[davidk21770]

It could also be disk-bound -- SA using enough of the disk bandwidth that playback becomes choppy because playback can't get access to the disk when it needs it. I had that problem with one of my drives if I was recording and playing back from the same drive -- without SA. I replaced that drive...

But, the SA beta used to have a setting to throttle it's disk i/o. I don't see that in this version. Have you had any luck with process lasso?

If not, you could try an alternative directory watcher. Several have been mentioned in other threads that may do the trick for you to run SA when your system is not in use. I don't use them, so I can't comment there.