FXpansion releases Cypher2

[nordickvr]

@Angus_FX
Is unified TransMod between Cypher 2 and Strobe 2 planning?
That would be great.

[Angus_FX]

Nice skin @stefken!

Is there a way to target specific knobs? I wanted to draw attention to the filter cutoff.
If I change the colours of styModKnobLarge3, I can change the color of the knob, but others change as well.
I'd prefer more granular control.

You could modify SynthEngine.skin, you can add new styles in the skin_defs and they'll be picked up there. That's maybe digging a little deeper than we intended, but if it looks good, that's not a problem. Certainly I'm not offended by people hacking in to those files and doing clever stuff.

Is there a faster way than deleting the plugin and reopening it in your DAW, to see the changes in the xml reflected in the GUI ( I use Ableton 10 on Windows 7, 64 bit)?

Yes, just switch to another skin and back again, and the skin files will all be reloaded from disk.

[Angus_FX]

So... is Windows 8.1 supported for Cypher2? I'm still running that, and moving to Windows 10 will be a big pain (many dozens of plugins to re-authorize), so I won't be doing it for a while.

8.1 will work with the caveat that high-DPI support may not work consistently across multiple-monitor setups. Mixed DPIs across monitors is very much Here Be Dragons territory prior to W10.

[Angus_FX]

Is unified TransMod between Cypher 2 and Strobe 2 planning?
That would be great.

Do you mean the UI/UX conventions or something else?

The plan is for there to be a second mid-life upgrade to Strobe2 (v2.3 was the first) bringing over some of the new UI elements from Cypher2. It'll stay at 16 TransMod slots (to Cypher2's 24) and won't get the beefed-up arpeggiator / sequencer, but there's a lot of other things that would make sense to bring across. I can't give you any timeline for that, but it's very much the plan. Tidying up any loose ends with Cypher2 is higher priority though.

[nordickvr]

Yes, UI/UX conventions, if this means working with TransMod in the exact same ways across the two synths.
Thank you for the reply!

[Stefken]

You could modify SynthEngine.skin, you can add new styles in the skin_defs and they'll be picked up there. That's maybe digging a little deeper than we intended, but if it looks good, that's not a problem. Certainly I'm not offended by people hacking in to those files and doing clever stuff.

Will this not break other skins, If I add a new style in my skin_defs file and reference this new style in SynthEngine.skin? As other skins will not have a definition for that new style?

Edit: or maybe I could copy the line in SynthEngine.skin and keep the original?
Like:

<CtrlModKnob2 name="Osc3*1" style="styModKnobLarge6" rect="[x:2 y:225 w:36 h:36]" visible="true" id="102" zorder="5" />
<CtrlModKnob2 name="Osc3*1" style="MYNEWSTYLE" rect="[x:2 y:225 w:36 h:36]" visible="true" id="102" zorder="5" />

If the second style 'MYNEWSTYLE" isn't found, it will not change any attributes and just ignore this style.

Just guessing here....

[Angus_FX]

Yes, that'd break the other skins (although you could add the new style there as well); right now there is no fallback mechanism if a style name isn't found, but I do rather like that as an idea, being able to specify additional styles and have it fall back gracefully to the default one for the widget type.

[drewfx]

There seems to be some odd behaviour with tuning stability going on in the FM engine. Check out the sound example below. It's the init patch with only the following modifications: 'FM from 2' is turned up in osc 1, osc 2 is active but with the volume turned down (thus using purely as an FM source), sine wave mode is active on both oscs and their shape dials are turned fully left. We hear 6 notes played with very short gaps between notes, then 6 notes with slightly longer gaps between, then 6 final notes with short gaps again.

Now take a variable-waveshape oscillator with phase reset, as featured in Cypher. Most of its waveforms have some inherent DC component (think about a 0-5v pulse wave on 5% duty cycle.. huge amount of undesirable DC), and there's a DC-blocking filter (a basic high-pass) to remove it. This is absolutely normal, there's a bit of art and science in choosing a filter to remove undesirable DC without removing desirable bass, but that's nothing new or clever.

But what happens when you take one of these VCO style oscillators and use it as an FM source? Well, the DC filter takes a few waveform cycles to warm up (for example, a 10Hz filter needs tens to hundreds of milliseconds). During that time, there's some DC present, which causes the modulated waveform's center frequency to shift, hence the detuning you're hearing.

In actual fact, Cypher2 (unlike its predecessor) has separate DC filters on the VCOs' audio outputs and FM paths. On the FM side, it uses a much more aggressive filter to try and mitigate the issue you've outlined above, whereas on the audio path it's set lower to preserve the bass, but even so it's not possible to remove this effect completely. In addition, when a phase reset happens, the DC filter is initialised to an approximate value based on the last known frequency and wave shape to try and get it to stabilise quicker.

This doesn't seem correct: a free running osc (phase reset off means free running, correct?) though a HPF can't have DC with each new note.

And if I start with the default patch as described and turn polyphony to 1 (mono) it doesn't happen, so it seems to be related to something with the polyphonic voice/osc allocation to me.

Or am I missing something?

[D Midas]

I’m on protools 12.8, finally fired up cypher 2 after purchasing it last week. Runs for a few mins and sounds great then crashes protools and won’t let me restart it even after a computer reboot protools will keep saying that it did not shut down properly and won’t load. I have to remove protools and the re- install it. Happened three times and I gave up

[aMUSEd]

I've made a NKS version of Cypher 2 if anyone wants it - in the NKS User Library (in my sig) - no presets yet, just the controller template and integration files.

[FastTriggerFish]

I took the plunge and bought a Rise 49 and Cypher2.
My initial impression after a few hours : the combination is incredible.
Cypher2 is extremely powerful and expressive, and excellent sounding.
I like the interface, steep learning curve but having everything in one panel is great.

The filters are OK, but not on the same level as say Diva, Repro,Oddity2 etc. I thought filter sweeps with the Rise would be incredible, and they're acceptable but I think that's not where the real goodness is to be found, it is in the FM and ring mod instead. Now these are really amazing.
So it's better thought of as a West Coast synth with some filters for additional sound shaping. That's cool with me.
I'm not a big fan of the Reverb and Delay, or at least how they are used in many presets, I find them a bit muddy and I've found myself reaching for the effects off button more often than normal. I will need to spend more time with them.

The modulation system is extremely well thought out.
So, despite a couple of niggles I feel like this is one of the most exciting synths to come out in a long time and I can't wait to spend more time with it.

[Angus_FX]

@D Midas - please reach out to ROLI tech support with your full system info, that should not be happening at all.

@drewfx - what you're perhaps missing is:

- that the osc (apart from osc 1) isn't totally free running in the sense of an analogue synth - it "powers down" when the voice is off.

- that in some cases (though not all), the asymmetry or DC component may be frequency/pitch dependent.

Fundamentally the issue is that this kind of FM is far, far more sensitive to otherwise-unimportant amounts of DC or near-DC frequencies (ID on fx bugtracker: 0015498)

@FastTriggerFish have you tried the filters with different amounts of drive? The timbre of the JPT, FAT and MGF especially can change radically as you push the gain stage.

[JerGoertz]

I initially wasn't sold on the filters either, but there are some patches where they shine quite nicely.

[himalaya]

The FXpansion filters are superb. The SVF can do a superb imitation of the SH-101 filter, with similar harmonics when swept at high resonance.

But, Cypher2 shines when the two filters are used in the split stereo mode. Here, some of the timbres are trully astounding. Very, analogue sounding. Very powerful. Not something that one would use for the latest EDM hit, instead, something that should satisfy peeps into darker electronic themes.

Check out the audio demo a few pages back, and the 'dual filters' description beneath it.

[FastTriggerFish]

Thanks @himalaya and @Angus_FX, maybe I was too quick to judge the filters.
I will spend more time fine tuning them.