Disk Is Too Slow (prepare)

Question

Disk Is Too Slow (prepare)

Hi All,

I see this error message when trying to start playback sometimes.

I get the beach ball for about 10 seconds, then the above message.

it may do this several times.

if i leave it a while, a few seconds, maybe re-locate in the track, it will play fine.

yes, a heavily loaded session, but not heavy on Disk I/O.

track plays fine, except when this happens. have seen this on several sessions.

does anyone actually know what this error means? (prepare)?

Thanks,

James.

Posted on Oct 6, 2005 5:08 AM

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Answer 1

Oct 6, 2005 5:24 AM in response to James Ratcliff

Sounds like maybe your energy saver settings may be putting your drive to sleep..?
uncheck HD sleep in the sys prefs.

best to only let screen sleep..

a thought..

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Answer 2

Oct 6, 2005 5:40 AM in response to James Ratcliff

Thanks for your reply.

no sleeping or disk spindown set.

I am using the computer when it happens, with disk in use by Logic, so don't think it would spin down anyway...

J.

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Answer 3

Oct 7, 2005 2:13 AM in response to James Ratcliff

Hi

I will check the speed of ALL your HD, use Xbench (free) (send me the results at blanc(point)cyril(at)wanadoo(point)fr )

Are your 2 barracuda in a Raid 1 or Raid 5 ?
What is PoCo FW ?

Do you use big libs ? (VSL ....)

Best

Cyril

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Answer 4

Oct 7, 2005 3:45 AM in response to Cyril Blanc

Hi Cyril,

The disk can keep up fine. the system performance meters show very little HDD activity, and certainly no spikes when playing.

CoreAudio host processing is keeping up too.

It is just sometimes, when i hit play, the system hangs BEFORE playback starts. with the d**n beach ball. with the message it has a "continue" option, not an "ok." the SPL moves and the song looks like it's playing, only with no audio...

I was wonderng if anyone knew what my specific message "disk is too slow (prepare)" means?

it seems to be specifically related to Logic getting ready to play...?

if i have too many tracks for Logic, i get a different message - not the "(prepare)" one. The "(prepare)" message is only ever when playback fails on a start command.

PoCo Fw = powercore firewire.

Only small, hand made EXS instruments in use, plus instruments + stylus rmx etc.

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Answer 5

Oct 7, 2005 4:08 AM in response to James Ratcliff

The error is:

CoreAudio:

Disk is too slow. (Prepare)
(-10001)

continue

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Answer 6

Oct 7, 2005 9:50 PM in response to James Ratcliff

from what I know the "prepare" error is linked to EXS VM ( may be I am wrong, can somebody confirm !)

The EXS is preparing samples to be played in VM (on disk)

what are the setup of the Virtual Memory of the EXS.

run Xbench to see how fast are your disk !

You can also analyze all the flows using "Bigtop" (on Apple dev directory on MAC OS X disk)

With the PoCo FW ; do you have anything else on your FW buss

Best

Cyril

P.S. you configuration is an "oil refinery" LOL ; 2 UAD and a PoCO FW on a G4 2X1

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Answer 7

Oct 8, 2005 4:24 AM in response to Cyril Blanc

Hi again,

I wonder if anyone can confirm the "prepare" message? it would make sense that it is some kind of function like that.

re: VM for EXS, the settings are disk speed: medium, activity: average
disk traffic happens to show: 144 right now. not read in time always = 0.

I may try turning VM off for the time being.

Xbench says by audio HD on the ATA-66 buss has a score of 50.1.

This seems to be average (if slightly higher) than most G4 MDD.

I think this is a glitch in how logic is preparing playback vs. speed of the disk.

with so many plugs, full PDC etc, maybe it has too much to queue up to start playback?

thanks for your help, will take a look at Big Top if get some time later, dev kit is not instaleld at the moment...

James.

ps. yes, lots of processing in my refinery here! (oxford eq / urei 1176....)

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Answer 8

slurpa

Level 1

10 points

Oct 8, 2005 4:57 AM in response to James Ratcliff

Hello,
I don't know if it can help, but I have the same behaviour with a LaCie BigDisk 500G°. Sometimes, it shut down while Logic playing and the same message appear (Disk too slow (prepare)). I notice Logic is not responsible of that, when I do copy, the disk shut down too, randomly, and then restart... No explain!
I used this disk from a year now, without problem, until 2 weeks... I think it's a disk malfunction (I did a complete backup for security, of course).
If anyone has an idea...
Jérôme

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Answer 9

Oct 8, 2005 11:49 PM in response to James Ratcliff

re: VM for EXS, the settings are disk speed: medium, activity:

try :
DD speed = Slow
HD recording = Extensive

These setting will use more ram !

Xbench says by audio HD on the ATA-66 buss has a score of 50.1.

This is very slow !

look at that :
-------------------------------------
I have run Xbench on a G5 2x2 here are the marks given by Xbench on different configuration (higher is better)

86 with Lacie 160 GB FW800
97 with Lacie 200 GB FW800
103 with Lacie 250 GB FW800
109 with my internal Sata
122 with a Maxtor 250 GB
158 with a raid 0 of 2 Sata using Apple raid software
160 with a raid 0 of 2 Sata using Softraid
184 with the Rocket raid and 4 Raptor 10 000 (with 1024 KB segments)
198 with the Rocket raid and 4 Raptor 10 000 (with 64 KB segments)
205 with the Rocket raid card in slot 3 and 4 Raptor 10 000 with Softraid driver optimize for digital audio
237 with the Rocket raid card in slot 4 and 4 Raptor 10 000 with Softraid driver optimize for digital audio
268 with the Rocket raid card in slot 4 and 6 Raptor 10 000 with Softraid driver optimize for digital audio

---------------------------------------------

I think this is a glitch in how logic is preparing playback vs. speed of the disk.
with so many plugs, full PDC etc, maybe it has too much to queue up to start playback?

From what I have noticed ; playback is prepared by a sub task (tread) in VM (correct me if I am wrong )

You did not answer to my question : what is on the FW bus ? the POCO FW and .....

oxford eq / urei 1176....)

I Do not understand ! sorry for my English

Best
Cyril

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Answer 10

Oct 9, 2005 3:21 AM in response to Cyril Blanc

Hey.

Will try VM OFF when back in the studio on monday.

a score of 50.1 might be slow in comparison, but for the job here it is adequate. The session plays from top to end ok, unless i might get the "prepare" message. (a couple of times an hour.)

Powercore has the FW buss to itself.
Nothing else on FW at all.

Oxford EQ = an equalization plug in that runs on the powercore.

urei 1176 = a vinatge compresion algorithm that runs on the UAD.

cheers.

James.

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Answer 11

Oct 9, 2005 5:41 AM in response to James Ratcliff

the disk is spinning down despite what it says in your energy saver control panel. this happens when you are using several disks to run a project.

I get this message too. doesn't bother me though. if i want to make sure that i don't get it. i open a sample edit window using a sample from the drive i know needs to spin up. making sure your disks are not spinning down is a system issue not a logic one.

I personally would love to have a utility to manually spin up or down my drives. i've looked for one but i can't find one.

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Answer 12

Oct 9, 2005 10:14 AM in response to Rohan Stevenson1

I am aware that despite the system prefs for spin down not being checked, OSX still spins disks down.

There is a unix command where one can set the delay manually, but don't remember where i have seen it.

There are only 2 drives in the system; one system drive and one audio drive. all the session files, audio, EXS samples etc are located on the Audio drive - Do you think it (or any drive) would still spin down during continual playback?

Logic, OS X, plugs etc are obviously on the system drive.

James.

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