Kontakt sounds worse in Reaper when audio preferences are not set correctly

[BachRules]

So... does that mean you are Stanley Jungleib? Presumably there was more than just Stanley in Seer Systems though.
http://seersystems.com/1991/11/

He and Dave Smith were my bosses, and there were a couple of engineers over me who made the more important decisions.

[spaceman]

Bach does indeed rule.

[arkmabat]

I'm sure the sound is fine.

That's silly.

You're being silly.

Check Image-line's site for their FL11 manual ...particularly the Saw Wars chapter.

There is no fracking difference between daws soundwise..

So Kontakt is lying when it says it's using lower-quality interpolation for online renders? Do you even begin to understand the issue? I programmed the world's first commercial software synth. I aced CCRMA. If you want to interpret the "Saw Wars chapter" as are you're doing, that's your problem.

Daw Wars....fricking autocorrect..

I think you mean:


But seriously, I'm sure there's different coefficient-divisions and stuff working in the background but at the end of the day... does it matter if we can't tell? Darude's "Sandstorm" was programmed in Fasttracker 2 (DOS) and Cubase (Atari). Sounds good to me though. The amazing thing is how much better a song sounds just by turning up the volume on the monitors. Some DAWs may indeed have a louder limiter on the main bus by default...

[EvilDragon]

Also I wondered whether Kontakt's "interpolation" is limited to pitch-changing samples, or whether it might come in to play in other areas too. I don't know the answer there.

I do know the answer there, hence my reply. Interpolation modes (standard, high, perfect) are only used when Kontakt is RESAMPLING, that is, when you play a sample with a different rate than its default sample rate (at root key). Chromatically sampled libraries then don't use any interpolation, unless they are changing the pitch of the samples in any other way (via LFO/envelope modulation, zone tuning change, or change_tune() KSP command, etc.). It would also perform resampling if the samples that the library is using are differring to the sample rate used by the DAW, etc.

In any case, the difference between those three interpolation modes are really only noticeable on large stretches (more than +/- 1 octave).

[BachRules]

Or are you sayng that even after ticking the option, you have found that Reaper still does not tell plugins when it is offline rendering?

I don't mean that.

I agree with the OP that it is daft that Reaper's default setting is not to inform plugins about offline rendering. But that is all - a bit daft.

That is more than the mindless Reaper minions can bring themselves to say, so I will take your opinion seriously.

Not long after installing Reaper I went through the varous options and set them to suit my needs. That included the offline rendering setting. I think it would be unusual for someone to continue to use any application without customising at least some of the settings to suit them.

That's no excuse for a daft default, imo. If a DAW crashes by default, unless you turn on some obscure "don't crash" option that's one of hundreds of (very poorly documented) options, I'd say that's a dumb DAW; but of course the Reaper drones (not you) would chant that it's the user's fault for not changing the option.

If you were unhappy with the results of offline rendering you would investigate, make the setting and be happy again. To contine to use it with the 'wrong' setting (and talk about how poor it sounds) when you know how to correct it seems a bit weird.

I think it's weird to produce software which makes the users conduct unnecessary investigations. I don't want to put my customers through this:

I'm trying to track down a problem....

http://forum.cockos.com/archive/index.php/t-83815.html

and this:

I have to render several times until I get acceptable result (without missing samples parts or crackles or something else).

You're missing a step as it does work. You need to enable... the "inform offline rendering"....

http://www.soundsonline-forums.com/arch ... 35096.html

It's not the customer who really missed a step there; it's the developer.

Even if I had fanboys who'd cheer for any stupid programming I did, I still wouldn't want to make daft software, because for me it's not just about satisfying fanboys with low standards (not against you, rock).

There are a lot of options in Reaper, which can seem daunting, but it really is worth going through them and setting them to suit your own circumstances.

If a user doesn't do all that, it should still work, instead of generating people showing up in Google asking "why doesn't this work"? Reaper might sound good if you're a geek with all the time in the world to tweak settings (no offense, I'm like that), but the software world doesn't revolve around such geeks. There are people who need the sh-t to work up front, because they have lives and jobs and don't sit around all day on DAW forums, and they would do better on this with other DAWs.

I'm also not convinced that the part of the VST spec referenced on p60 of that doc

I'll look closer.

[arkmabat]

Okay, well if offline rendering is getting mixed up by the daw, yes that would be a problem... Z3ta sounds terrible in "draft" quality :/

[whyterabbyt]

I'm also not convinced that the part of the VST spec referenced on p60 of that doc

I'll look closer.

Surely you should have looked closer before making the assertion you used it to justify. It certainly seems like your grasp of the VST spec isn't good enough, since you still havent been able to back up your claims.

[Turello]

If you talk just about how sounds I casually used REAPER and it's not so bad, in my opinion at least important are converters of your audio interface...

Anyway i have a true faith in the "audio motor" of Nuendo 5... I have 2 old Fostex nearfields but in Nuendo i hear better... Suggestion\awesomeness?

[BachRules]

There's also the fact that with this particular default, what you hear is what you get.

That myth was disposed of in my 2nd post, if you'd followed the links:

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=142218

-->

With the current defaults, Reaper renders as fast as possible, while misinforming plugins about the offline state; and there's no guarantee this will give you the same result as realtime playback anyway.

Your needs here are fully satisfied by "Save live output to disk (bounce)...", aren't they?

"Surely you should have looked closer before making the assertion..." blah blah....

There's no shortage of posts on Reaper forums where things sound one way when the user is playing in realtime, then he renders and the rendered file has new defects, and then a mod comes and tells him he needs to change his settings so that the plugin is informed of offline rendering. This is not what-you-hear-is-what-you-get; it's inanity.

[trimph1]

Banned?

[LawrenceF]

Lol. He joined as "Ammonium Nitrate" and being true to the name dropped explosive comments everywhere.

That's at least two forums he's banned from. Either most forums are nuts or he's just a really confrontational guy.

But yeah. He compared the mods to Hitler and Stalin, before he got banned.

[whyterabbyt]

There's also the fact that with this particular default, what you hear is what you get.

That myth was disposed of in my 2nd post, if you'd followed the links:

I followed the links. One of the developers says exactly that, that what you hear is what you get ie

that is the sound you hear when playing back the project while you are working on it in real time...

However I see nothing in that link which proves that, or anything a myth.

Please quote that proof (ie not just reiteration of your own assertions there) that this is a myth, because all I see there is basically the same as your posts here, particularly those unsupported claims that that the default should be different because of something you (falsely or ignorantly, it would appear) claim exists in the VST spec.

There's no shortage of posts on Reaper forums where things sound one way when the user is playing in realtime, then he renders and the rendered file has new defects, and then a mod comes and tells him he needs to change his settings so that the plugin is informed of offline rendering. This is not what-you-hear-is-what-you-get; it's inanity.

That's a shifting of goalposts. Your claims here started off with the assertion that offline renders were not leveraging the expected offline rendering behaviour of plugins, not that it introduced new audio errors. If it introduces new audio errors, its odd that its taken you this long to specifically assert that, especially given the varying (unsupported) assertions you've put your effort into in the meantime.

And just so we're clear, Im sure you're perfectly aware that the intent of the default setting is to give you what you hear, which was the actual point. It would be nice if you attempted to support your claims in their original context, rather than merely springboard onto another set of unsupported claims. In this case, that would be providing evidence that the setting 'should' default differently according to the VST spec, as you have repeatedly claimed here and there.
Or are you merely trying to obfuscate the issue because you know your claim to be incorrect?

[C-note]

When I was using Reaper It definitely sounded worse than any other DAW. In fact I had a hard time hearing any sound coming from Reaper at all...Because I was too busy yelling at it for the Gawd-Awfull Midi "Features" and workflow...

[ccDuckett]

*ahem* Without delving deeply into the techie aspects of this, it was always my impression that Reaper has this default setting due to some plugins behaving differently/badly when "aware" of being offline. I don't remember specific plugs, but I do remember having some WTF moments with some older plugs after trying to render when they were "aware" of being offline. Therefore, this setting makes life better for me, it makes sure older or more obscure plugs can still be used. Why rendered files never sound exactly the same as the
engine running live does will always be a mystery, but that's what audio editors are for (for me).

..and yes, cranky truculent guy is cranky and truculent.

[BachRules]

all I see there

Then something's wrong with your seeing.

One of the developers says

That guy is a developer for Reaper? Why do you believe that? You are talking about a person who assumes that the offline flag:

in 99% of the cases doesn't do anything...

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=141758

Do you share that assumption?

the intent of the default setting is to give you what you hear,

Why do you believe that?