Hive 2.0 sanity check

[Biome_Digital]

Really good update! Hive is a great synth and the new features are awesome. Thanks for adding the shapers!!

[Stefken]

Feature request: a way to set the modulation depth of a modulator on the target knob itself.

Once you have dropped the bullseye onto a target, you can press the orange circle and drag to change modulation depth.

Thank you. Still have to read the manual. Glad the functionality is there.

[Yorrrrrr]

I've noticed that the plugin is quite 'slow'. It runs @ ~55 FPS and even lower when moving knobs, going down to around ~22 FPS.
I hope this will be fixed when released!

Yes, I've noticed that. Why not 60 fps everywhere? And here when I change to a GUI size other than 100%, it becomes like 5 fps.

[exmatproton]

I've noticed that the plugin is quite 'slow'. It runs @ ~55 FPS and even lower when moving knobs, going down to around ~22 FPS.
I hope this will be fixed when released!

Yes, I've noticed that. Why not 60 fps everywhere? And here when I change to a GUI size other than 100%, it becomes like 5 fps.

Indeed. Also, when the plugin is "slowing down", MIDI input (playing notes on a midi controller for instance) is sluggish as well. This behavior is gone when the interface is closed (the plugin isn't showing)

[zoikkis]

Really nice new features but UI indeed is almost unusably slow with an integrated GFX card, especially with other than default GUI size and having the keys visible. Hopefully will be fixed, or giving the option to disable realtime osc/filter displays, if those are causing the slowdowns. Maybe creating an alternate skin having all the gpu intensive features disabled.

[Urs]

I've noticed that the plugin is quite 'slow'. It runs @ ~55 FPS and even lower when moving knobs, going down to around ~22 FPS.
I hope this will be fixed when released!

Yes, I've noticed that. Why not 60 fps everywhere? And here when I change to a GUI size other than 100%, it becomes like 5 fps.

I have just given an interview for a German magazine where I outline that the biggest CPU issue is not the DSP part (analogue modelling) anymore but the UI. Retina displays have increased the amount of calculations needed to display things, and at the same time e.g. Apple has dropped hardware acceleration on many of their standard user interface technologies. Thirdly, people slowly prefer vector UIs, which are a magnitude slower than pixel graphics when rendered without hardware acceleration.

We are in a bit of a dilemma: If we rewrite our UI engine to use Metal, we don't know what happens when Apple switches to ARM processors. If we rewrite our UI to use OpenGL, we know we're definitely going to be rendered on the CPU, not the GPU. We can follow some other ideas, but those might force us to do more spreadsheet-like UIs since we can't have freely overlapping areas anymore.

That said, we are aware that some hosts slow down our UIs even more due to the way they configure the drawing environment of their process. That's another angle.

Lastly, and most importantly, if you're on Mojave, there is the issue with the Colour Profile for your screen, and we found that sometimes using HDMI offered very different frame rates from using USB-C etc.

Neither of these issues can be addressed in less than "many months", possibly years even, but we found no issues in Hive while the Scope and Wavetable hexagons are closed. If you experience issues, try to avoid keeping those open.

[Urs]

Feature request: a way to set the modulation depth of a modulator on the target knob itself.

Sorry, check out the user manual!

I'm also working on a video for Tuesday which shows this stuff in action. Hope I can get it in time.

[Urs]

I've noticed that the plugin is quite 'slow'. It runs @ ~55 FPS and even lower when moving knobs, going down to around ~22 FPS.
I hope this will be fixed when released!

I think we actually run UI updates at 25 Hz. If I remember correctly, the recommended update rate for plug-ins once was 20Hz, I'm not sure where this is at.

"UI sluggishness" in our previous UIs was always related to a) vector graphics and b) immediate drawing on mouse events. We dropped the immediate drawing on mouse events and found that the current UI is overall way more responsive than it used to be.

How do you measure FPS? - I'd be curious to do some tests myself after the roll out.

[Julien Unison]

This upgrade is insanely good ! "next level" virtual synth

Amazing quality/cpu ratio, very dynamic/responsive sound. This synth is full of life, a really pleasure to hear/play.

[exmatproton]

I've noticed that the plugin is quite 'slow'. It runs @ ~55 FPS and even lower when moving knobs, going down to around ~22 FPS.
I hope this will be fixed when released!

I think we actually run UI updates at 25 Hz. If I remember correctly, the recommended update rate for plug-ins once was 20Hz, I'm not sure where this is at.

"UI sluggishness" in our previous UIs was always related to a) vector graphics and b) immediate drawing on mouse events. We dropped the immediate drawing on mouse events and found that the current UI is overall way more responsive than it used to be.

How do you measure FPS? - I'd be curious to do some tests myself after the roll out.

I see.

FL Studio (latest) has a FPS counter build in. Not sure how exact this figure is, but i've tested multiple vst's with different update speeds ranging from 60FPS (Rapid) to very slow ones (Rob Papen vst's ~20 FPS).

When the preset browser is open in Hive2, it runs at 60FPS according to FL Studio and it 'feels' like that indeed. The number drops fast when using other UI elements in Hive2 (moving knobs when SCOPE or WAVETABLE view is open). When i run the plugin BRIDGED, FL Studio is reporting 60FPS, but the UI is still as 'sluggish'.
Same goes when i BRIDGE the plugin and use an external window.

Maybe i am spoiled with high refresh rate displays (OnePlus 7 Pro) and applications like Rapid, but i think this can become an issue when MIDI input is becoming sluggish as well (other plugins have this as well; Synthmaster One for instance).

[Urs]

Yeah, I guess we'll recommend to keep WT tab and Scope closed unless necessary...

[exmatproton]

Yeah, I guess we'll recommend to keep WT tab and Scope closed unless necessary...

Other then that; nice update.

1 BIG problem i've encountered;

Saving presets isn't working like it should. There is something wrong with the X/Y controllers. When saving a new preset without any entry in the X/Y section, these will be loaded with entries when trying to opening said preset.

[pekbro]

The Scope is awesome...

[Urs]

Saving presets isn't working like it should. There is something wrong with the X/Y controllers. When saving a new preset without any entry in the X/Y section, these will be loaded with entries when trying to opening said preset.

This is how we managed to magically assign XYs to thousands of existing Hive patches. It's been like that since Hive 1.2, when we introduced XYs.

But now of course you have additional control over them, and quick ways to remove/change/redo assignments.

But yeah, we simply don't want unassigned XYs, and experience tells us that people can't be bothered to assign them. Hence we auto-assign whenever necessary/possible.

[Urs]

The Scope is awesome...

hehe, yes. It wasn't planned for Hive, but I wrote it for debugging purpose, and it was just too good not to include it.

(just remember to not keep it open all the time... drawing it costs considerable CPU)