Waves MaxxBass: freeware equivalent?

[tommy_d]

guitars and banjos

A bass player writes: Oi! Get off moi laaaaaahnd!

[Fritze]

Thread wouldn't be complete without a tumble into the subterranean depths of Lowender from Refuse: http://www.kvraudio.com/db/2547
No psycho-acoustic-babble, just mo' beefy bottom. Synthetic bottom, sure, but your kidneys and neighbors won't know the difference. Great when used on wimpy guitars and banjos, in a deeply troubling way.

Their page is dead.

[Fritze]

guitars and banjos

A bass player writes: Oi! Get off moi laaaaaahnd!

[kbaccki]

A post-script: I've just read Mike Senior's Mix Rescue piece in the December issue of SOS. He describes using Voxengo LFMaxPunch for precisely what I'm talking about There's even a nice big screenshot (page 97, top RHS) Which is pretty timely - cheers, Mr Senior!

Would be interested in hearing some A/B between MB and LFP... but alas, you don't have MB! Hope you can get acceptable results out of your existing tools, and use that money to buy your mom a nice gift for the holidays. Either that or jump on one of the many plugin sales going on...

[mandolarian]

Thread wouldn't be complete without a tumble into the subterranean depths of Lowender from Refuse: http://www.kvraudio.com/db/2547
No psycho-acoustic-babble, just mo' beefy bottom. Synthetic bottom, sure, but your kidneys and neighbors won't know the difference. Great when used on wimpy guitars and banjos, in a deeply troubling way.

Their page is dead.

Not dead, just resting. Try again. There's an article on the News page that's barely a month old. Old news maybe, but definitely not deadly, 'cept for the PT10 part.

[mandolarian]

guitars and banjos

A bass player writes: Oi! Get off moi laaaaaahnd!

But, on the bright side, peeps will be impressed that the bass player is finally playing in time.

[valhallasound]

I'm genuinely surprised, as I say, that there isn't a viable freeware alternative. There are so many good freeware eqs, dynamics processors, 'verbs, delays etc., even freeware versions of more esoteric or specialised processors (real-time pitch correction etc.) that I just assumed - naively, it would seem - that there'd be a free MaxxBass. Clearly I was wrong.

The workings of MaxxBass are discussed in a US patent granted to Waves (5,930,373). So the techniques being used have been publicly disclosed, but are also covered by patent protection until the patent runs out, in 2017 or something like that.

(Maybe that will change. I'm sure Waves are good at what they do but - in the words of Silvanus P. Thompson - "What one fool can do, another can" so perhaps someone will create one, one day)

Well, if someone created an exact replica of the Waves stuff, they would open themselves up to legal claims, due to the patent coverage. A technique that differed from the Wave technique would work, but it probably wouldn't sound exactly like MaxxBass.

There are a lot of audio patents that went nowhere, as the amount of profit to be gained from the patent would be less than the costs of taking things to court. My guess is that MaxxBass is NOT one of those patents, and is a patent that Waves would vigorously defend. Waves may make some money from the MaxxBass plugin, but the real money on this type of technology is in the consumer electronic space. Spending <$1.00 per unit to license an algorithm that synthesizes bass ends up being much cheaper than spending several dollars on better speakers for your laptop/TV/whatever, as speakers require higher quantities of physical materials to sound better.

Sean Costello

[Chrisma]

There are a lot of audio patents that went nowhere, as the amount of profit to be gained from the patent would be less than the costs of taking things to court. My guess is that MaxxBass is NOT one of those patents, and is a patent that Waves would vigorously defend. Waves may make some money from the MaxxBass plugin, but the real money on this type of technology is in the consumer electronic space. Spending <$1.00 per unit to license an algorithm that synthesizes bass ends up being much cheaper than spending several dollars on better speakers for your laptop/TV/whatever, as speakers require higher quantities of physical materials to sound better.

Sean Costello

That being said...What happens to the sound if you process the mix with Maxsbass and then its ran through a MaxxBass powered system? Will the mix still translate correctly or will the low-end harmonics be over hyped? I assume there is some limiting/compression or something going that would prevent this. Anyone?

[Giusmex]

just a consideration.

I have waves maxxbass.


i not always us it but i ask:


if you increase the harmonic spectrum of the bass frequencies with maxxbass, dont you also increase the "muddy" frequencies in the spectrum ( 250-500 Hz or so ) ? is there a way to "level" them off after using maxxbass or similars?

[tommy_d]

guitars and banjos

A bass player writes: Oi! Get off moi laaaaaahnd!

But, on the bright side, peeps will be impressed that the bass player is finally playing in time.

Ouch!

[Johnny!]

just a consideration.

I have waves maxxbass.


i not always us it but i ask:


if you increase the harmonic spectrum of the bass frequencies with maxxbass, dont you also increase the "muddy" frequencies in the spectrum ( 250-500 Hz or so ) ? is there a way to "level" them off after using maxxbass or similars?

EQ?

[RunBeerRun]

Dang cornhuskers union, I went to download the maxxbass demo but it requires an Ilok key.

The old JB Smash Pro is a good multiband exciter for low precise frequencies, could easily be found at the Marketplace for like 10 bucks. But I don't know what this bass harmonics thing sounds like.

[tommy_d]

The workings of MaxxBass are discussed in a US patent granted to Waves (5,930,373)

...and there it is: "METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR ENHANCING QUALITY OF SOUND SIGNAL, Meir Shashoua et al." (thank you, Googlepatents).

the techniques being used have been publicly disclosed

So in fact it should be relatively straightforward to develop a MaxxBass clone - freeware or otherwise - because the patent application tells you everything you need to know.

if someone created an exact replica of the Waves stuff, they would open themselves up to legal claims

So anyone who did develop a MaxxBass clone would be infringing Waves' intellectual property rights and could be sued.

Suppose it was just for personal use, though? Suppose they made no attempt to release or distribute the plugin, and only used it for non-commercial purposes? Presumably that would be legal(?) (Forgive me if this is a stupid question; I know nothing of patent law and very little of the law in general. Also I'm not proposing to do what I'm describing, and I'm not advocating that anyone else do so. Just thinking aloud...)

Waves may make some money from the MaxxBass plugin, but the real money on this type of technology is in the consumer electronic space. Spending <$1.00 per unit to license an algorithm that synthesizes bass ends up being much cheaper than spending several dollars on better speakers

Good point! Hmmmmm...

(...)

Very interesting! Thank you

[aciddose]

Suppose it was just for personal use, though? Suppose they made no attempt to release or distribute the plugin, and only used it for non-commercial purposes? Presumably that would be legal(?) (Forgive me if this is a stupid question; I know nothing of patent law and very little of the law in general. Also I'm not proposing to do what I'm describing, and I'm not advocating that anyone else do so. Just thinking aloud...)

no, personal use is not technically legal. good luck to waves in trying to catch you though.

if you couldn't create a clone the patent wouldn't be valid. might be a good test

[tommy_d]

There are a lot of audio patents that went nowhere, as the amount of profit to be gained from the patent would be less than the costs of taking things to court. My guess is that MaxxBass is NOT one of those patents, and is a patent that Waves would vigorously defend. Waves may make some money from the MaxxBass plugin, but the real money on this type of technology is in the consumer electronic space. Spending <$1.00 per unit to license an algorithm that synthesizes bass ends up being much cheaper than spending several dollars on better speakers for your laptop/TV/whatever, as speakers require higher quantities of physical materials to sound better.

Sean Costello

That being said...What happens to the sound if you process the mix with Maxsbass and then its ran through a MaxxBass powered system? Will the mix still translate correctly or will the low-end harmonics be over hyped? I assume there is some limiting/compression or something going that would prevent this. Anyone?

Good question. Maybe this can help answer it: MaxxPlayer(TM) Technical Description.

Section 4, page 5 is concerned with MaxxBass. I'm interested that Waves felt the need to diss a rival technology (SRS Lab's TruBass). Seems rather mean-spirited to me but anyway...

(...)

Reading this document - reading about iVolume™, MaxxBass®,
MaxxTreble™, and MaxxStereo - part of me thinks "Hey, wow! The trickle-down effect! Professional tools for domestic use! Empowering the consumer!"

...but another part of me thinks: "Oh great! Another way for people to screw up a carefully-crafted mix and make a mockery of the mastering process" It's bad enough trying to compensate for all those "BassBoost"/"MegaBass" buttons...