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09-03-2015, 02:53 PM
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#1
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Toronto
Posts: 35
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Increase rate of the playhead cursor refresh/Hertz?
Is it possible to speed up the refresh/rate of the Playhead Cursor and overall arrange window updating? I do a lot of zoomed in edits chopping samples about and it's often very hard to visually gauge where you are when the transport is in motion (without using tab to transient) because the Reaper gui is sluggish.
We can adjust the Hz of the mixer meters to 60hz (or more if your monitor supports) and it goes a long way to improving the clarity of the metering. For a long time I've thought that the main arrange window would benefit from the same responsiveness. I'd estimate that Reaper is typically updating the playback cursor no more than 5 times a second maybe less, and I don't know about anyone else but it gives an impression of sluggishness and 'lagging' behind the audio.
If you are on the Mac and have access to Twisted Wave (e.g. demo) you can see an example of what I mean when an app is built to refresh the playback cursor very slickly, it makes the overall waveform navigation experience a lot more pleasurable and easier to quickly zone in on edits.
The thing is that modern computers & gpu's have no problem animating a DAW gui with a fluid refresh rate, and you can already see this in Reaper even by setting your mixer Hz preference to 60hz, have it onscreen at the same time as the arrange window in progress and you can see the disparity between the super fluid meters and the playback cursor staggering along the top ruler.
It's hard to tell a realtime Reaper running on a fast desktop computer from someone demonstrating a feature with a captured gif video on the forum, because the updating rate is so low by default.
I saw Justin's interview where he mentions admiring John Carmack, cmon let's get some Quake 2 butter smooth refresh rates into Reaper!!!!
p.s. Logic 9 went from something that looked like a smooth 30hz playhead refresh rate to what must be an atrocious 2hz on Logic X, spawning a load of long frustrated threads on Apple's community forum and Gearslutz....would be great to see Reaper do exactly the opposite
Last edited by Joe Miller; 09-20-2015 at 11:18 AM.
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09-03-2015, 02:58 PM
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#2
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Toronto
Posts: 35
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p.s. The same question applies to other components like the current time display in the transport, and the Big Clock view (just what is that clock doing??, I would not want to be a drummer using the Big Clock as a visual cue, because it has some serious Parkinsons issues....)
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09-03-2015, 11:55 PM
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#3
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2015
Posts: 53
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+1
The play cursor flickers alot in the MIDI editor as well and does get annoying when trying to work with precision.
This would be a fantastic improvement.
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09-20-2015, 11:28 AM
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#4
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Toronto
Posts: 35
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I had to do some long sessions in Reaper 5 of editing very short chunks out of some long audio files this week, came up against this problem again, the refresh rate of the arrange window and the timeline cursor ruler when zoomed just brutally grinding to a halt, resulting in missing where I'm placing edits by a mile. It's definitely a much slower redraw rate than I remember from similar work I did a while ago in Reaper 3. I really hope this isn't a side effect of extraneous weirdo feature requests that are being incorporated into Reaper at the expense of basic performance.
Oh how I miss how responsively the audio apps used to run a decade ago, everything now feels like it's running in a Java virtual machine.
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03-21-2016, 09:35 AM
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#5
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Toronto
Posts: 35
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Bumping this subject. Had to do some Reaper editing today for the first time in ages, updated to the most recent 'leet' version. Still sub 5hz Playhead cursor!
This vague and laggy display issue is the main reason I ditched Reaper, despite all the other positives. I can't believe that no-one else has an issue with how much the transport staggers visually in Reaper now.
I'm baffled that we have options for 60hz to 144hz meters on monitors that support them and a fixed incredibly slow playhead cursor making editing and scrubbing difficult. Both Windows and OSX seem to suffer this with Reaper nowadays.
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03-21-2016, 10:12 AM
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#6
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Toronto
Posts: 35
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This attachment .mov is what I am talking about, nice smooth 60hz meters left. Playhead Cursor jumping an inch at a time on the right.
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03-21-2016, 12:19 PM
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#7
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Apr 2011
Posts: 504
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Yes, this would be much welcome.
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03-21-2016, 12:34 PM
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#8
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 12,482
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+1 would like it too.
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03-23-2016, 07:23 PM
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#9
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 12,482
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Notice:
Lowering audio interface buffer size makes it re-drawing faster.
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03-24-2016, 03:22 AM
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#10
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Dec 2012
Posts: 13,334
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dstruct
Notice:
Lowering audio interface buffer size makes it re-drawing faster.
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GUI refresh depends on audio? Yes, it could be true.
+1
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03-24-2016, 03:26 AM
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#11
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Croatia
Posts: 24,798
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What's the "UI Updates" setting set to in Preferences->Appearance?
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03-27-2016, 05:29 AM
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#12
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Toronto
Posts: 35
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Hi, sorry I didn't reply sooner.
Evildragon: The updates are set to Fast Always, doesn't seem to make much difference which setting is used there. The machine is very quick, 32gb Ram, 6 core, SSDs, and pretty much any other audio app runs smooth as butter, including Pro Tools 11.
I don't think the UI updates setting affects the 'refresh' rate of the playhead cursor, it's almost as though the cursor needs it's own preference to allow people to set it much higher if they wish to see it that way (I'm confident most machines would laugh it off, I can't see how too many cursor redraws could bring the computer to it's knees.) If it's something to do with how the waveform regions are drawn and updated, then the cursor should really be 'decoupled' from that drawing operation so that it's smooth regardless of either zoom level or how many regions are being drawn.
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06-03-2016, 01:11 PM
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#13
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Oct 2013
Posts: 509
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It may interest some of you to know that some graphics performance issues can be mitigated by simply having fewer VU and LED meters active and viewable at a single time.
Using the storable layout views, you can configure the screen layout to have fewer meters during times when you don't need them.
And more importantly, if you right-click the master meters, you can configure them to show just peak LED's or just RMS VU's instead of both. Also, here you can adjust the window timing of the RMS VU's to something longer. On my system, doing these things helped reduce audio buffering issues since there's basically less screen drawing activity affecting CPU.
I know this doesn't provide the feature you guys are requesting, but it might help for other related things.
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06-03-2016, 03:05 PM
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#14
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Posts: 1,344
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+1 on this! The jumpy behaviour of the play cursor definitely could be better.
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06-03-2016, 03:32 PM
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#15
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Near Cambridge UK and Near Questembert, France
Posts: 22,754
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All you guys struggling with this - following on from what ED said earlier, what buffer setting are you using and does reducing it help at all?
I cant seem to get a noticeable lag or flicker on my puny little projects.
But I generally run a 32 to 128 buffer all the time, even when mixing.
__________________
Ici on parles Franglais
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06-04-2016, 12:51 PM
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#16
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Banned
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Too close to Charlotte, NC
Posts: 3,554
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The playhead has always been horribly jumpy for me, it's terrible. It's beyond jerky, it looks like it's actually jumping back and forth from left to right as it struggles its way eastward.
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03-26-2017, 05:35 PM
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#17
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Feb 2012
Posts: 1,972
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Too bad we still can't see progress in this area...
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12-13-2017, 05:31 AM
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#18
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Posts: 1,344
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Time to do something about this I think!
Not crucial, but its quite irritating to see the play cursor totally flickering. The more zoomed in it is, the worse it gets.
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02-24-2018, 01:35 PM
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#19
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Sep 2015
Posts: 13
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It's still happening, and it's still annoying!
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07-22-2018, 03:59 AM
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#20
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Sweden
Posts: 24
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It's not just the cursor but the whole UI, really visible when zoomed in or using project sync in a MIDI editor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3UI...ature=youtu.be (looks terrible)
edit: compare to how it looks in a fruity DAW https://youtu.be/OQ2qPm458KY (recorded at 60hz, looks even smoother since it updates at monitor refresh rate)
Last edited by Cyaoeu; 07-22-2018 at 04:13 AM.
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07-22-2018, 06:29 AM
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#21
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Croatia
Posts: 24,798
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FL Studio gives more priority to graphics than most other DAWs. Of course, that shows in its CPU usage. Reaper's first and foremost priority is non-glitchy audio, it's prioritized above graphics.
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07-22-2018, 07:21 AM
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#22
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Sweden
Posts: 24
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Quote:
Originally Posted by EvilDragon
FL Studio gives more priority to graphics than most other DAWs. Of course, that shows in its CPU usage. Reaper's first and foremost priority is non-glitchy audio, it's prioritized above graphics.
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Why not both? :P
I think FL just uses more CPU in general. I would be happy to pay a few CPU% for higher UI refresh rates.
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07-22-2018, 07:22 AM
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#23
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Banned
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Too close to Charlotte, NC
Posts: 3,554
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyaoeu
I would be happy to pay a few CPU% for higher UI refresh rates.
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Boy, me too!
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07-22-2018, 08:17 AM
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#24
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Croatia
Posts: 24,798
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyaoeu
I think FL just uses more CPU in general. I would be happy to pay a few CPU% for higher UI refresh rates.
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I wouldn't.
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07-22-2018, 08:23 AM
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#25
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Banned
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Too close to Charlotte, NC
Posts: 3,554
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Not even as an option? That's not Reaper-like.
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07-22-2018, 09:35 AM
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#26
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 29,269
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyaoeu
Why not both? :P
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If you mean both as choosing which to give priority, it's likely not "just use a few extra cycles for a fast GUI" as it is "favor the audio stream (not having dropouts) over the GUI" aka one of them has to have the final word. It would be very rare to favor GUI over dropouts hence the lack of an option to do so.
That being said, there could be something else at play here such as the video driver/subsystem on the machine since I'm fairly oblivious in experiencing the issue described in my years using Reaper.
__________________
Music is what feelings sound like.
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07-22-2018, 10:27 AM
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#27
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Banned
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Too close to Charlotte, NC
Posts: 3,554
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Does FL have glitchy audio? Esp. on low track counts?
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07-22-2018, 01:10 PM
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#28
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Posts: 1,344
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The gui overall is fine, just fix the play cursor please!
__________________
Magnus Lindberg Productions - VRTKL Audio - Redmount Studios
magnuslindberg.com
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07-22-2018, 01:38 PM
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#29
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 29,269
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mlprod
The gui overall is fine, just fix the play cursor please!
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It's still the GUI, just that it moves, hence the challenge. They may be able to make it better for those who experience it, but it's the same thing as the GUI. I'm not against fixing it if possible, but it's important to understand what's going on if we are going to discuss it.
__________________
Music is what feelings sound like.
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07-22-2018, 02:08 PM
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#30
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 29,269
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JHughes
Does FL have glitchy audio? Esp. on low track counts?
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I have no idea, never used it since it was fruity loops 1.0. If reaper already has a variable/code for the explicit refresh rate of the cursor redraw, they could probably expose that in settings and let the user change it at their own risk which may work out well. However, the cursor is on the GUI thread because it is an animated visual element and we don't get anything for free - as I said, user-own-risk may be fine though.
__________________
Music is what feelings sound like.
Last edited by karbomusic; 07-22-2018 at 02:14 PM.
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07-23-2018, 02:17 AM
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#31
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Posts: 1,344
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Quote:
Originally Posted by karbomusic
It's still the GUI, just that it moves, hence the challenge. They may be able to make it better for those who experience it, but it's the same thing as the GUI. I'm not against fixing it if possible, but it's important to understand what's going on if we are going to discuss it.
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Sure, only the devs would know I guess. All i know is that it is irritating and sometimes even slightly workflow problematic.
__________________
Magnus Lindberg Productions - VRTKL Audio - Redmount Studios
magnuslindberg.com
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07-23-2018, 03:34 AM
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#32
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jul 2012
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 5,247
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I run FL Studio - latest mac version on my macbook Retina 2015.
I do have a Dell Monitor connected to the macbook with little scaling set.
The GUI of FL Studio is looking really great to my eyes ("sharp" / "defined").
Way better than GUI Reaper imho.(duhhh: "vector graphics").
But... As soon as i open FL Studio (empty project), my macbook fans start spinning and go through the roof.
This issue is not only with FL Studio, it's also with Bitwig Studio.(empty project).
Apparently, FL Studio and Bitwig Studio demand more GUI processing than Reaper on my macbook (driving the Dell Monitor), thus, macbookfans kick in easily and keep spinning.
Now, i am aware of the fact that Apple just hasn't has its thermal conduction in control, in the thin macbooks they make (google the new I9 macbook: it's a disaster: thermal throddling performance in this new model !).
So the problem i have is not only due to Bitwig and FL Studio's handling of GUI processing, it's due to Apple also.
But i believe the way less demanding GUI of Reaper makes Reaper always workable for me, without fans going to the roof and thermal throddling down of CPU / GPU.(and thus: causing dropouts / performance decrease, which is purely killing when producing).
Just my 2 cents and experience regarding other DAW's GUI.
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07-23-2018, 05:05 AM
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#33
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 29,269
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mlprod
Sure, only the devs would know I guess. All i know is that it is irritating and sometimes even slightly workflow problematic.
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Makes sense, understood.
__________________
Music is what feelings sound like.
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07-23-2018, 05:05 AM
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#34
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: Somewhere PRO
Posts: 1,049
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Ive used laptops that did this.
Sure enough, reaper runs lean and mean, and the fans stay quiet and the entire rig doesn't melt...
... but the problem arises as soon as you open that sexy vst/vsti and its greedy GUI kicks those fans straight into gear
Good lappys that don't overheat, are getting rarer and rarer.
Anyway, I've never really noticed the playhead cursor being slow or choppy.
Then again, my GUI/UX standards are pretty low.
__________________
"REAPER... You're simply the best" - Tina Turner
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07-23-2018, 06:51 AM
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#35
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Sweden
Posts: 24
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JHughes
Not even as an option? That's not Reaper-like.
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That's kind of my point, those who prefer the current Reaper which saves all CPU for audio processing could have that. Those that are not using too many VSTs/effects (for example writing MIDI arrangements) could have a smoother UI (without any problems) as a new setting. And in reality you could probably use the smooth UI setting with a whole bunch of effects and stuff anyway (it's Reaper).
Quote:
Originally Posted by karbomusic
If you mean both as choosing which to give priority, it's likely not "just use a few extra cycles for a fast GUI" as it is "favor the audio stream (not having dropouts) over the GUI" aka one of them has to have the final word. It would be very rare to favor GUI over dropouts hence the lack of an option to do so.
That being said, there could be something else at play here such as the video driver/subsystem on the machine since I'm fairly oblivious in experiencing the issue described in my years using Reaper.
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Having a higher refresh rate in the UI doesn't really mean lots more dropouts. If you have CPU/GPU power to spare, why not use it to make the software look nicer?
To easily see the issue you can zoom into a midi track, change the sync to project sync and watch as the notes scroll by, it's very stuttery. It's not as visible without project sync because only the playhead cursor is seen as glitchy then.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JHughes
Does FL have glitchy audio? Esp. on low track counts?
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No. I don't really know why people think that having a smooth UI means dropouts. You can have a smooth UI while still preventing audio dropouts. In FL I played the demo song with maximum smoothness UI settings, it was at about 20-40% CPU in FL (128 samples ASIO) with maybe 40 mixer tracks and it was fine, no dropouts or anything.
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07-23-2018, 08:50 AM
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#36
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 29,269
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyaoeu
Having a higher refresh rate in the UI doesn't really mean lots more dropouts. If you have CPU/GPU power to spare, why not use it to make the software look nicer?
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I didn't say anything about "lots more dropouts", or not to try to make it better but that doesn't mean there isn't a trade off that may extend beyond a few extra CPU cycles. IOW, just because I have a technical interest beyond "hell yea do this right now" doesn't mean I'm against the end result being asked about - though I will always question the "It must be this easy" part.
__________________
Music is what feelings sound like.
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07-23-2018, 11:26 AM
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#37
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Sweden
Posts: 24
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Quote:
Originally Posted by karbomusic
I didn't say anything about "lots more dropouts", or not to try to make it better but that doesn't mean there isn't a trade off that may extend beyond a few extra CPU cycles. IOW, just because I have a technical interest beyond "hell yea do this right now" doesn't mean I'm against the end result being asked about - though I will always question the "It must be this easy" part.
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For example there's a setting for the meter update frequency (Preferences - Appearance - Track Control Panels) where you can choose a refresh rate in Hz. It's default to 60 I think and setting it to your monitor refresh rate if you've got a higher refresh rate probably won't cause any issues either (performance meter numbers didn't change).
So, thinking technically:
1. There's a setting for meter refresh rate.
2. In the code somewhere there's a value for the refresh rate, either like for the meters a value in Hz or something that triggers a redraw.
So to me it seems easy, just either increase the Hz value or trigger more redraws of the UI. Will this cause Reaper to explode? Honestly I don't know really but I doubt it because Reaper is a very good software.
Of course hearing from the devs what the actual reason for the slowish playhead cursor is would be more useful than trying to guess.
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07-23-2018, 11:48 AM
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#38
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 29,269
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyaoeu
For example there's a setting for the meter update frequency (Preferences - Appearance - Track Control Panels) where you can choose a refresh rate in Hz. It's default to 60 I think and setting it to your monitor refresh rate if you've got a higher refresh rate probably won't cause any issues either (performance meter numbers didn't change).
So, thinking technically:
1. There's a setting for meter refresh rate.
2. In the code somewhere there's a value for the refresh rate, either like for the meters a value in Hz or something that triggers a redraw.
So to me it seems easy, just either increase the Hz value or trigger more redraws of the UI. Will this cause Reaper to explode? Honestly I don't know really but I doubt it because Reaper is a very good software.
Of course hearing from the devs what the actual reason for the slowish playhead cursor is would be more useful than trying to guess.
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^Emphasis mine, yea, I mentioned the same thing in a previous post but we don't know for sure - The reason they chose a refresh rate instead of just letting it refresh every time the screen is redrawn seems technically interesting. If it is only CPU cycles then there must be some reason for caring - aka some negative side effect if too fast.
As I mentioned earlier, if it is that easy in code then a user configurable rate would make it possible and a use at your own risk setting but there is also likely a sensible reason why there was a limit to begin with.
__________________
Music is what feelings sound like.
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08-06-2018, 05:14 AM
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#39
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Aug 2018
Posts: 1
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I found this after searching for ways to increase the drawing rate of the playhead cursor... I do not expect REAPER to have beautifully polished design like FL does etc., I'm quite the fan of "form follows function". But the playhead is kinda flickering and not really smooth when moving for me, which makes it less comfortable to follow with your eyes to tell where exactly it is. It's not unusable it's just... exhausting.
I can't use continuous scrolling at all since it gives me headaches because now the whole tracks move in a kinda jerky and non-smooth manner. Nothing I tried that was suggested or that I came up with myself actually had any noticeable impact on the smoothness of the playhead movement.
I love how fast REAPER is in general, but I'd prefer it to be fast AND smooth of course.
So +1 for smoother playhead movement. Even if it's just updating 10 or 15 times a second, that'd still be better than jerking and flickering to me.
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10-15-2018, 06:59 AM
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#40
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Human being with feelings
Join Date: Oct 2018
Posts: 60
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+1 on this
The smooth meters are amazing. Would love to see the same option for the playhead!
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