Our game runs choppy when I set our shot sound "Limit Instances" to "1" and "Behavior At Max" to "Replace".  (For those who do not know, this makes the sound restart for each shot, instead of playing two shot sounds at once.)

Other settings were left as defaults:
Fade In (sec) = 0.000
Fade Out (sec) = 0.000
Replace Instance = Lowest Priority
Crossfade Type = Linear

Our game barely uses any resources (CPU or GPU).  Why is this happening?

jwatte:

You must still call Dispose on the old Cues, even if you use "replace" for the replacement mode. 

Should I be calling SoundBank.Dispose in Update?  I am not calling SoundBank.Dispose, at all.  I followed the "Beginner's Guide to 3D Games" tutorial, and it never used this. 

jwatte:

You must still call Dispose on the old Cues, even if you use "replace" for the replacement mode.

 

Can you give me an example of when I should call dispose?  The sound in question is my ship's firing shot, which is called 10..15 times per second throughout the game.

I am unknowledgeable in audio maintenance... all I do is:

- call SoundBank.PlayCue() on each event (i.e., my ship shooting)
- call AudioEngine.Update() each Game.Update()

What other maintenance must I do?

Should I optimize PlayCue() calls if cue the same sound a lot?

Is calling PlayCue() on the same sound (one instance limit) 10..20 times per frame similar to calling it once time per frame, or is there a performance hit?

[edit] I found an interesting MSDN thread which may be related to this: https://forums.microsoft.com/msdn/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=1298653&SiteID=1

Maybe the best approach is to use GetCue() and cache the Cue object so it never goes out of scope. Then, before playing, check whether it's valid with (Cue.IsPrepared and !Cue.IsDisposed) and replace it with GetCue() again if it's not valid. [/edit]

Fippy Darkpaw:

I have have 50+ combat units vying for sound effects in my game, and no performance issues. I am doing "limit instances: 3" and "fail to play" for weapon sounds. Maybe try that instead?

I have 100's of enemies and 1,000's of bullets, each causing a sound effect.  I do not like the "fail to play" because in shooter games, generally the sound is expected to restart.  Think of any shooter game's player's weapon.  Or think of the tinging sound Contra and Super-C would make when you'd hit an enemy.  A sound was played every time, just restarted.  It creates an intense effect that you lose with "fail to play".  I did try it, though, so thank you.

I think my problem is calling PlayCue way too much.  We are going to test this out today and post back the results! :)