Band-in-a-Box Question

Don McClellan · Post by **Don McClellan** » 19 Feb 2009 11:20 am

Sometimes I'll be jammin' along with my BIAB and it will suddenly start losing the audio of certain instruments intermittently and then completely until all of the sound has dropped out entirely. What is happening here and what can I do? Thanks, Don

Wiz Feinberg · Post by **Wiz Feinberg** » 19 Feb 2009 11:29 am

What is your computer's operating system and service pack level? How much RAM is installed? What is your audio device? Are other apps running actively? Does this happen when you listen to streaming audio or YouTube videos? Does it happen to local files you saved to disk and playback?

You can find out if the system is swapping out data to your hard drive by opening your Task Manager and monitoring the use of Resources, like pagefile and memory. Also, look at Total Commit and see if you are running out of resources during playback.

Gary Baker · Post by **Gary Baker** » 19 Feb 2009 11:41 am

Don McClellan wrote:Sometimes I'll be jammin' along with my BIAB and it will suddenly start losing the audio of certain instruments intermittently and then completely until all of the sound has dropped out entirely. What is happening here and what can I do? Thanks, Don

Don, we need a little more info about your set up. First: Are you using any MIDI instruments?
Second: Are you using any Real Tracks?

If you are using MIDI - what type of MIDI interface are you using, by that I mean what is playing the parts, Sound Blaster, dedicated GM interface like a roland keyboard or rack mount.

If you are using some or all MIDI than you may be loosing "parts" which are limited by the amount of multi-timbral parts you can play at one time. Different MIDI players have different number of parts that they can play. A part is not a note but a "sound". Some sounds take more parts than others. Simple sounds may only need one part (think cymbal or piccalo) while others "richer in sound" like a string section may need 4 or 5 parts to sound realistic. The cheaper boards are quite limited in the number of parts they can offer.

This is also effected by the number of notes that are played at the same time. So, a keyboard sound with a 4 or 5 note chord, a three part horn patch, a guitar chord with all six strings playing, 3 or 4 strings playing all add up to a lot of "parts" - which means some will "drop out" until one of the others stops playing.

Even when you "mute" a part I believe the parts are still spoken for so you would have to eliminate that instrument from the arrangement to free up some headroom.

I seem to remember Tony Prior having some info on this from a L O N G time back. Perhaps he will chime in!

Good Luck . . . tell me more and maybe I'll have some other ideas.

Blessings, bo baker

Papa Joe Pollick · Post by **Papa Joe Pollick** » 19 Feb 2009 2:24 pm

Don,the place to get good answers is the BIAB forum on PG music web site.Some sharp dudes there with a lot of experience with BIAB....PJ....

Gary Baker · Post by **Gary Baker** » 19 Feb 2009 3:05 pm

Papa Joe is right . . . just go here and post your question http://www.pgmusic.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php

bo

Don McClellan · Post by **Don McClellan** » 20 Feb 2009 11:26 am

Thanks for your replies gentlemen. If I had a little more computer savvy maybe I could answer all of those questions about my set-up. I called my computer guru and he's coming over on Monday. In the mean time I'll go to the BIAB help site and see what happens. Don

The Steel Guitar Forum

Band-in-a-Box Question

Band-in-a-Box Question

Re: Band-in-a-Box Question