Scanning songs is a fast way to get your music into OnSong. However, different scanner settings can create files that are too large for devices with limited memory and processor speed to open. Many scanners can perform at very high resolutions and color depths that can slow performance or cause OnSong to crash due to the limitations of the device.
For instance, many scanners today will default to a 600 DPI scan resolution and scan in full color. This means for each page in a scanned document, the system will need to process around 100 MB of information. While the final PDF file may not appear that large due to compression technology, it does expand to that size when the system is processing and displaying the document. If you have a set full of multiple page documents, this can quickly use up all of your device's working memory.
Older iPads have 512 MB of system memory or less. Newer iPads have 1024 MB or more which makes a big difference. However, the best way to achieve great performance is to adjust your scan settings.
We recommend that you scan your documents at 300 DPI or less and use greyscale instead of full color. For instance, a page scanned at 200 DPI and greyscale will use only 4 MB of memory instead of 100 MB. This will let you view the document at a resolution that works great on the iPad, fit more songs in your device and greatly improve performance.
You can also adjust some settings in OnSong to improve performance until you can rescan those documents. To do this, tap on the gear icon in the
Menubar top open the
Utilities Menu. Then navigate to
Settings >
Display Settings >
Song Viewer >
Renderer Version and set that to New. This will use less memory, but may result in slower performance when performing the song. You can also turn off the
Render Ahead/Behind feature so that OnSong is not preloading next and previous songs in the set.
With these tips, you should be able to take music that you own on paper and convert it for fair use within the OnSong app. Also consider using text-based chord charts to make the most out of OnSong and achieve the best performance.