Dune 2 ...absolutely fantastic ..audio rate modulation ..lil appreciation thread

[chk071]

Just did some tests with 3 plugins, modulating the filter cutoff with high resonance settings, and oscillator pitch with a sine wave. Spire sounded very clean and punchy, and also good with pitch modulation, Sylenth1 did well until a certain LFO rate, and everything above that sounded a bit weird, pitch modulation seemed a bit more "tame" than on Spire. But, Saurus 2 sounded absolutely horrible with anything above 50 Hz or so, and also the pitch modulation sounded very thin. Kind of typical... AFAIC, there's really always some sloppiness, or weirdness in the Tone2 synths (really sorry to say, i like their synth, but there's always the one or the other niggle i have with them). Can't really tell how high up the LFO rates of Spire and Sylenth1 go, i think the one in Spire goes up to about 150-200 Hz, and the one in Sylenth1 seems to go up to 192 Hz.

I can't really tell if what Dasheesh posted is true, modulation sounds pretty good on Spire, and also pretty clean, in the audible range. Loads of artifacts in Saurus though, and Sylenth1 also seems to have some. As i'm not sure what exactly i should look out for, i can't really tell if it does "audio rate modulation" though, maybe someone else knows better what to look for, and can tell. To me, it sounds very good.

Wasn't there an option in Sylenth1 to change the oversampling?

Is there? Please let me know.

Edit: Can't find any, and i really looked everywhere. It says 2x oversampling on Lennardigitals website, but that's probably the default oversampling it does permanently. I also don't know oversampling is supposed to have an influence on modulation.

[exmatproton]

Is there? Please let me know.

Edit: Can't find any, and i really looked everywhere. It says 2x oversampling on Lennardigitals website, but that's probably the default oversampling it does permanently. I also don't know oversampling is supposed to have an influence on modulation.

My mistake. i downloaded the demo to find out. But indeed, no oversampling options. And 1 extra thing that i find lacking (offtopic, i know) is the lack of (real) PWM. Weird that it wasn't with this newer version. Not my synth

[carrieres]

what would be a sexy size ?

Try Dune on a 27" 4k monitor. It's very tiny.
Because of this I've had to switch from Dune as my main synth to other, scalable, options.

A 4k compatible size that's at least twice as big would be great. Maybe 3x as big.

i will not be able to test it

[recursive one]

Audio rate modulation is a confusing term.

Last time I checked 50 - 200Hz was audible and thus audio rate. Common rates that softsynth LFO's work at.

I am not so sure that "audio rate modulation" guarantees good, smooth acceleration/deceleration, glitch free/beat frequency free modulations of your synth parameters.

(Beating, meaning that kind of secondary lower rate beating pulse you can hear on some synths at high LFO rates for example when LFo'ing a self resonant filter cut off, like a durr, durr, durr, estimated between 3-10Hz cycles, maybe could be called sub aliasing ? That beat frequency typically does not sync well with your music and would be best programmed out of existence)

If I understand this correctly (maybe I don't) audio rate modulation means not the speed of the modultator but the speed by which the target parameter value is actually updated. E.g. if you have 100Hz sine LFO modulating pitch but your synth is not capable of audio rate modulation (e.g. if you set low modulation rate in Dune2 settings) the pitch will actually change step-wise and not smoothly which will lead to audible artifacts.

[Synthman2000]

It would be a good time for the developer of Dune 2 to explain the full details.

I just use my ears they always tell me what sounds best.

[recursive one]

more importantly does it actually make any difference audibly to ones ears.

I think it can be directly tested since Dune2 allows selecting different modulation rates.

Dune2 manual says the follwing

>> Audio-rate modulation needs a lot of CPU, as the entire synth engine, plus all modulation sources (e.g. LFOs, MSEGs, ...) are processed sample by sample, rather than in blocks.

[gentleclockdivider]

Audio rate modulation is a confusing term.

Last time I checked 50 - 200Hz was audible and thus audio rate. Common rates that softsynth LFO's work at.

I am not so sure that "audio rate modulation" guarantees good, smooth acceleration/deceleration, glitch free/beat frequency free modulations of your synth parameters.

(Beating, meaning that kind of secondary lower rate beating pulse you can hear on some synths at high LFO rates for example when LFo'ing a self resonant filter cut off, like a durr, durr, durr, estimated between 3-10Hz cycles, maybe could be called sub aliasing ? That beat frequency typically does not sync well with your music and would be best programmed out of existence)

FFS , Yes ..but this thread is about the audio rate UPDATE in the MODULATION MATRIX .
Got it ?
It doesn't matter if your lfo goes to 250 hz , if it's updated at a low rate..the modulation will have artifacts , dune is great because it has the option to update at sample rate ..

[Synthman2000]

Oh. So Hz are not Hz in Dune ?

Yes I get it now, and even greater reason to ignore anything but what you hear.

[Cinebient]

F.e. the LFO´s from Icarus goes up to 440Hz or so but you hear that they really loose out above 100Hz compared to the ones in Dune 2 (which ends at 220Hz).
And when you use an OSC to modulate something it is even more important that the update rate is sample accurate.
I think many people don´t need this stuff but if you like it you will appreciate real audio rate modulation.

[chk071]

What i find really cool is this almost vowel like sound when you modulate the filter cutoff on a Minimoog: viewtopic.php?p=5939476 Haven't really heard that effect on many synths, actually, i can't remember any. I'll have a go at it in Monark later, it should be capable of that.

[Buckster]

I've been trying the demo and very impressed

but if you were focused on Trance - would you go for Dune 2 or Spire (both on offer atm) - I'd like to be able to afford both - but can't really at this stage

I do also own Omnisphere 2

[exmatproton]

I've been trying the demo and very impressed

but if you were focused on Trance - would you go for Dune 2 or Spire (both on offer atm) - I'd like to be able to afford both - but can't really at this stage

I do also own Omnisphere 2

It doesn't really matter. The synths do different stuff equally good imho. Yes, they are different, but you will have a blast with either of them.

[recursive one]

but if you were focused on Trance - would you go for Dune 2 or Spire (both on offer atm)

I own both, prefer Spire by far (I make psytrance and some trance too)

[cytospur]

What i find really cool is this almost vowel like sound when you modulate the filter cutoff on a Minimoog: viewtopic.php?p=5939476 Haven't really heard that effect on many synths, actually, i can't remember any. I'll have a go at it in Monark later, it should be capable of that.

You can get similar vocal effect sounds from DUNE2 using that approach.

[chk071]

Yeah, agree with recursive one. I definitely prefer Spire for supersaw, strings, and plucky sounds.

But, see for yourself, enough soundsets for that genre available for both synths (Spire has a gazillion more of those though, naturally).