Sound missing or dropping out

[Rowland]

Yes, I think this one I'm using now has just that as I didn't get a restore/system disc with it and I couldn't find anything on the hard-disk that said anything about it. (And the start up manual said nothing either.) The manufacturer's support told me, when I asked, to press a certain function key at start up to be able to do a reinstallation of the system. So they have hidden it pretty well.
To sidetrack just a little. It is funny. I have been using computers since they didn't come with hard-disks, and I have seen them grew and grew in capacity and speed, and you are supposed to be able to do multitasking and having several programs running and several files open at the same time etc. etc. But when problem arises with a program you are often told to run only that program on the computer and skip all the others not to get into conflict with anything. Well, well.
Rowland

[steve]

To sidetrack just a little. It is funny. I have been using computers since they didn't come with hard-disks, and I have seen them grew and grew in capacity and speed, and you are supposed to be able to do multitasking and having several programs running and several files open at the same time etc. etc. But when problem arises with a program you are often told to run only that program on the computer and skip all the others not to get into conflict with anything.

Computers have got faster, and hard drives have got bigger, but hard drives have not got much faster at all.
When working with audio or video, the speed of drive access is important. While recording the computer has to write the data to disk in real time, but if the hard drive decides to skip off to the other end of the disk to do something else and then come back again to continue writing the audio data, in the time taken for its little excursion it may well have missed some of the data and you will get a "drop-out".

This is why two physical disks are better than one disk with two partitions. If you are writing audio data to a drive on the secondary master interface, and running the operating system from the primary master, then the secondary drive is not having to do anything except write the data, which is an ideal solution (and essential for ProTools). (even better if the secondary drive is a fast raid array, then with a reasonably quick processor and board you can run loads of tracks simultaneously).

[Rowland]

Right.
I have downloaded and installed a Partition Manager, and I have tested it first on my little Net-Book with excellent results.
Before I take the step to use it on this one I will have to make some back-ups first. But I have taken a look at the drive structure, and that in itself was quite interesting. I found the hidden Recovery partition which is over 8 GB. But then there are also two small unlocated drives or areas of about 1 MB each, and the two "normal" partitions C and D.
Next I'll take a look at my wifes Lap-top too, as that probably has two partitions too.
The other two machines we have are a couple of years old and there are only one drive, not counting the hidden recovery ones.
It is true that hard drives haven't got much faster over the years, and sometimes that does create problems too.
Thanks for all the tips and explanations. I see there were things I had forgotten, but probably should have known.
Rowland

[kozikowski]

Intel giveth and Microsoft taketh away.

Windows was never a multi-tasking operating system. The only people who think so have never used anything else -- or work for Microsoft, and some of them aren't talking.

I'm pretty agnostic, I work on all three, but I'm always amazed the narrowing of tools and activities available when I have to use a Windows machine.

Koz

[Rowland]

Friend,
I'm not going to argue about operating systems here. All have their advantages and disadvantages.
The only thing I want at the moment is to understand why a particular thing happened and what can, eventually, be done about it to minimize the risks in the future. And as to that I have learned quite a bit in this Forum, from you, Koz, and from others.
Rowland