PC doing other things while I'm trying to test!

1
Hi everyone,

I am a PhD student and am using the toolbox to help with running some
auditory experiments. I am using MATLAB+soundcard to present sound
stimuli online. However, every now and then the stimuli break up
briefly. I think it is because the PC (+windows 2000) is working on
other jobs while I'm trying to test which takes processing away from
generating the stimuli and so are not played out smoothly! Does anyone
disagree and perhaps have a better suggestion or know of how to reduce
the activity of the PC on obscure jobs I don't want it to be working
on.

Thanks folks and best wishes

Daniel

*************************************************
Daniel Rowan
Research Student
Institute of Sound and Vibration Research
University of Southampton
Southampton SO17 1BJ
England, UK
Tel: 023 80594968
*************************************************
2
Daniel Rowan wrote:

>Hi everyone,
>
>I am a PhD student and am using the toolbox to help with running some
>auditory experiments. I am using MATLAB+soundcard to present sound
>stimuli online. However, every now and then the stimuli break up
>briefly. I think it is because the PC (+windows 2000) is working on
>other jobs while I'm trying to test which takes processing away from
>generating the stimuli and so are not played out smoothly! Does anyone
>disagree and perhaps have a better suggestion or know of how to reduce
>the activity of the PC on obscure jobs I don't want it to be working
>on.
>
>

Daniel,

You can raise the priority of Matlab using either the Psychtoolbox
command "Priority" or "Rush".

I am interested to know if this solves your problem.

Best,

Allen

PS. You might need to grab the latest version of the Psychtoolbox from
Psychtoolbox.org to use "Rush" or "Priority". I'm not sure that they
worked correctly in version 2.45.
3
Allen

Thanks for the advice. Prioritizing the entire code to level 2 has
definately helped. In addition, I noticed the PC I was using was
networked and it slowed down when other users attempted to print
anything. However, I am now using a different PC in a different place
without the networking problem (disconnecting from the newtwork wouldn't
have helped as the matlab was on the network!).

Having run a number of 'calibration' checks, I have found that the
MATLAB function PAUSE to be extremely unreliable. I have been using
this to produce inter-stimulus intervals. Are you aware of any
alternative functions?

Best wishes

Daniel

*************************************************
Daniel Rowan
Research Student
Institute of Sound and Vibration Research
University of Southampton
Southampton SO17 1BJ
England, UK
Tel: 023 80594968
*************************************************

>>> Allen.Ingling@... 06/18/02 07:13pm >>>


Daniel Rowan wrote:

>Hi everyone,
>
>I am a PhD student and am using the toolbox to help with running some
>auditory experiments. I am using MATLAB+soundcard to present sound
>stimuli online. However, every now and then the stimuli break up
>briefly. I think it is because the PC (+windows 2000) is working on
>other jobs while I'm trying to test which takes processing away from
>generating the stimuli and so are not played out smoothly! Does
anyone
>disagree and perhaps have a better suggestion or know of how to
reduce
>the activity of the PC on obscure jobs I don't want it to be working
>on.
>
>

Daniel,

You can raise the priority of Matlab using either the Psychtoolbox
command "Priority" or "Rush".

I am interested to know if this solves your problem.

Best,

Allen

PS. You might need to grab the latest version of the Psychtoolbox from

Psychtoolbox.org to use "Rush" or "Priority". I'm not sure that they
worked correctly in version 2.45.







------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor

http://psychtoolbox.org
POST a message to: psychtoolbox@yahoogroups.com
UNSUBSCRIBE by sending a blank message to:
psychtoolbox-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/