YMMV but I seem to realize I’ve done quite a bit of fiddling with reducing CPU myself. I recall that with some VSTs or even KONTAKT instruments you can get higher CPU happening with the built in effects than with some external effects particularly reverbs and the like.
I recall turning off the internal reverb of a synth, and instead sending it in GP to a global rackspace that included the MeldaProduction MCharmverb VST. It seems to be very efficiently coded and I noticed a significant drop in CPU (although I can’t remember the details). This will probably vary a lot too with the parameters you need for the reverb sound you want.
I guess it wouldn’t take long to try this tweak, turning down/off internal effects in a VST and finding out if this efficient reverb (for example) instead will first of all sound as good and second; reduce your CPU utilization. Might be worth a try.
Also it’s very tempting to pick the “high quality” options in VSTs but really a lot of people just cannot hear much above 15kHz even lower if the speakers even reproduce it, and you’ll find most people CANNOT hear a difference between these higher quality settings which can use a lot more CPU.
This is one of the awesome things about Gig Performer - you can just “whip up” a test rackspace to find out the answer to something like this. Go whole hog and just open a blank .gig file and save it as “junk” and find out. If it works great you can export that rackspace and import it into your show gig file!
@kevinf … THAT IS EXACTLY what I have done also and I ALSO use Melda verbs that I even activate and deactivate according to whether I use them or not in each rackspace … It’s a total game changer… Reduces a tonne on CPU… Great minds think alike
Also this technique can be used to selectively “invest” CPU in hungrier VSTs. So say you’re using something that tends to use more CPU generally like um… mmmm…. Waves…. Mmmm… Kaleidoscope… mmmm …. For no reason…
This lets you sort of target where you’re expending that CPU percentage. So that you can brag to all your friends that you’re using emulation of Abbey Road Studios reverb rooms. If that’s important for any reason… or no reason…
GLOBAL is awesome for this sort of use… I have some pretty hungry racks but with a combination of variations that bypass plugins that I’m not using and Reverbs in GLOBAL that I bypass in each variation… My gigs hardly EVER go higher that 40% AUDIO CPU… Than actual machine is running at about 90% IDLE … even in the most demanding situation.
“REGGAETONES 24” is a mix with 4 variations.
Each time I change variation, it activates instruments, reverbs I’m going to use and deactivates what I won’t be using.
