,

[clemenshaas]

Hi Dietz,

thanks for the quick reply.

As i said, i already maxed out my machine when testing with the trial roompack, running about 20 icons AND the corresponding vienna instruments (latency settings on maximum). so maybe my mac would be ok for MIR alone, but not for MIR and all the other stuff at the same time. 

but how can i test that? i thought i read somewhere in this forum, that MIR only consumes cpu when audio is actually running  to the icons, to put it simple and a little wrong, but you get the idea i think. and don´t we have a ram problem if i use a quite large orchestral setting? i did the test with a composition that already eats up about 16 gigs of ram. 

i did another test with a brand new project (mozart kv 467 by the way, oh so beautiful, feel free to watch http://vimeo.com/32753388), and this time all went fine, icons for every single instrument.

when using the exact same template, but this timing using MIR in surround mode, my mac had to surrender, i could still bounce offline though.

If my machine could handle MIR with 50 icons, that would be fine for me, i would just buy a "cheap" pc to handle my vienna instruments and spend the rest on the missing 4-5 dvd collections. :)

is there no difference if i run MIR on the host or on a slave? just the exact same thing? no additional hardware/cables...?

[Dietz]

@Another User said:

 If my machine could handle MIR with 50 icons, that would be fine for me, i would just buy a "cheap" pc to handle my vienna instruments and spend the rest on the missing 4-5 dvd collections. :)

is there no difference if i run MIR on the host or on a slave? just the exact same thing? no additional hardware/cables...?

You will need a conventional LAN-connection, but other than that, no special hardware is required.

HTH,

[Karel]

Make sure it's at least a Gigabit LAN connection.

[clemenshaas]

Hi Dietz,

still on duty, highly appreciated. :)

Yes, much of my RAM was eaten by instruments when testing, very much indeed. And yes, clever use of optimization certainly would help, but to be honest, I really love to have random access to any articulation at any time, and I love to be lazy at work. And I´m ready to pay for that.

SSDs certainly would help, too. In my case however, transferring about 2 TB of sampling data to SSD would be rather pricy. I will transfer some of my most used of it, though, even if just for decreased loading times (yawn).

This is an open thread that anyone can read, so I do not want to say that MIR does not work on my machine. It does, when I limit myself to normal standards. Indeed, when testing, my eyes went all shiny and a little wet. MIR made my life a little happier, it really did. sniff.

That said, I sometimes do not limit myself and am happy (well, QUITE happy) to spend money on an additional computer just to have MIR run happily, even if I, just for the fun of it, add some more icons to see if cowbell 7 sounds cooler than cowbell 4, without removing all the other muted cowbells before. Call me decadent, I am what I am.

And now for the final question. I definitely will buy another computer, for MIR´s sake. But which? If my mac is strong enough to handle Logic, a few additional PlugIns and MIR with say 50 icons, a rather cheap pc for my VIs could do. Any way to test MIR´s hunger alone on my mac?

If this is a risky game, I would prefer to have a dedicated monster-pc to make MIR really happy. In this case: Is it possible to quantify the amount of RAM for ONLY MIR alone per icon (per reverb-time of the venue, per stereo/surround)? I´d rather spend my money on missing VIs than on unused RAM.

And now for something completely different: Happy Weekend and let the candles burn, burn, burn.

Clemens

[FlorianWalter]

Hi Clemens, here are some rough values for RAM usage of MIR Pro (64bit, stereo):

• Studio 2 (IR-Length 1s): 225 MB Engine, 12MB per Icon
• Teldex (IR-Length 3s):    460 MB Engine, 30MB per Icon
• Steinhof (IR-Length 9s): 800 MB Engine, 50MB per Icon

With a surround setup the RAM usage for the engine is the same, for the icons it grows nearly analogical to the number of additional channels. For a 5.1-setup (6 channels) I get about 30MB per icon for Studio 2.

All those values were measured without laoding any VIs or other instruments. The values might be slightly different on your machine, depening on latency, soundcard audio buffer size, etc.

I hope that's sufficient for your new hardware design, please let me know if you have any additional questions.

Florian

[clemenshaas]

Hi Florian,

thanks for your values. I have already been in direct communication with Dietz on this matter, and I´m pleasantly surprised that RAM will not be an issue.

CPU-wise it´s a different story. 

My Mac will not be powerful enough for my wishes, as I have tested yesterday (glitches starting with 19 instruments legato unisono, latency 1024, VE PRO Buffer 1).  So I´m planning to keep my primary computer untouched and have all VIs etc. play here and buy a slave just for MIR and nothing else but MIR. 

Options are a i2600k (cheap) or a i7 990 XE (fast). 

I would like to have this machine powerful enough to handle about 50 instruments @latency 512, VE-PRO Buffer1

I should probably ask the pc-dealer, as this is a matter of hardware, but any information or experiences from VSL or users will be appreciated. :)

Clemens

[Dietz]

Clemens - maybe you should try different audio hardware first. In your last mail you wrote that you use a Digi 003 on that computer ... Digidesign's (i.e. Avid's) ASIO-drivers are not exactly famous for their efficiency.

HTH,

[clemenshaas]

Dietz, yeah, I thought so. I had to stick to Digi/Avid-Hardware until recently however.

I´m seriously considering RME HDSPe. 

Well, I definitely have to talk to my dealer. Too many parameters, protools-compatibility etc.

As he earns the money I spend on new hardware, not VSL, he should do the research. :)

I´ll let you know the results. 

Any experiences concerning the i7-2600k vs. i7-990 EX-matter are still welcome.

Money for MIR on your account before Xmas. :)

Clemens