Configuring Your Windows System - A Guide For The Perplexed

Following our discussions with David Beaudry and Andrew Pask’s remarkable report on using Windows compute sticks (complete with Beaudry Secret Max Tricks!) as part of the Max life, there’s been a lot of buzz on the part of both beginning users and some longtime Apple users about investigating new Windows machines. One thing that both beginners and folks new to the Windows OS have in common has to do with needing to get a handle on the ins and outs of configuring a Windows system for use as a real-time audio system. If you’re unfamiliar with digital audio and general Operating Systems martial arts in general, it’s tough to figure out what you don’t know. And if you are familiar with the basics, you still need to navigate how it is that Windows systems do things.

I’ve got a suggestion for you.

The free and downloadable book Glitch Free: An In-Depth Guide to Tuning Windows for Reliable Real-Time Audio Performance by Brad Robinson and the folks at Cantabile Software may be just the place for you to start. If you know nothing, there’s introductory material on digital audio and the ways in which hardware, and OS/software makes noise happen. If you’ve already got the basics sussed out and don’t flee at the mention of memory-related issues, page faults, and things like ISR & Delayed Procedure Call latency issues,Glitch Free has a detailed checklist of the stuff you need to check/set, etc.

The text covers Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10, too. Just to make sure, I checked with my colleague Darwin Grosse, who reports that the stuff on Windows 10 is reliable and works well.

Glitch Free is a great check list for setting up a Windows box and just perfect for people thinking of trying out Windows. And yeah – the price is right.

P.S. The estimable Andrew Pask has suggested that you might also find Thesycon's DPC Latency Checker to be an excellent analytical tool to have at your disposal. I am inclined to agree. I guess that the sign-off for an article like this, properly put, is Happier Patching!