KVR Audio

tehlord · Post by **tehlord** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:40 am

Bronto Scorpio wrote: As I said, sometimes (always?) it's totally worth it to sacrifice realisim for awesomeness

Cheers
Dennis

Isn't that why we still love analogue brass?

dalor · Post by **dalor** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:41 am

My prediction: Once we have 99ghz computers running 1024 cores you still be able to play only one note at the time because emulation will have every aspect of analogue sound virtually modeled - or better, they will emulate a today's CPU emulating a 0df sem synth (to get the vintage 0df sem emulation sound)

Bronto Scorpio · Post by **Bronto Scorpio** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:46 am

tehlord wrote:
Bronto Scorpio wrote: As I said, sometimes (always?) it's totally worth it to sacrifice realisim for awesomeness

Cheers
Dennis

Isn't that why we still love analogue brass?

~Pd~ · Post by **~Pd~** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:51 am

dalor wrote:My prediction: Once we have 99ghz computers running 1024 cores you still be able to play only one note at the time because emulation will have every aspect of analogue sound virtually modeled - or better, they will emulate a today's CPU emulating a 0df sem synth (to get the vintage 0df sem emulation sound)

Our descendants will emulate a Compaq running FL Studio 4 for that authentic kid in a bedroom sound.

mcnoone · Post by **mcnoone** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:52 am

Don't know if it was mentioned yet, but the hardware synths don't need to run other background software (os...etc)
They simply had all resources dedicated to the synth, but computers don't.
This is why it takes more cpu power for computers.

As for the this...

http://www.vintagesynth.com/yamaha/an1x.php
Got to try it out, and it's a great VA imo.
I'm getting it sometime early next year fo sho.
Can't get it atm unfortunately.

Teksonik · Post by **Teksonik** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:57 am

ttoz wrote: and i friggin LOVED my an1x......

yet today in the age of quad i7's we would need the ENTIRE processor to get 64 voices out of say diva or synthix?

But the AN1X couldn't do 64 Voices so your comparison is completely invalid.

Wiki:

"In monotimbral mode the AN1x has 10-note maximum polyphony, though the actual polyphony depends on scene settings and unison. Scene layering halves polyphony, unison uses five notes per note played, thus in layered unison mode the synthesizer is monophonic, though capable of 10x unison with careful programming. Using keyboard split assigns five voices to each scene, which may also be unisoned into two monophonic voices. Unison is also possible in poly mode - it uses two notes per note played."

I can easily play Zebra layered with Alchemy and Z3TA+ 2 on my modest Q6600 CPU without getting anywhere near using 100% and that combination will easily blow away anything the AN1X could do.......we are living in the Golden Age of Synthesis.

trimph1 · Post by **trimph1** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:59 am

dalor wrote:My prediction: Once we have 99ghz computers running 1024 cores you still be able to play only one note at the time because emulation will have every aspect of analogue sound virtually modeled - or better, they will emulate a today's CPU emulating a 0df sem synth (to get the vintage 0df sem emulation sound)

Don't forget the OSC drift and all that other stuff from just warming it up....

tenshin111 · Post by **tenshin111** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:59 am

Timfonie wrote:I'll add one more reason.

Hardware VA's usually run largely on dedicated Digital Signal Processors (DSP chips). These are far less flexible than the General CPU's we have in our PC's but they are also much more efficient. You can compare it with the graphical power of a video card versus that of the CPU itself.

Of course that's only a small part of the explanation. Modern day CPU's easily crunch those old and not so old DSP's.

I think this is actually quite a good explanation. The whole synth was a highly optimized machine - a single architecture with well-defined purpose and specialised dsp chips.

You can see something similar with game consoles these days - whether its Xbox 360 or PS3 - their architectures are almost 7-8 years old yet they are still capable of producing quite impressive gaming experience because they were built from scratch with this single task in mind. Of course, they cannot match the latest gpus but I still think that for such old (ancient?) hardware they are doing really well!

tenshin111 · Post by **tenshin111** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 11:59 am

tenshin111 wrote:
Timfonie wrote:I'll add one more reason.

Hardware VA's usually run largely on dedicated Digital Signal Processors (DSP chips). These are far less flexible than the General CPU's we have in our PC's but they are also much more efficient. You can compare it with the graphical power of a video card versus that of the CPU itself.

Of course that's only a small part of the explanation. Modern day CPU's easily crunch those old and not so old DSP's.
I think this is actually quite a good explanation. The whole synth was a highly optimized machine - a single architecture with well-defined purpose and specialised dsp chips.

You can see something similar with game consoles these days - whether its Xbox 360 or PS3 - their architectures are almost 7-8 years old yet they are still capable of producing quite impressive gaming experience because they were built from scratch with this single task in mind. Of course, they cannot match the latest gpus but I still think that for such old (ancient?) hardware they are doing really well!

But let's be honest - the nostalgia factor is also very important!

jupiter8 · Post by **jupiter8** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:02 pm

tenshin111 wrote:
Timfonie wrote:I'll add one more reason.

Hardware VA's usually run largely on dedicated Digital Signal Processors (DSP chips). These are far less flexible than the General CPU's we have in our PC's but they are also much more efficient. You can compare it with the graphical power of a video card versus that of the CPU itself.

Of course that's only a small part of the explanation. Modern day CPU's easily crunch those old and not so old DSP's.
I think this is actually quite a good explanation. The whole synth was a highly optimized machine - a single architecture with well-defined purpose and specialised dsp chips.

Actually it isn't. The DSP designer of today has like 1000 times the number cycles to play with than they had back then even though the DSP only did one thing. The available calculating power is NOT the answer to the question.

tehlord · Post by **tehlord** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:03 pm

I don't see how DSP efficiency effects the eventual sound coming out of a machine. Whether it's processing efficiently, or inefficiently it's still the same digital 1 and 0 result at the end.

jupiter8 · Post by **jupiter8** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:18 pm

I'm going to call it hyperreality even though that isn't the correct term for it but i think it describes it pretty well.

"I just traded my Prophet 5 for a Yamaha AN1X!"
"But it sounds nothing like a Prophet 5"
"Yeah i know,it's awesome"
"But there's like aliasing,noise and horrible digital distortion"
"Yeah i know,it's great,phat like a motherf**ker!"

or wood against plastic

"Hey i just changed from wood to plastic"
"Like why???"
"Wood is horrible,it's heavy and gets wet and stuff"
"But it's not the same thing"
"Yeah i know it's much better. Look at this one,it's red"
"That doesn't even look like wood"
"Awesome,isn't it?"

Some people prefer one thing over the other,that's all.
Even better than the real thing.

jupiter8 · Post by **jupiter8** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:20 pm

tehlord wrote:I don't see how DSP efficiency effects the eventual sound coming out of a machine. Whether it's processing efficiently, or inefficiently it's still the same digital 1 and 0 result at the end.

The implication would be that though the old DSPs weren't that powerful on paper they were in real life applications so you'd have tons of cycles to spare for awesomeDSPsauce. However that is far from the case. Really far.

Bronto Scorpio · Post by **Bronto Scorpio** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:22 pm

jupiter8 wrote:
tehlord wrote:I don't see how DSP efficiency effects the eventual sound coming out of a machine. Whether it's processing efficiently, or inefficiently it's still the same digital 1 and 0 result at the end.
The implication would be that though the old DSPs weren't that powerful on paper they were in real life applications so you'd have tons of cycles to spare for awesomeDSPsauce. However that is far from the case. Really far.

REALLY far!

jupiter8 · Post by **jupiter8** » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:23 pm

Bronto Scorpio wrote:
jupiter8 wrote:
tehlord wrote:I don't see how DSP efficiency effects the eventual sound coming out of a machine. Whether it's processing efficiently, or inefficiently it's still the same digital 1 and 0 result at the end.
The implication would be that though the old DSPs weren't that powerful on paper they were in real life applications so you'd have tons of cycles to spare for awesomeDSPsauce. However that is far from the case. Really far.
REALLY far!

Like going to the store compared to going to the next galaxy far!

How come "Hardware" VA's 16 years ago sounded so good like the AN1x and now....