Total Cubase and Spark freeze

[matt1314]

Hello!

It's me again with another problem I've been facing very often. The problem is simple: Spark occasionally crashes my entire Cubase project when I select the DR-606 but also sometimes any other drum machine. I wonder why the DR-606 doesn't have any samples in the editor like the others do...

Well, when I play around with it - like creating a pattern, fill, change sounds to match the original as close as possible etc. - in a certain moment when the pattern is running, it just stops, freezes e.g. on the snare and goes like "trrrrrrrrrrrrrr..." and I can't close it. Nothing, Cubase hangs then as well and doesn't react to my commands at all! Then the stupid Windows warning pops up saying Cubase stopped working and it's "searching for a solution"... of course... And the Cubase process in the task manager isn't closable as well. I press the button to kill the task but it doesn't respond so I have to wait like 5-10 minutes for it to close automatically listening to very nice trrrrrrrrrr "music"... It's getting very annoying, it hinders my workflow! No other program could kill the process, too.

Any solution on this? Spark is the only source for vintage drum machines to me and I'm a very big fan of them, so I want Spark to work correctly. I doubt it's a problem of Cubase...

[Kevin]

Hi Matt,
thanks for your support and feedback, even this is for bug report, it is very appreciated .
We will do our best to solve this very annoying issue.
I you can find a step to reproduce it easily, it will be very helpful.

Kevin

[EDIT]
BTW, the DR-606 has no sample editor, this is because there is no sample in it. All is done with TAE.
About the crash, I think it comes from the Plate Reverb effect. Do you have still crashes if you remove the Plate?

[Kevin]

Can you give me some details about your system (OS, CPU, RAM, soundcard, driver ...)?

[matt1314]

Thank you for your kind support. About the DR-606, I have all effects turned off and I did this also for every vintage drum machine as well so I don't think this has something to do with that because it crashed also once on the DNX.

Sure:

Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit Service Pack 2
Intel Core 2 Quad 2,33 GHz
6144 MB RAM
On-board Soundcard Realtek High Definition Audio (Driver Version: 6.0.1.6343), I use ASIO4ALL v2 for Cubase etc. with 512 Samples buffer size @ 44100 Hz.

If anything else is important, just let me know.

[Kevin]

I didn't achieve to reproduce it on my computer (Mac Pro with Windows 7).
I will try to find a computer like yours.
About step to reproduce, did you do something special to have this crash or not?
Second question, what is the incidence of the crash (sometimes, very often)?

[matt1314]

1. Well, I didn't do anything special, I was just switching through the first 10 patterns using my FCB1010 (my controller for Spark as you already know). I just play along a melody while pattern 1 is running. Then, I switch to pattern 2, 3 and like on the fourth I get that hang. I was also pressing many times the snare drum while the drum loop was running, so that I get some kind of a fill. While doing that (I was going like "buff, buff, buff, buffbuffbububuff" ) I got that hang after which I had to wait 5-10 minutes to launch Cubase again to continue my work. On top of that I was changing the sounds, like pitch and decay to get some realistic sound. That's all I did. Maybe there was an overload of Spark although the CPU usage wasn't rising up very high.

2. The incidence is not often but sometimes. Like once in 4-5 Cubase launches. It just happened three times since then, once on the DNX and like twice on the DR-606.

[Kevin]

So I got a clue. You were using external MIDI device to change pattern

[Kevin]

Can still not reproduce it  
Are you using Cubase 32 bit or Cubase 64 bit, AND are you using Spark VST 32 bit or 64 bit (you can see it in Spark's About panel)?

[matt1314]

I have Cubase 32 bit and Spark 32 bit as well.