{"id":29,"date":"2018-08-19T10:32:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-19T18:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"\/blog\/post\/2018\/08\/19\/VIVALDI-is-the-new-ROSSINI-(Part-2)"},"modified":"2023-07-04T08:32:59","modified_gmt":"2023-07-04T16:32:59","slug":"vivaldi-is-the-new-rossini-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/2018\/08\/19\/vivaldi-is-the-new-rossini-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"VIVALDI is the new ROSSINI (Part 2)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>In which we upgrade our DAW and experiment with PCIe-PCI adapter cards.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>ROSSINI has four internal hard drives:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>C: (SSD 256G) OS and applications<\/li>\n<li>D: (SSD 256G) audio projects<\/li>\n<li>E: (HD 1TB) backups, rips, temp<\/li>\n<li>H: (HD 600G), mp3 library; leftover stuff from the last DAW migration 8 years ago<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Every time I upgrade my DAW I end up with a new primary OS drive and then I move over the drives from the older machine. ROSSINI was the third generation, and only some of the drives are transitioning to VIVALDI. E: and H: still have gobs of free space.<\/p>\n<p>VIVALDI has a 512 GB SSD as the primary drive (it&#8217;s a tiny thing mounted directly on the motherboard!) and room for three additional full-size drives.<\/p>\n<p>First up, some file management to back up the contents of D: to H: and also put everything I&#8217;ll need (installers, product keys, license files, sound libraries) on E:.<\/p>\n<p>Then, D: and E: transferred cleanly into the new chassis:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_8.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_thumb_3.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"274\" height=\"193\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I also upgrade the power supply, replacing the no-brand Dell 450W unit with a brand new <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newegg.com\/Product\/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817153232\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SMART 600W from Thermaltake<\/a>. I purchased this from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yelp.com\/biz\/pc-plus-novato\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">PC Plus in town<\/a>. Support your local retailers, guys.<\/p>\n<p>(I always upgrade the PSU in my DAW computers, but this time I had an additional reason that I&#8217;ll get to later.)<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s a free bay on the bottom left, but I&#8217;ll keep C: and H: in ROSSINI for now to serve as a backup machine for now, and eventually as a perfectly serviceable general-purpose PC. (The 4-core i7-920 is no slouch, really, and it has 16 GB RAM.)<\/p>\n<p>Next Step: Powering up; cleaning up the Windows 10 Pro default installation (I can&#8217;t believe the number of options you have to disable to make it bearable); and installing my suite of audio applications, VSTs, and libraries.<\/p>\n<p>That took about a full day.<\/p>\n<p>Now it&#8217;s time to see how the Focusrite 6i6 USB 2.0 audio interface performs (see <a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/post\/2018\/08\/17\/VIVALDI-is-the-new-ROSSINI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">previous post<\/a> for details of testing in ROSSINI):<\/p>\n<pre>Computer: VIVALDI\nInterface: Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 USB2.0\n\nBuffer Size  ASIO Reported RTL    Measured RTL\n-----------  -------------------- ------------\n     256      25.5 ms 1102 samples   0.037 sec\n     128      13.1 ms  578 samples   0.020 sec\n      64       8.2 ms  362 samples   0.013 sec<\/pre>\n<p>The RTL latency tested out exactly the same as ROSSINI! I was expecting better performance but it seems that RTL is not affected by processor speed or core count.<\/p>\n<p>However, if you recall, playback of a large project on ROSSINI at 256 did result in clicks and pops. On VIVALDI, the same project played back smoothly at 128 but started clicking at 64.<\/p>\n<p>Bottom line: It appears I could use the external USB 2.0 Focusrite 6i6 on VIVALDI and get <em>almost<\/em> the same RTL performance as the ECHO Layla 3G internal PCI card on ROSSINI. I&#8217;d call it acceptable.<\/p>\n<p>But we&#8217;re not done yet. A few days earlier, a timely <a href=\"http:\/\/forum.cakewalk.com\/FindPost\/3776182\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">post from John Kenn<\/a> on the Cakewalk SONAR Hardware forum suggested an interesting alternative: using a PCIe -&gt; PCI adapter card. Perhaps we could use the ECHO Layla in VIVALDI after all?<\/p>\n<p>Checking the specs on the Layla PCI card: it&#8217;s a half-height\/low profile universal voltage PCI card (3.3V\/5V).<\/p>\n<p>Worth experimenting with, I think. Ahead of time, I ordered this <a href=\"https:\/\/www.startech.com\/Cards-Adapters\/Slot-Extension\/PCI-Express-to-PCI-Adapter-Card~PEX1PCI1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">PCI Express to PCI Adapter Card<\/a> from StarTech.com for $60, and it arrived just before VIVALDI was shipped:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_9.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"240\" height=\"165\" \/><\/p>\n<p>One catch: I needed a spare molex power connector to supply additional voltage to the adapter card. The generic PSU in the new XPS 8930 did not have any molex leads!<\/p>\n<p>No problem. I was going to upgrade the PSU anyway, I&#8217;d just make sure I got one with standard molex as well as the usual MB, FAN, and SATA connectors. The SMART 600W from Thermaltake fit the requirements.<\/p>\n<p>The adaptor card fit snugly into a spare PCIe x4 slot on the motherboard:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_10.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_thumb_4.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"383\" height=\"141\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s sufficiently distant from the GPU fan that I don&#8217;t think there&#8217;ll be an issue there. (I don&#8217;t plan to drive the GPU too hard anyway).<\/p>\n<p>The ECHO PCI card piggy-backs on to the adapter card without trouble:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_11.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_thumb_5.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"332\" height=\"184\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In the picture above it looks as though the PCI card is having trouble sitting firmly in the PCI socket, but that&#8217;s on me &#8211; when I took the photo I hadn&#8217;t firmly located the two cards together. It&#8217;s tight, but they mate well together without using excessive force.<\/p>\n<p>In fact, I recommend connecting the two cards together outside the chassis and then inserting them as one unit into the PCIe slot.\u00a0 Just for kicks, I&#8217;ll show you the result:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_12.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_thumb_6.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"328\" height=\"211\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Yeah, that&#8217;s not going to work as-is. The full-size back plate on the ECHO PCI card is going to have to be modified, or&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>The solution is to remove the back-plate from the PCI card, and swap the back-plate on the adapter card with an alternative one that ships with it:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_13.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_thumb_7.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"328\" height=\"227\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Without a back-plate of its own, the PCI card has more movement than I&#8217;m comfortable with, but luckily there&#8217;s a lip on the alternative back-plate that the card can rest against, and a convenient hole in the card that I could use to hold the PCI card in place using a little bolt with washers on either side.<\/p>\n<p>Nice, just like a bought one.<\/p>\n<p>Final assembly:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_14.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border: 0px;\" title=\"image\" src=\"http:\/\/www.prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/image_thumb_8.png\" alt=\"image\" width=\"325\" height=\"205\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Not bad.<\/p>\n<p>Power up; install ECHO drivers (they still work well in Windows 10 despite only being certified for Windows 7).<\/p>\n<p>Works perfectly. Measurements are IDENTICAL to ROSSINI:<\/p>\n<pre>Computer: VIVALDI\nInterface: ECHO Layla 3G PCI via PCIe adapter\n\nBuffer Size ASIO Reported RTL     Measured RTL\n----------- --------------------- ------------\n   256       13.7 ms  602 samples    0.015 sec\n   128        7.8 ms  346 samples    0.010 sec\n    64        4.9 ms  218 samples    0.007 sec<\/pre>\n<p>That&#8217;s fantastic. Thanks John Kenn for the suggestion to investigate PCIe-PCI adapters. Apparently they work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In which we upgrade our DAW and experiment with PCIe-PCI adapter cards. ROSSINI has four internal hard drives: C: (SSD 256G) OS and applications D: (SSD 256G) audio projects E: (HD 1TB) backups, rips, temp H: (HD 600G), mp3 library; leftover stuff from the last DAW migration 8 years ago Every time I upgrade my [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computers","category-studio-diary","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":945,"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29\/revisions\/945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prodigalsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}