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apple lossless
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apple lossless

Product
ITCH
Version
-
Hardware
Allen & Heath Xone:DX +
Computer
Mac
OS
Platform
-
erwin 6:31 PM - 1 August, 2010
Product: itch
Hardware: allen-heath-xonedx||no-fx-controller
Computer: mac
OS Version: dont-know
---

Hi,

Most of my music was ript with itunes from cd and lp on a windows xp laptop to mp3 and with a bitrate 192 kbps. I used it for a while with a vci 300 setup and this all worked fine. Soundquality was not perfect but acceptable in most cases.

For the xone dx i use an imac 20" with 2.66 ghz intel core duo and 4 gb ram. When i play a gig, the imac and xone dx are pluged in an UPS powersystem from MGE (450W/750VA).
I have used the same mp3 files from my laptop. With these files, beatgrid is far from accurate and in some songs difficult to adjust. It seems also that the xone tells more about the 192 kbps soundquality. The loss of sound seems more obvious compared with the VCI-300 setup.
So i desided to rerip my cd's and lp's straight to the mac again with itunes but this time in apple lossless joint stereo. (a big task!!)

Soundquality has improved dramaticaly, so that is perfect. The beatgrids are also far more accurate and easyer to adjust to perfection. Problem is that every time i load a song cpu meter goes red. On a 8 hour set i had over the whole night maybe 5 times a very smal dropout. Latency was on 1 ms.
Now i have changed the latency to 5 ms and played an other 8 hour set. There was no dropout anymore and sound was realy good. But most of the songs i load CPU goes to the red light.
Question: Does the red CPU light harm my imac?
Question: Is apple lossless a good format for itch, or is WAVV or AIFF or MP3 a better choice?
I play 3 marathon gigs every week and try to find the ideal setup.

Thank you very mutch for you time.
Best regards, erwin
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 11:37 PM - 1 August, 2010
Hi erwin.

First up - sound quality of audio will affect how a computer can analyze a track. Because we use transients to detect beats, BPM and set a grid, using a 192 quality file will result in slightly poorer analyzing than a higher quality file.

Higher audio quality will also always sound a lot better than poorer quality files such as 192kbps. I am personally now only buying WAV files, after years and years of 320. I have the space now with all the new cheap storage, but if I had to replace my entire music library with WAVs I couldn't fit it entirely on my laptop's internal drive, so this is why I am only moving slowing to WAV now. Apple lossless is a good compromise, but it is purely up to you if you think that you'll be using too much hard drive space or not. The sound will be better with WAV, but not extremely so, so most people will be happy with Apple Lossless.


With your computer having a latency setting of 1 will be more likely to push your computer's processor, hence dropouts. Setting it higher will mean you get less dropouts. Can you go here to check the basic tweaks for getting good audio playback: www.serato.com

This covers the basics, but there is more we can do.
Let me know the specs of your laptop (make, model, CPU type and speed, RAM, and list all USB devices you may use).

Cheers.
erwin 5:22 PM - 2 August, 2010
Hi Matt,
Thanks for the fast respond. Last night i had a 7 hour gig with the imac setup as discribed and latency on 5ms. No dropouts anymore.
Only thing i'm stil worry about is that when i load a song CPU goes red for a 2 to 3 seconds. when playing the song CPU stay around 20%, a normal value i guess.

strange thing is that songs that i have allready played and load again, CPU load is much less then when i loaded the song for the first time.
all songs are analized before i do a gig.

in the next days i will do a couple of tests with WAVV files and report the results.
maybe the imac is not powerfull enough to play these large files?
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 11:31 PM - 2 August, 2010
It sounds like what is happening is that when you load a track ITCH is analyzing the songs when they are first loaded (which would increase the CPU for sure).

You should analyze all your files in the offline player before playing, this will mean the software won't have to analyze the file when loading to a deck.

Your iMac should be plenty powerful to play any audio file (even massive WAVs).
erwin 9:51 PM - 9 August, 2010
Hi Matt,

all my music is analyzed before the gigs. anyway i am 3 gigs later now and i mentioned that cpu load is big with all AAC tracks wether they are lossless ore not. if i load a AAC track that is analyzed before, CPU goes almost always red for 2 seconds and during playback stay around 20%. Load the same track in the same gig again and CPU load is much less then when you load it for the first time.
take this same track day after in one other gig and cpu goes red again for 2 seconds.

now i have ript a cd in WAVV with all sethings for maximum quality also with itunes and make a test with these tracks. sound is again a lot better than with apple lossless indeed and more important CPU load is way more normal around 40% maximum.

with that experience i think aac and apple lossless don't fit so well to itch.

only downside is that the wavv file is really big (50 MB for a song).
i think to change the most important songs in wavv and the other songs in 320kbps

do you have a suggestion on ideal wavv ripsettings?
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 12:13 AM - 11 August, 2010
ALAC still uses Quicktime to decode the tracks, so there should be a small amount of CPU increase as the tracks are compressed. WAV files are uncompressed, and even though they are bigger files, there will be no decompression needed.
But it shouldn't be too massive....

But it sounds like the track is being analyzed when you load a track for the first time. When you load the track again the track has been analyzed so it's sticking.
Can you please check your music files/folders to see you have read + write permissions, and not just read? That could explain the analyzing not sticking.
erwin 11:28 AM - 11 August, 2010
Hi Matt,

I have checked the files and they are all read and write. I have changed my music in apple lossless because i expected that was the right since. apple computer wih itunes and software (itch) with itunes integrated....

thanks to your advice on the wav files, i guess we have find a good solution.
great sound and an acceptable cpu load during a gig.

today i received new usb cables from the dj tech tool website, guess this will be also a good improvement.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 11:19 PM - 11 August, 2010
There looks like something odd going on, are you able to attach a couple of these tracks to this thread, and we can see if it's something to do with the tracks or with our software....

It'd be a shame to have this functionality, but users can't use it!
10:26 AM, 12 Aug 2010
erwin attached a file: 1-02 Alejandro.m4a
Download· Permalink
10:40 AM, 12 Aug 2010
erwin attached a file: 01 Vino Vino.m4a
Download· Permalink
erwin 10:48 AM - 12 August, 2010
Yes indeed. And since a couple of years there are not many good musicstores anymore so i am forced to by tracks from itunes from time to time. i have no idee where i can by files in wav.

i try to attach a couple of files, maybe you find a solution.
erwin 12:57 PM - 12 August, 2010
the first song alejandro came direct from the itunes store
the second song vino vino is ript from the original cd in apple lossless
djgeorgek 7:47 PM - 23 August, 2010
hi matt..i'm playin with a xone-dx and my laptop is an macbook pro 13''-2,53 intel duo-4g memory-external lacie rugged 500 gb hd with firewire 800 connection & mac os snow leopard(the last version).
i'm having 2 problems
1.when itch runs,suddenly everything's stop and a window says ''itch quit unexpectedly''.
needs about 2 minutes to reopen or 5 to restart.why????
2.when i'm loading a track for the first time or loading a mix(80 min),cpu becomes red....
i tried a high-efficiency cooler and the cpu was only green,max 70-80 %.
but the problem with ''itch quit unexpectedly'' is still gives lots of problems in my job...
please give me a sollution...
erwin 9:47 PM - 23 August, 2010
hi matt,

did you find something on the the 2 files? all aac files are still masive cpu loads in itch, no mather how much i played and analyzed them already in the past. on my imac they play well with latency set to 5ms, but i hold my breath everytime i load a aac file...
as a backup i still use sometimes my laptop with a vci 300. with same latency set to 5ms (10ms sounds disturded!!) there the problem is even more aparent with more frequently a small dropout and a frezing screen.

all wav and mp3 files play in both configurations very good with no problems ad all and cpu load between 20% and 50%
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 3:34 AM - 24 August, 2010
These files work fine here. hmmm...

Can you please test by dragging both of these files to your desktop, then import them into ITCH into a new crate called Test.

When the hardware is disconnected can you please drag these files onto the Analyze Files button from the Test crate.

Once you have done this please connect the hardware and drag them to the virtual deck.

What happens now?
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 3:35 AM - 24 August, 2010
djgeorgek - can you please start a new help request with a detailed description of your issue and your computer specifications. Thanks.
6:00 AM, 7 Sep 2010
This help request has been closed due to inactivity.
erwin 2:18 PM - 12 September, 2010
hi matt, sorry for my late respond my job took all my energy.

i deed try the thing with the test crate, as you suggested but the result stay the same.

i mentioned that the problem is exactly the same in the offline player: first time you load the track: massive cpu load, second time you load the song is a normal cpu load.
close itch and startup again: first load of the track is again a massive cpu load.
very strange, for so far i did'nt had playback issues with these tracks.
Serato, Forum Moderator
Matt-C 5:10 AM - 14 September, 2010
You mentioned you checked the music files to see if they have read+write permissions, can you please check if the music folders have write permissions?
Something looks like it's stopping the files from storing the analyzed data.

If you drag a track to your desktop, then in the offline player press ' analyze files' then close ITCH down, and then reopen ITCH with the hardware connected and load up this track direct from the desktop, do you get this problem?
6:00 AM, 28 Sep 2010
This help request has been closed due to inactivity.