Ditching LSP (this year)

[Kaden]

So I still have no idea why I was having so many troubles with LSP, but my change to LOR has resulted in success!

Yesterday I achieved my first ever completely sequenced song (clocking in at around 4hrs for a 2.5min song). I tested it late last night and it all worked.

Tonight I filmed it (first ever attempt at that too) and it didn't turn out too well (as expected). I am uploading it now, but I am tired, so I will post it here in the morning sometime.

The sequence is much simpler than I had imagined, but I am still happy with it given it was the first and I learnt lots from it. The next one will be better

Thanks for letting me vent on you guys, it helped to get it out of my system and move on.

 

[richardd]

I have to seconded most of what was said here, I have a LSP pro and after to problems I seem to be having decided to go with LOR again this year with the E1.31 support ever thing is seems to be running well Knock wood!

My only problems is my P12R's and a number of ports not working. I'll post those issues elsewhere

 

[Kaden]

Tonight I filmed it (first ever attempt at that too) and it didn't turn out too well (as expected). I am uploading it now, but I am tired, so I will post it here in the morning sometime.

As promised, the video is in this thread http://auschristmaslighting.com/forums/index.php/topic,3301.msg28211.html#msg28211

 

[fasteddy]

After watching the video of your display im actually suprised why you have had so much issues with LSP im wondeing what may be causing the issue because with the channels used LSP should have run fine. Im doing a hell of a lot more with LSP with 10K channels and yes i have seen lag (now dealt with) and im running things close to the line.

I created a 40 second voice over with some macros and some matrix animations in under an hour which is very effective.

As far as the scheduler it has been running well for me but i did notice lag will appear even after a reboot if i have just started the sequencer by accident and then close it, it appears something is going on in the background and then the sequence will lag in the scheduler if the sequencer had been loaded before hand and then closed. If i do a fresh reboot and just use the scheduler without ever starting the sequencer then the show runs without issue.

When sequencing in the grid I have found that LSP will repond much faster when in the grid if you only have elements you are working on showing. If you have all your controllers showing, then LSP will slow right down. So try to reduce the amount of actual channels that are you have active in the grid by creating different manageable layers. Lots of things have been learnt with LSP and annoying behaviour like this will be high on the priority list for next year.

 

[Kaden]

I am a Network Systems Administrator, so I have a lot of diagnostic skills (as well as the ability to look at things from different angles) so a lot of what you have suggested I have already tried, albeit in a time limited fashion.


I never got to try the scheduler so I can't comment on it.


The interesting thing is I have been playing with LSP (creating test sequences just for fun) ever since 2.5 was released (bought it for 1/2 price earlier this year) and I never had troubles sequencing. The issues came when I wanted to start sequencing for production, it would freeze a lot and occasionally crash.


I thought the same as you FE - I am not doing anything crazy with my sequences this year, so I thought I would be fine and could persevere through it. I am sure I could have got a sequence to complete, but after spending several hours tolerating the freezing I got frustrated and left it for two days and then tried again - same result.


I thought to myself, this can't be right - so many hours spent and only 1 minute of a simple sequence created, that's when I swapped to LOR and everything proceeded as I anticipated (even faster than anticipated).


I acknowledge that my opinion and feelings are biased by the fact that I am sequencing at night after the kids have gone to bed and that I am tired. I just need a sequencer to work quickly for this year and to not use frustrating (when tired) work arounds to do simple tasks.


I know lots of people have successful shows, but I suspect it is because they have used LSP long enough to understand those undocumented and counter-inuitive work arounds, again if I had more time I would pick at your brains (because ACL seems to want to give as much of their brains as you can take) I would get through the learning experience.


I am not meaning to bash LSP at all, it is not my intention. I am planning on using LSP next year, when I have more time and patience to put up with the niggling issues the product has as I believe it *is* the product of choice for our hobby.


I guess what I am really saying is: I wish I had more time to work through and learn LSP to get it to a point that I can productively use it, for now I am stuck with LOR.

 

[fasteddy]

Your issue is the fact that you didnt try the scheduler as you would have found that output is much smoother, with all the GUI and extras the sequencer loads in it seems to struggle, but your results would have been very different in the scheduler and most probably of an acceptable level. I must say though until LSP64 bit was released i had all the similar issues you are talking about in the sequencer, but since ive been using LSP 64bit i have had a lot better experience with being able to produce an effective 40 second voice over in under 1 hour.

I know your not trying to bag out LSP and it is a well known fact that LSP has immense sequencing power and features but lacks in some stability and this has been recognised by both Minleon and the LSP QC comittee, so I expect a lot of effort (there has already been a lot in the background) to make LSP a much more stable product for the future which I have faith in Ryan being able to achieve.

 

[Kaden]

Your issue is the fact that you didnt try the scheduler as you would have found that output is much smoother

Funnily enough, the output was always smooth and never a problem for me (apart from needing to re-enable the output each time in one of the versions), it was the freezing and slow down when I was actually editing the sequence that drove me to frustration. It felt like it was using all my CPU power, but when I checked the process it was using less than 5% on any of the cores.


Further to my frustration, I just opened the same sequence I was struggling with in LSP and did some editing just to see what would happen and it is performing like a champ! WTF?!?!?!

 

[Kaden]

Well after many children related delays, I have finally finished my second sequence!


What a relief! I have resigned to only having two songs this year and now I can finally relax.


It is a great feeling now that I can sit back and not think about sequencing!


Once again, thanks to everyone who helped me get this far, it has been a long and at times frustrating journey, but I am just astounded at what I am capable of (with ACLs help).


I look forward to visiting a few other displays on the Gold Coast now

 

[Wombat]

Im too am not very happy with LSP yet again. Why do I persist with this software

I am not able to get it to output properly and I get the same stopping issue with the sequencer. Seems to be sound related. I know if I pull out the speaker it stops and cant work again until LSP is restarted. it cannot ge through a single sequence without stopping requiring a restart of LSP.

I have however been able to get it to work reasonably reliable with the scheduler but it does go out of sync with the music often. Im definately looking at other software next year but ive said that before.

Wombat

 

[Kaden]

The reason you persist and say the same thing every year, is because nothing compares to LSP in features and hopefully next year with the new QA team, the reliability will be there too.

 

[anon]

[SIZE=78%] It felt like it was using all my CPU power, but when I checked the process it was using less than 5% on any of the cores.[/SIZE]

Oh it is using a core. Watch the usage while you move the mouse over the grid, or scoll up and down, left and right.


The user experience relies on the GUI thread being responsive, but it's choked up with a whole lot of inefficient drawing making it so frustrating to use, not to mention some other nuances.

I almost threw it away too, but had no other option to fall back on. The first sequence was a right pain. The second one I took a step back and tried to work with all the oddities. It still took a while due to some of the gotchas, but there was a lot less swearing the second time around....still a fair bit vulgarity flying round....but a lot less

Only having 2 sequences I'm just running it straight out the sequencer so am yet to have the joys of the scheduler.

 

[jediknight2]

kaden...dont be over confident..i am a network/system guy as well...and i have made some silly mistakes because i ....knew...what i was doing. Everyone with LSP feels your pain and most are on the same page that...Minleon has ONE chance to fix this.

 

[Kaden]

kaden...dont be over confident..i am a network/system guy as well...and i have made some silly mistakes because i ....knew...what i was doing. Everyone with LSP feels your pain and most are on the same page that...Minleon has ONE chance to fix this.

I am actually confused at what you are saying there......


I am guessing you are saying there are lots of issues with LSP and to make sure I check over everything with other members to ensure that I am using the correct workarounds for the bug i have encountered?

 

[fasteddy]

LSP has so much potential and the LSP QCC is aiming at making LSP as good as a product it can be,

For me there is no other software that will allow me to sequence in so many different ways, LSP is a very powerful piece of software when you compare it to other software packages. I was able to achieve all i wanted without using 3rd party or external resouce packages to create all my effects

LSP is harder to learn but thats because it supports so much and has many more features than its competitors, so this does add to complexity.

I look forward to seeing LSP improve with its performance because that is the main goal for LSP in 2013

 

[Kaden]

LSP has so much potential and the LSP QCC is aiming at making LSP as good as a product it can be,

For me there is no other software that will allow me to sequence in so many different ways, LSP is a very powerful piece of software when you compare it to other software packages. I was able to achieve all i wanted without using 3rd party or external resouce packages to create all my effects

LSP is harder to learn but thats because it supports so much and has many more features than its competitors, so this does add to complexity.

I look forward to seeing LSP improve with its performance because that is the main goal for LSP in 2013

Agreed, if LSP QA and devs iron out the bugs early next year, they will be unstoppable in 2013!