what's going on & how to stop it? what the CPU meter displays is somewhat confusing, but the easiest way to think about it is as capability at a given speed. in order to process audio in apparent real-time, live must make tons of calculations & the CPU meter determines how much of that allotted time (determined by a variety of factors, namely sample rate & buffer size) is being used. in other words, if your CPU is hitting 99%, live is finishing its requested calculations just barely in time to deliver them when requested. conversely, if the CPU hits 10%, live is only using a portion of its available buffer time & then waiting (albeit fractions of a second). you can learn more about this in the live manual.

CPU isn't always a problem, but when it is, it is prohibitive. let's look at some of the ways we can ease live's load & alleviate problems.

classic methods