Closest thing to a fairlight CMI Series III emulation.

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whyterabbyt wrote: While Im agnostic to the idea that its 'easy', you do realise that they may not be the best people to judge whether its impossible or not?
Personally, I'd be asking a developer who's already done analogue modelling on native hardware that question.
Do you think Peter V didn't already do this?
whyterabbyt wrote:So Peter is Walmart, and Korg are a corner shop? You sure you got that right?
I think it's pretty obvious which way around that comparison was supposed to be...
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EvilDragon wrote: It's not impossible, it's just that Peter doesn't want it to happen, so he can continue to command a price premium. It's fairly obvious.
This is completely wrong and untrue on every level.
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Failed Muso wrote:Peter has many plans and projects in the pipeline and, as a tiny business, is looking for as much cashflow as possible to progress these. If a plug in was an option, he would've most definitely considered this.
This goes exactly to the point that I (and others) was trying to make: It is obvious that he don't want other developers to start building an emulation, so the only thing he can do right now is spread uncertainty and doubt about the viability of such a project. If another dev would do it and even came close a little bit, he will have to play 'catch-up' to create any cashflow himself from that idea. Another thing is, that in the 'Farlight universe' something (anything) cost a lot of money, so some legendary status being carried over to a software emulation will go a long way in charging premium price for a plugin (like so many other 'legendary' hardware companies are doing these days).

Seriously, to me the whole story reeks a bit too much like 'protecting the IP and development investment'. A lot of BS is going around in that department (and has always been so), regardless of the company in case.
CrimsonWarlock aka TechnoGremlin, using Reaper and a fine selection of freeware plugins.

Ragnarök VST-synthesizer co-creator with Full Bucket

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Well, of course output stages are analog :D What else is analog in CMI?

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Failed Muso wrote:
whyterabbyt wrote: While Im agnostic to the idea that its 'easy', you do realise that they may not be the best people to judge whether its impossible or not?
Personally, I'd be asking a developer who's already done analogue modelling on native hardware that question.
Do you think Peter V didn't already do this?
I have no idea. You specifically made references to his own knowledge/skill as the source of authority on the matter, so I took that at face value.
whyterabbyt wrote:So Peter is Walmart, and Korg are a corner shop? You sure you got that right?
I think it's pretty obvious which way around that comparison was supposed to be...
Not to me. When something is ambiguous, I prefer to ask.


(edit for quote correction)
Last edited by whyterabbyt on Wed Oct 02, 2013 10:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
my other modular synth is a bugbrand

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Failed Muso wrote:
EvilDragon wrote: It's not impossible, it's just that Peter doesn't want it to happen, so he can continue to command a price premium. It's fairly obvious.
This is completely wrong and untrue on every level.
Well excuse me if I'm not convinced. :D

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EvilDragon wrote:
Failed Muso wrote:
EvilDragon wrote: It's not impossible, it's just that Peter doesn't want it to happen, so he can continue to command a price premium. It's fairly obvious.
This is completely wrong and untrue on every level.
Well excuse me if I'm not convinced. :D
And there we have it. Classic KvR (and general forum) Syndrome. Someone offers facts based on knowledge of the people and the machine in question, others don't accept them, based on speculation and conjecture but cannot prove otherwise. And round and round we go.

When someone comes up with a true emulation of a CMI in software that can run as a plug in on a current pro consumer host, call me.
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What you said didn't sound factual to me... A direct quote from Peter Vogel explaining (in DSP speak) what and why exactly today's CPU processing power is not sufficient to reproduce CMI, that would be factual.

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Failed Muso wrote:When someone comes up with a true emulation of a CMI in software that can run as a plug in on a current pro consumer host, call me.
Sure. But could you define what 'true' would mean first.
my other modular synth is a bugbrand

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Failed Muso wrote:And that is where you're wrong because the Fairlight is not just digital. As is explained here... :)
i did not read the explanation anywhere and on vintagesynth there is no obvious description of analogue part.
anyway, Urs and others dev have proven these recent years that analogue parts can be modelled at the price of cpu usage !
so, it should be easy to translate the algorithms running previously on old Motorola cpu to Intel newest processor !
if you don't want to translate you can also emulate the hardware like it has been done to death for old computers like apple ][, Amiga, atari and all the game platform from the 80's
Maybe Peter made the choice to invest in a new hardware CMI because of piracy and i would understand it perfectly instead of investing into a plugin development !
it's a shame that piracy prevent most musician to discover the technology behind CMI !
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Failed Muso wrote:In my experience over the years, the most prominent request is for those classic sounds produced by the sampling element, and as I've said before, Bitley or UVI's products provide these really well.
This is where I am. I'm interested in the samples for that flavour and interest of someone who was back in the day rather struck with (many of) the records coming out of Fairlights - and a decent Fairlight sample library is "good enough" for me.

I'm interested in the front end interface probably out of nostalgia and some fanboi interest, so playing with something like the iOS version would be fun, but I'm not really interested in working or making music this way - Fairlight's page R (at least, pre CMI III) was basically like the tracker software of the Atari/Amiga era, 8 mono channels of relatively primitive sequencing - pretty cool back then of course, but today I'll stick to my MBP/Logic/Live setup for composing, thanks! :)

I'm less interested in a "full" virtual Fairlight model (it would be fun, but I don't think I would pay eg £100+ for one) and anyway, despite how good the later versions sounded, the reason that those Fairlight records sounded as good as they did was more the composer/arranger, producer and mixer's contribution than anything else. Anyone who has some Fairlight samples knows how relatively primitive sounding they are (which is, of course, part of it's continuing charm).

But maybe a few afternoon's around Failed Muso's gaff playing with his Series III might change my mind...? ;)

I'm all for Peter Vogel not letting the Fairlight CMI legacy die and coming up with interesting products based on some of that IP - however, I'm not sure the effort in making a *proper* modelled VST instrument would pay back the investment in sales. Something like the iOS app is a much more viable proposition and should generate some healthy sales and satisfy some of us would be really enjoy playing with a virtual Fairlight.

For me personally, the sample library is good enough, and really is where the charm is (same goes for the Emulator II library).

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a very cool person
https://soundcloud.com/mavryck-james
(hopefully he doesn't mind the share of his SC)

has sent me a message via soundcloud telling me of this really cool upcoming program.

Might wanna keep your eyes on this one ;) I sure am!

http://www.visualjockey.com/wave2/index.html


Im not too sure about the system recommendations though. It says system:

OS:OSX Lion (Minimum)

CPU:
1.3Ghz i5 (intel)

MEMORY:
4GB

DISPLAY:
1280 x 720 (retina supported)

AUDIO:
Standard output

MIDI:
Up to 4 MIDI input/output

HARDWARE: <------------------------ What is this? Does this mean I need this?
Customised Fairlight MFX Hardware
Customised Neve Spectra Hardware
:borg:

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Emulating a CMI i,ii,ii+ is totally possible.
I've been working on an emulator for the last few years, doing
a bit here and there when I have time.

I have both processors, video systems, memory management, PIA's for keyboard & musical keyboard, almost all of the main board done + the Q256 board. The system boots up with rom a/b and drops into the built in monitor. I will say, it really is not a trivial thing to emnulate, there's alot of hardware and it's a complex system.

I just have'nt had time to complete the system, the next step is to complete the hard drive emulation, then the system should boot up qdos.

There are lost of boards that don't need to be emulated, like the sound channel boards, their just dedicated sound looping boards, easy to do with software, no emu required.

FYI, it runs about 20x faster that and real CMI IIx.

I could do with some help, I can only do about 1 day a month on it at the moment.
So if your a really good C/C++ programmer you could write some modules perhaps.

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V0RT3X wrote:a very cool person
https://soundcloud.com/mavryck-james
(hopefully he doesn't mind the share of his SC)

has sent me a message via soundcloud telling me of this really cool upcoming program.

Might wanna keep your eyes on this one ;) I sure am!

http://www.visualjockey.com/wave2/index.html


Im not too sure about the system recommendations though. It says system:

OS:OSX Lion (Minimum)

CPU:
1.3Ghz i5 (intel)

MEMORY:
4GB

DISPLAY:
1280 x 720 (retina supported)

AUDIO:
Standard output

MIDI:
Up to 4 MIDI input/output

HARDWARE: <------------------------ What is this? Does this mean I need this?
Customised Fairlight MFX Hardware
Customised Neve Spectra Hardware
Too bad it's only for Mac. :(

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Referring to the opening post, what is the big difference technology wise beween a Fairlight Series II or III and the PPG Wave 2.3. Both have a digital part, playing back samples or wavetables and controlling the device. This runs in the originals on low specified CPUs that fairly easy should be emulated on modern devices. And maybe some DSPs, whose algorithms should also be transferred to the application, which may be harder.
Also they have an analog part, D/A conversion and analog processing. But the PPG Wave V.3 VSTi, and also here lots of other emulations (Jupiter 8, Synthix, OPX just to name a few) and non-emulations (e.g. Diva) show analog circuits can be modelled (almost) to perfection, albeit against the use of a lot of CPU power.
So where PPG has its VSTi version, I wonder where the really technically difficult part in doing the same with the Fairlight is?

Maybe the guy that does the Fairlight restauration can detail?

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