KVR Audio

Breeze · Post by **Breeze** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 5:24 pm

fluffy_little_something wrote:Oddly, after loading I have to play the bass for a minute or so until it sounds the way it should. As if the plugin had to warm up or something Initially it is also too loud. Or maybe it is a DAW bug, no idea...
Switching the Unison button on and off a couple of times while playing also seems to reduce the time it takes to make it sound the way it should. Weird...

How timely!

This is exactly the kind of thing we need to be on the lookout for. On closer examination, most of the "odd behaviors" I've noticed turned out to be a logical result of the settings.

I've been trying to figure out why the two builds were different after the "spread" fix because it seemed to me it wasn't just the OSC2 detune.The spread detune seems as random as it used to be and the random pitch variation on each note without it is extremely minor(< 0.01%) but I found something a little strange: when you first instantiate the Obxd it seems to select Spread random pitch variations for the 8 voices once. After that it seems the variations don't change until you re-instantiate the Obxd. I'm not sure if this is normal or a bug. It's common to all recent builds, if not all of them since the start.

It's easy enough to hear: from the Default, turn off osc2, put spread on max and play the same note in a higher range over and over; after 16 reps you'll hear the variations as a micro-tonal "melody" created by the spread detune that repeats every 8 notes. And it doesn't seem to matter if you change to another default patch: the "melody" stays the same till you remove the Obxd and re-instantiate it. Then it creates a new spread pitch variation pattern.

The two oscillators are initialized with different spread "patterns" but this also means the the detune between them is repeated every 8 notes. Mind you, the modulation applied does all kinds of things that make this much less obvious, but underneath it all this pattern repeats.

This is probably why when using 2 Obxd's at the same time it sounds so rich: the "choice" of spread detune is bound to be different.

This may not relate to your issue, FLS, but maybe you can figure out why the same behavior happens every time you start your patch. It could just be your choice of settings, but it could also be something else...

Frantz · Post by **Frantz** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 5:26 pm

fluffy_little_something wrote:Maybe it is the same with my OBXD unison bass patch, where there are 8 voices sounding at the same time.

The issue also occurs for me with a unison bass patch. I haven't tested non-unison patches. Your explanation regarding oscillator phases could very well be it.

2DaT · Post by **2DaT** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 5:39 pm

I am using Studio One's built in patch management. Whenever I switch between OBXD patches while the song is playing, the patch sounds very odd -- almost out of time with the rest of the song. My workaround is to stop and restart the song every time I change OBXD patches.

Are you using ASIO drivers? This seems odd.
@FLS:
Yes, phases arent ramdomised on start (a bug, a feature?)

Elementary, Watson

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 03, 2014 5:40 pm

Frantz wrote:
fluffy_little_something wrote:Maybe it is the same with my OBXD unison bass patch, where there are 8 voices sounding at the same time.
The issue also occurs for me with a unison bass patch. I haven't tested non-unison patches. Your explanation regarding oscillator phases could very well be it.

Yes, I guess that is it. I just opened an instance and played the default patch (which is not unison) and then after a few seconds I loaded my unison bass patch. The sound was almost right immediately, not too loud

So I think the oscillators are free running, but it takes some time as initially, i.e. upon loading an instance, they all start out with exactly the same phase.

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 03, 2014 5:42 pm

2DaT wrote:
I am using Studio One's built in patch management. Whenever I switch between OBXD patches while the song is playing, the patch sounds very odd -- almost out of time with the rest of the song. My workaround is to stop and restart the song every time I change OBXD patches.
Are you using ASIO drivers? This seems odd.
@FLS:
Yes, phases arent ramdomised on start (a bug, a feature?) Elementary, Watson

Basically no problem if we know and keep that in mind when loading an 8-voice unison patch right away, else it could destroy our speakers

Breeze · Post by **Breeze** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:06 pm

BTW. very nice DX_Bass sound, FLS! I like it with a little less cut but it's got meat (lower PW for more!). Kinda what I originally hoped to get out of a DX7...

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:17 pm

Breeze wrote:BTW. very nice DX_Bass sound, FLS! I like it with a little less cut but it's got meat (lower PW for more!). Kinda what I originally hoped to get out of a DX7...

Thank you

I assume by little less you mean lower cutoff? I also don't like bass sounds with many high frequencies. They seem to reduce the punch.
Yes, I picked that cutoff setting because of the rudimentary keyboard tracking control, with it the highs were much too strong on higher notes, without it they were too weak, thus I set the cutoff to that value, a compromise...

idfpower · Post by **idfpower** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:34 pm

Very impressive synth

The sound quality is great - for a first creation, this is one hell of a statement

And the presets created by you guys are very cool, congratz all for the hard work

Too badd OBXD is CPU hungy so I can't use it ftm on my old PC (some presets are pushing it straight to full overload); but overall, probably one of the best synths released this year

Good job

Frantz · Post by **Frantz** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:36 pm

2DaT wrote:Are you using ASIO drivers? This seems odd.
@FLS:
Yes, phases arent ramdomised on start (a bug, a feature?) Elementary, Watson

Yes, I am using ASIO drivers. I guess what I am hearing is the oscillator phases all synchronizing the moment I change patches.

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:42 pm

idfpower wrote:Very impressive synth The sound quality is great - for a first creation, this is one hell of a statement And the presets created by you guys are very cool, congratz all for the hard work

Too badd OBXD is CPU hungy so I can't use it ftm on my old PC (some presets are pushing it straight to full overload); but overall, probably one of the best synths released this year Good job

Well, this year is still young

Try setting the voices parameter to 3 or 4 voices and disabling HQ, that should reduce the CPU load by about half. Of course with patches designed to use 5 to 8 voice unison, the sound will be different than intended by the designer...
Also, maybe it is your DAW. I am using two DAWs on exactly the same hardware, on one DAW OBXD causes the same overload problem as on yours, on the other, though, no problem at all...

Breeze · Post by **Breeze** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:44 pm

fluffy_little_something wrote:...on one DAW OBXD causes the same overload problem as on yours...

Is that Mulab?

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:47 pm

Breeze wrote:
fluffy_little_something wrote:...on one DAW OBXD causes the same overload problem as on yours...
Is that Mulab?

Yes

Same difference when using Diva...
But there is a new version of Mulab I saw in the news section, maybe he has improved its efficiency, but I don't think so...

Btw, this is the main reason why I won't do more patches because on Mulab I have the CPU issue, but in Mixcraft, where there is no CPU issue, I can't save patches as fxp files. So what I do is program patches in Mixcraft, make a screenshot, and then visually recreate the patch in Mulab only in order to save it. A bit clumsy for my taste...

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 03, 2014 6:57 pm

Frantz wrote:
2DaT wrote:Are you using ASIO drivers? This seems odd.
@FLS:
Yes, phases arent ramdomised on start (a bug, a feature?) Elementary, Watson
Yes, I am using ASIO drivers. I guess what I am hearing is the oscillator phases all synchronizing the moment I change patches.

I don't think the oscillators synchronize when loading a new patch. Else I would hear the wrong bass patch sound when loading the patch after having played with other patches for a while in the same instance. But I don't hear that issue when merely changing patches, only when opening a new instance. Maybe it is something else...

Frantz · Post by **Frantz** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 7:15 pm

fluffy_little_something wrote:But I don't hear that issue when merely changing patches, only when opening a new instance. Maybe it is something else...

Yes, it could be something different. I will investigate when I have time.

idfpower · Post by **idfpower** » Mon Feb 03, 2014 8:23 pm

fluffy_little_something wrote: Try setting the voices parameter to 3 or 4 voices and disabling HQ, that should reduce the CPU load by about half. Of course with patches designed to use 5 to 8 voice unison, the sound will be different than intended by the designer...
Also, maybe it is your DAW. I am using two DAWs on exactly the same hardware, on one DAW OBXD causes the same overload problem as on yours, on the other, though, no problem at all...

Yeah, I know, but like you said, it's not the same

Anyway, in my case the DAW is FL Studio (9).

Obxd synthesizer