Reference Guide

1685
Preferences dialog
32-bit VST effects and instruments are loaded into “servers”, and each server can address up to
4GB of RAM. BitBridge supports up to 32 independent plug-in servers, and each server can address
up to 4GB of RAM, allowing access to a massive 128GB of RAM. This allows SONAR x64 to
address all available RAM in your computer.
By default, SONAR manages memory automatically, and will allocate and allow access to all
available RAM dynamically as plug-in's are used. This is done by dynamically creating new
BitBridge servers only when necessary, up to a maximum of the available RAM.
Server loading is either automatic or customizable, giving you full control over which server to load
plug-ins into. To enable automatic server loading, select Automatic (Based on available RAM). To
manually manage BitBridge servers, select the server that you want plug-ins to be loaded into.
After a specific server is selected, all plug-ins subsequently loaded will be loaded into that specific
server, bypassing SONAR's automatic memory management. This also applies when you load a
project that contains VST plug-ins.
Custom server assignments are saved with the project file.
See also:
“Preferences dialog” on page 1647
“File - Folder Locations” on page 1676
“File - Audio Data” on page 1681
“File - Initialization File (Advanced)” on page 1686
“File - Advanced (Advanced)” on page 1688
Tip: To more optimally use your available memory, assign memory hungry VST's to their own private
BitBridge server. The actual memory consumed by a server instance is shown in the server list,
allowing you choose which server you may want to load into.
Note: Server management is common for all loaded projects. If you have multiple projects open
simultaneously, you can potentially overflow the 4GB capacity of a server if the projects
reference the same server. Under this condition, a plug-in may fail to load. If this occurs, close
the current project before opening another project.