Old 06-13-2021, 12:34 PM   #1
kgbeat
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Default Audio Thread Priority?

Being a non computer person, Audio Thread Priority means nothing to me I'm afraid but as there are options in Reaper's preferences, I would like to know which is the correct setting to use for my computer.

My system is an INTEL XEON (R) 3.40GHz which has 4 cores and 8 processors. I use a Presonus Studio 26C Interface and select the Studio USB ASIO driver in Reaper.

Can anyone tell me which is the correct or best setting to use out of the following six that are available.

1) Normal / 2) Above Normal / 3) Highest / 4) Time Critical / 5) MMCSS Time Critical / 6) ASIO Default MMCSS Pro Audio Time Critical.

And now I have discovered settings in the Buffer preferences...says 'Thread Priority Highest' And then 'Behaviour'. What does behaviour effect please?

I have looked in the manual but could not find reference to these settings.

Many thanks.

Last edited by kgbeat; 06-13-2021 at 12:55 PM.
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Old 06-13-2021, 06:13 PM   #2
foxAsteria
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The only "correct settings" are default or the one that works better for you.

Just change it a little and start playback to see if there's a difference.

Be sure to have performance monitor open and right click to enable RTCPU, which is the important one that's not enabled by default for whatever reason (maybe to reduce emails asking what the difference is between regular CPU and RealTimeCPU I guess)...

Answer is audio is more critical than other types of computation and RTCPU depends on your system operating on "good drivers" that don't create excessive DCP.

LatencyMon will tell you what's what.
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Old 06-16-2021, 03:07 AM   #3
kgbeat
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Quote:
Originally Posted by foxAsteria View Post
The only "correct settings" are default or the one that works better for you.

Just change it a little and start playback to see if there's a difference.

Be sure to have performance monitor open and right click to enable RTCPU, which is the important one that's not enabled by default for whatever reason (maybe to reduce emails asking what the difference is between regular CPU and RealTimeCPU I guess)...

Answer is audio is more critical than other types of computation and RTCPU depends on your system operating on "good drivers" that don't create excessive DCP.

LatencyMon will tell you what's what.
Thanks for that Fox...I'll do some tests as you suggest. I've checked the meter and and the RTCPU usage appears to be only 1.2% when playing back a reasonably heavy section.
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Old 06-16-2021, 03:02 PM   #4
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As for what "Thread priority" actually means...

Almost all programs run by the user in Windows get "Normal" priority (there are also "Below Normal" and "Low", which are not options in Reaper). When the process scheduler looks through all the program tasks that have work to be done all of equal priority are sorted by the one that was run the longest time ago. Tasks that have higher priority will be serviced before ones with lower, even if they've been active more recently.

So programs with higher priority can preempt other programms running at the same time. That can help with preventing audio dropouts, which may happen if the buffer empties before Windows gets back to the DAW for its next time slice.
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Old 06-17-2021, 04:32 AM   #5
kgbeat
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Originally Posted by ScuzzyEye View Post
As for what "Thread priority" actually means...

Almost all programs run by the user in Windows get "Normal" priority (there are also "Below Normal" and "Low", which are not options in Reaper). When the process scheduler looks through all the program tasks that have work to be done all of equal priority are sorted by the one that was run the longest time ago. Tasks that have higher priority will be serviced before ones with lower, even if they've been active more recently.

So programs with higher priority can preempt other programms running at the same time. That can help with preventing audio dropouts, which may happen if the buffer empties before Windows gets back to the DAW for its next time slice.
Thank you Mr Scuzzyeye...that's a great explanation. Surely this means that if you only have Reaper running, then Thread Priority is virtually irrelevant?
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Old 11-29-2023, 01:15 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by kgbeat View Post
Thank you Mr Scuzzyeye...that's a great explanation. Surely this means that if you only have Reaper running, then Thread Priority is virtually irrelevant?
You never have only Reaper running. Is your monitor on? Does your keyboard respond? Do have an operating system? There is a lot going on, and technically a CPU can only do one task at a time. It has to do a billion other tasks just so your computer has the most basic usability. It will have to ignore Reaper at times. The question is, how often?
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