Garageband = sound delay

[iemcj]

So part of how I make my living is as as voice actor and historically I've just used my windwos laptop. I'd like to use Garageband since it came with my new 16" macbook pro.

However the audio delay is extremely frustrating, if I hook up my headphones directly to my microphone and speak, there is zero lag and hearing my own voice sounds natural, like when I'm using Vegas on my windows machine. But when I have it plugged into the 3.5mm jack on my 16" imac and use my headphones for feedback, there's a noticeable delay and it makes it very difficult to concentrate since I'm hearing my own voice on like a 20ms delay.

How do I fix this? I don't have any other programs running, I have 32 gigs of ram, this laptop on paper absolutely crushes my 8 year old HP laptop, is there something I can fix settings wise? Thanks!

 

[casperes1996]

Interesting. Have you a lot of plugins on the track or something? I have a less powerful Mac than you and zero noticeable delay for either my microphone or plugging my guitar in (Both in and out go through an iRig I/O MIDI Keyboard).

Macs have always been praised for a really low latency audio pipeline. A lot of DAWs have latency settings you can tweak, but I think GarageBand is a bit on the basic end for that and to my knwledge doesn’t have much to tweak and should just work. You say you plug your headphones into the 3.5mm port. How is your mic connected? Do you have any plugins installed?

 

[iemcj]

Interesting. Have you a lot of plugins on the track or something? I have a less powerful Mac than you and zero noticeable delay for either my microphone or plugging my guitar in (Both in and out go through an iRig I/O MIDI Keyboard).

Macs have always been praised for a really low latency audio pipeline. A lot of DAWs have latency settings you can tweak, but I think GarageBand is a bit on the basic end for that and to my knwledge doesn’t have much to tweak and should just work. You say you plug your headphones into the 3.5mm port. How is your mic connected? Do you have any plugins installed?

Hmm no plugins at all, the only thing I have is whatever the base audio sound effects are that it prompted me to download, otherwise there's no external plugins installed, I have reverb and ambiance all the way off and even eq off to be as natural as possible. There's still a continual 20ms or so delay on everything. I'd love to use audacity but apparently it doesn't work on catalina.

Mic is just connected through the usb port on the side (of course with an adapter since apple thinks it's 2040 and won't accept that 99% of all things are using a regular usb port!).

 

[casperes1996]

Mic is just connected through the usb port on the side (of course with an adapter since apple thinks it's 2040 and won't accept that 99% of all things are using a regular usb port!).

Maybe the adapter introduces a delay? It's an insane delay for a simple USB-passthrough adapter so it feels kinda far-fetched.

There's also been a lot of talk about T2 Macs and USB audio devices, but I think that was just about dropouts, not delays.

Pro audio glitch with T2-equipped Macs associated with USB 2.0 connections | AppleInsider

The dropouts plaguing audio interfaces on Macs with Apple's T2 chip involve an overload of a USB bus running in the slower USB 2.0 speed, according to an Ableton-certified trainer.

appleinsider.com

It only happens with USB devices that go through the USB hub of the logic board, and thus the T2 chip, and not with Thunderbolt or devices with their own USB controller to go through.

It seems like a distinct issue, but just throwing it out there.

You could try Pro Tools; I believe there's a Pro Tools First or something like that which is a free tier of the software.

 

[iemcj]

I'm downloaded a free trial of Twistedwave and it's the exact same delay. So that either means it's with my computer itself, or the adapter. I'll perhaps order a different brand of usbc adapter and see if that helps, I know this has been said many times over the years but it's really annoying a 3000 dollar "pro" laptop doesn't have a single standard usb port....

 

[casperes1996]

I'm downloaded a free trial of Twistedwave and it's the exact same delay. So that either means it's with my computer itself, or the adapter. I'll perhaps order a different brand of usbc adapter and see if that helps, I know this has been said many times over the years but it's really annoying a 3000 dollar "pro" laptop doesn't have a single standard usb port....

I know what you mean, but I'm terribly pedantic, so sorry. But the USB-C ports on the laptop are standard. What it doesn't have is USB-A ports.
Really sorry for being an arse there...

But yeah, hope it's as simple as just being the adapter

 

[Release]

I can't really check because I have Logic installed and removed Garage Band but check if there is an option to enable Low Latency Mode for recording. Also see if you can adjust the I/O Buffer Size in preferences. No idea if either are available in Garage Band but it's worth a shot.

 

[casperes1996]

I can't really check because I have Logic installed and removed Garage Band but check if there is an option to enable Low Latency Mode for recording. Also see if you can adjust the I/O Buffer Size in preferences. No idea if either are available in Garage Band but it's worth a shot.

Pretty sure both those are not in GB. Though if you use the Kontakt plugin it has its own settings for that sort of thing, though that of course only impacts Kontakt instruments.

 

[Jerry Attric]

I think your lag is either 1: a software-powered real-time monitor setting, and/or 2: default software effects that GB sets up on a track. I had the same problem when I first used my Apogee Jam to record guitar to GB. I had to ensure GB was using the "built-in output" and not "system setting" under Audio/midi settings, plus de-select the "Monitoring" button under Track/Control/Recording settings, which seems to default to on.

 

[Jerry Attric]

So part of how I make my living is as as voice actor and historically I've just used my windwos laptop. I'd like to use Garageband since it came with my new 16" macbook pro.

However the audio delay is extremely frustrating, if I hook up my headphones directly to my microphone and speak, there is zero lag and hearing my own voice sounds natural, like when I'm using Vegas on my windows machine. But when I have it plugged into the 3.5mm jack on my 16" imac and use my headphones for feedback, there's a noticeable delay and it makes it very difficult to concentrate since I'm hearing my own voice on like a 20ms delay.

How do I fix this? I don't have any other programs running, I have 32 gigs of ram, this laptop on paper absolutely crushes my 8 year old HP laptop, is there something I can fix settings wise? Thanks!

I think your lag is either 1: a software-powered real-time monitor setting, and/or 2: default software effects that GB sets up on a track. I had the same problem when I first used my Apogee Jam to record guitar to GB. I had to ensure GB was using the "built-in output" and not "system setting" under Audio/midi settings, plus de-select the "Monitoring" button under Track/Control/Recording settings, which seems to default to on.

 

[BrianBaughn]

What model equipment (headphones/microphone) are you using and is there any other audio device connected?

 

[Brazilnut]

I continue to struggle with this lag also. If I switch between "system" and my external M-Audio box, and then back, it always seems to resolve it. Temporarily. Then it WILL go back to having lags later and I have to do this again. So I can make the problem go away, which is nice, but the constant switching back and forth is driving me nuts. Any thoughts?

 

[Dano121]

So part of how I make my living is as as voice actor and historically I've just used my windwos laptop. I'd like to use Garageband since it came with my new 16" macbook pro.

However the audio delay is extremely frustrating, if I hook up my headphones directly to my microphone and speak, there is zero lag and hearing my own voice sounds natural, like when I'm using Vegas on my windows machine. But when I have it plugged into the 3.5mm jack on my 16" imac and use my headphones for feedback, there's a noticeable delay and it makes it very difficult to concentrate since I'm hearing my own voice on like a 20ms delay.

How do I fix this? I don't have any other programs running, I have 32 gigs of ram, this laptop on paper absolutely crushes my 8 year old HP laptop, is there something I can fix settings wise? Thanks!

I found a fix for Garageband or a work around. Mac mini m1
I was getting this problem with my mic working for a few but left unintended it would turn to a robot or buzzing, I quickly did the drivers to my interface and it didn't work so I downloaded Ableton live lite and changed the buffer size & sample size and it adjusts it also when I opened garage band, Apple just needs to add the sample and buffer size adjustments, but give this a try! hope this works for others with audio issues.