Uhbik 1.2 -- CPU use issue?

[pedx1ng]

I've had the latest U-he stuff I own installed since release (Zebra 2.5.2, ACE 1.1, Uhbik 1.2), and haven't had any issues, but I haven't been working on actual projects. Just noodling and playing around. But I finally decided to go back to a mostly finished project I have and try to clean it up a little and call it done. Unfortunately, at a certain point on playback (and not at the same point everytime), I get runaway CPU use followed by audio death. That's with no tweaks done to the project, just playing it back to re-familiarize myself with it. I never had that issue with the project all during the time I was making it originally.

After a lot of troubleshooting, I think I have isolated it down to Uhbik 1.2, because after replacing it with 1.1, the project plays fine again. This is strange, because reading the release notes for 1.2 it seems most of the updates don't apply to me in any case.

Details: Ableton Live 8.2.5 (though I've tried an older version which I used to make the project with the same results), Windows 7 64 Home Premium SP1, Intel Quad core 2.33 or so (sorry I'm not at the music PC at the moment, I can't remember exact spec), 4GB RAM, etc ...

With Uhbik 1.1, playing the project, at no point does it go over 50% CPU use (using Ableton's non-standard meter, not the Windows one). With Uhbik 1.2 at a certain point (and again, it won't happen at the same point everytime), CPU use starts to run over 100% and audio becomes a distorted mess as you would expect. I stop it at that point so I don't know how far the CPU use would climb ultimately.

Any ideas? I guess I can just keep using Uhbik 1.1 but what about the line from the release notes which only states "- some minor bugs and niggles fixed"? That's almost as obscure a reference as Apple does in their release notes! What bugs are those that I should be mindful of if I continue to use 1.1?

And the thing is, if there is a problem with 1.2 with certain configurations it should probably be looked at in any case.

[Urs]

There seems to be an issue infamously known as "Denormals". What happens then is that the cpu needs more time to crunch very silent signals. The effect is cpu spikes in what seems to be silence.

Usually Uhbiks are supposed to go on standby during silence, thus never running into denormal issues. However, there must be a bug in V1.2 that prevents Uhbiks from detecting silence or just going into standby mode.

It's one of the next things we'll deal with.

Until then you can always add Digitalfishphones "Normalizer" in front of Uhbik. That solves the problem as well:

http://www.digitalfishphones.com/main.p ... &subItem=6

Cheers,

Urs

[pedx1ng]

Thanks for the info and quick reply Urs.

[antithesist]

Is there any word on a fix for this?

I never installed 1.2 thinking there might be an update sometime over the last year.

[Urs]

Gawd, time passes way to quickly

At least, we know now what happened: Some Uhbiks, I think G and A, maybe more would after some time create some sort of static noise, if being fed a low, random input signal over several hours. That was observed with an open Microphone channel in a project studio setup.

We got rid of it by changing some esoteric compiler settings. This was the main difference between 1.1 and 1.2. - which unfortunately introduced the denormals issue. Latter shall be fixed easily now, and I kept an eye on it during the RE port (doesn't happen there).

Now, after a year of drama with Diva, RE and The Dark Zebra we've been working on maintenance releases for all plugins, but we naturally had to get the serious ones out first. We'll continue to push those out once I'm back from vacation.

[antithesist]

Thanks for explaining. I shouldn't complain since I got in on the $99 (?) intro price. I've paid more for things that have been discontinued or had the company has go out of business in a shorter period of time than that since Uhbik's introduction.

It does seem to have been neglected a bit, though. I hope the club/subscription intention carries on and maybe is accelerated exponentially as a consolation for early adopters.

That might seem like taking money out of U-HE's pocket, but believe me, If we finally get some free additions as was nearly promised, I know that I will buy more in other U-HE offerings than I would pay in Uhbik upgrade fees.

[Urs]

Fair enough. We seem to have neglected quite a few products, but Diva and The Dark Zebra were two major efforts that just sucked up a year, like *plonk* and it was gone. Once I realised what we had it would have been silly not to go through with it. These have created such an enormous growth, it's against all common sense. It had to be done, even if other products did suffer.

We'll make up for it.

[antithesist]

Right on, and I'll be fine with whatever... well, short of having to pay more for updates to just the existing core plug-ins. I understand that you have to generate income, though. As you know, you can do that directly and by generating goodwill as an intermediate step. You seem to be pretty good at both. I'm mainly anxious for some Uhbik progress because I'm much more of an effect than softsynth user. Thanks and good luck.

[Goratrix]

I agree that Uhbik is long overdue for an update, at least a bug-fixing one. Some of us are not that interested in the latest-and-greatest synth wonders, you know?

[antithesist]

[heavensdaw]

waiting for God(ot)

Hd