Yes, there will be a new level of Fathom above Fathom Pro.
It will probably be called "Fathom Extreme", "Fathom X" or perhaps "Fathom Vector".
It will include the following features which are already done, but not yet released:
1. Intel AVX Parallel Processing (Super CPU Speed).
2. Universal Oscillator.
3. 16 Channel Digital Delay.
4. Extensive Skip Cycle processing.
5. Phase Modulation on Detune Page.
6. High Speed Phase Doubling (Moog Sound)
7. Bezier Curve over Additive Oscillator Spectrum.
8. NVidia GPU Video Card Audio Processing.
9. License Protection.
It will also include the following features shortly after which are not yet done:
10. Spectral Distortion and Morphing.
11. Compressor Limiter.
12. Comb Filter.
13. Arpeggiator.
14. Sampler.
15. Open GUI.
The universal oscillator is already done (mostly). This is a super oscillator which has all the existing oscillators rolled into one so you can morph and modulate between any of the oscillator types. It contains a new Phase page with high speed Phase doubling and multiple types of phase modulation as well as phase modulation added to the detune page.
The 16 Channel Digital Delay is already done. This monster delay unit has 16 independent stereo delay channels which can be routed into each other so the user can create any delay structure they desire.
The Open GUI exposes all Fathom's Image Files to the user so the user can edit them or load their own images on any part of the GUI. It will also have unlimited colors and textures for all the panels. The Open GUI will essentially allow users to completely re-skin the entire interface as well as a license to post and sell their own Fathom UI skins.
It will also include the one button press installer and license protector.
The price (for new users) will be somewhere around $125.00 (the price of our cheapest competitor with the same features, actually far less features).
However, existing users will have the total accumulation of everything they ever spent on Fathom, including the original price, all sound banks, and all upgrades, applied to the cost, plus a huge rebate. So for instance if you bought Fathom for $32, five sound banks for $25, and five upgrades for $25, plus the rebate of $25 you would essentially get your Fathom X license for free or close to it.
XBucket, I loaded up that preset, it's a really cool preset, I like the high frequency stuff.
Fathom Synth Development Thread
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- KVRAF
- Topic Starter
- 1579 posts since 25 Mar, 2017
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- KVRian
- 1421 posts since 14 Apr, 2016 from Germany
If you want you can start a competition to find the best name for your synth: Not only just for fun as it's also a good marketing tool and surely gain a little more interest for it.FathomSynth wrote: ↑Fri Oct 18, 2019 1:20 pmIt will probably be called "Fathom Extreme", "Fathom X" or perhaps "Fathom Vector".
Intel® Core™ i9-9900K•Cubase 11•Presonus Eris E8 XT•Focusrite Scarlett 18i20 & Octopre•NI Kontrol S61 MK2•Steinberg CC121•Synthesizers: Arturia Casio Korg Roland Yamaha
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- KVRist
- 41 posts since 2 May, 2018
Vector sounds nice. Can't wait for it!FathomSynth wrote: ↑Fri Oct 18, 2019 1:20 pm
However, existing users will have the total accumulation of everything they ever spent on Fathom, including the original price, all sound banks, and all upgrades, applied to the cost, plus a huge rebate. So for instance if you bought Fathom for $32, five sound banks for $25, and five upgrades for $25, plus the rebate of $25 you would essentially get your Fathom X license for free or close to it.
Keep up the good work!
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- KVRAF
- 9133 posts since 6 Oct, 2004
I like the idea of the bezier draw on additive. Might be able to get lucky
redrawing additive displays from screeshots of favorite Reactor instruments,
Vertigo, and other synths with additive displays. (but pondered and spoken
in my best Sergeant Schulz mode)
A short list of nVidia cards that will access the gpu capabilities
could help Santa in coming weeks
Cheers
redrawing additive displays from screeshots of favorite Reactor instruments,
Vertigo, and other synths with additive displays. (but pondered and spoken
in my best Sergeant Schulz mode)
A short list of nVidia cards that will access the gpu capabilities
could help Santa in coming weeks
Cheers
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- KVRist
- 283 posts since 6 Aug, 2017
Hmm. I was planning on buying an upgrade once the AVX update comes out. Is that still going to be part of Fathom Pro, or is it only going to be in a wholly separate, much more expensive product?
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- KVRAF
- Topic Starter
- 1579 posts since 25 Mar, 2017
To be honest I had not decided yet.
Intel AVX Parallel Processing will certainly be the heart of Fathom eXtreme.
We are currently working out the price points to meet the two critical priorities of extending full time development and providing a fair path to high speed processing to existing users who have supported the project for so long.
Generally speaking, Fathom Pro has always been about a quarter of the cost of our competitors. This was not done because we don't value our synth, but simply because without parallel processing it had approximately a quarter of the speed. The lower price was certainly not due to features, since Fathom at this point already has far more features than most of our competitors except Serum, Avenger and Omnisphere, and a few other synths with arpeggiators and samplers.
The original plan was to add Intel AVX Parallel Processing to an advanced version of Fathom which would enable us to sell Fathom at the same price as our competition, somewhere between $125 to $200. We will probably chose $125 since it is the price of our cheapest competitor. The reason for this is not increase profit but simply to extend full time development further so we can add heavy hitting features such as the Full Sampler, Arpeggiator, String Emulation, and Spectral Distortion.
The ultimate plan would be to have two products at these two important price points: Fathom Pro for new users and Fathom Extreme for advanced users and sound designers. Fathom Extreme will also have additional "extreme" features listed above such as the universal oscillator, 16 channel delay and some GPU processing.
However, we are also aware that many of our existing users have invested in the project under the expectation that Fathom's one weakness (CPU Speed) would eventually be addressed with Intel AVX. Therefore, we will probably have a special deal for existing users (anyone who has purchased Fathom prior to the AVX release) who will get a discount on Fathom X equal to all purchases they have ever made on Fathom, including Pro, Upgrades and Sound Banks.
If anyone objects strongly to jumping price points there may be an option to just add Intel AVX to Fathom Pro provided they run the license protection which will be mandatory for Intel AVX. I'm not yet sure how useful it would be since Fathom tends to attract serious sound designers who probably would prefer just to get everything provided their full investment is transferred.
The Universal Oscillator takes all the existing Fathom Oscillators and puts them in one oscillator allowing you to modulate and morph between any of the existing oscillators and all their parameters.
Plus it adds the following Wave Shaping options:
Compress/Expand.
Chop.
Skip Cycle.
High Speed Phase Modulation.
Compress/expand enables you to crush the waveform to the left, right or center. Chop allows you to cut notches in the waveform where the number of notches is continuously controlled by a frequency dial and the shape of the notches is adjustable. Skip cycle takes many or most of the oscillator parameters and allows you to apply them every other cycle to get some incredibly rich sub-oscillator textures without losing the tonality of the original octave. High speed phase modulation provides three completely unique phase modulation algorithms built into the oscillator itself which will enable you to get high pressure sounds out of the oscillator normally only possible with an analog synth. All options can be modulated.
These features are essentially done and just need to be merged into the main line code.
I already have NVidia GPU processing working for buffer calculation, but eventually I wanted to get it working for full oscillator processing. If this is possible it will essentially provide infinite CPU speed since with over 1024 parallel GPU threads it would be next to impossible to max it out even if you filled up the signal flow view with units and played 64 notes all at once. This would also make it possible to have signal flow layers. My own testing seems to indicate that latency is not an issue which is not surprising since most HD games run at 60+ frames per second, and 44K / 512 samples per block = 86, which is the same order of magnitude.
Intel AVX Parallel Processing will certainly be the heart of Fathom eXtreme.
We are currently working out the price points to meet the two critical priorities of extending full time development and providing a fair path to high speed processing to existing users who have supported the project for so long.
Generally speaking, Fathom Pro has always been about a quarter of the cost of our competitors. This was not done because we don't value our synth, but simply because without parallel processing it had approximately a quarter of the speed. The lower price was certainly not due to features, since Fathom at this point already has far more features than most of our competitors except Serum, Avenger and Omnisphere, and a few other synths with arpeggiators and samplers.
The original plan was to add Intel AVX Parallel Processing to an advanced version of Fathom which would enable us to sell Fathom at the same price as our competition, somewhere between $125 to $200. We will probably chose $125 since it is the price of our cheapest competitor. The reason for this is not increase profit but simply to extend full time development further so we can add heavy hitting features such as the Full Sampler, Arpeggiator, String Emulation, and Spectral Distortion.
The ultimate plan would be to have two products at these two important price points: Fathom Pro for new users and Fathom Extreme for advanced users and sound designers. Fathom Extreme will also have additional "extreme" features listed above such as the universal oscillator, 16 channel delay and some GPU processing.
However, we are also aware that many of our existing users have invested in the project under the expectation that Fathom's one weakness (CPU Speed) would eventually be addressed with Intel AVX. Therefore, we will probably have a special deal for existing users (anyone who has purchased Fathom prior to the AVX release) who will get a discount on Fathom X equal to all purchases they have ever made on Fathom, including Pro, Upgrades and Sound Banks.
If anyone objects strongly to jumping price points there may be an option to just add Intel AVX to Fathom Pro provided they run the license protection which will be mandatory for Intel AVX. I'm not yet sure how useful it would be since Fathom tends to attract serious sound designers who probably would prefer just to get everything provided their full investment is transferred.
The Universal Oscillator takes all the existing Fathom Oscillators and puts them in one oscillator allowing you to modulate and morph between any of the existing oscillators and all their parameters.
Plus it adds the following Wave Shaping options:
Compress/Expand.
Chop.
Skip Cycle.
High Speed Phase Modulation.
Compress/expand enables you to crush the waveform to the left, right or center. Chop allows you to cut notches in the waveform where the number of notches is continuously controlled by a frequency dial and the shape of the notches is adjustable. Skip cycle takes many or most of the oscillator parameters and allows you to apply them every other cycle to get some incredibly rich sub-oscillator textures without losing the tonality of the original octave. High speed phase modulation provides three completely unique phase modulation algorithms built into the oscillator itself which will enable you to get high pressure sounds out of the oscillator normally only possible with an analog synth. All options can be modulated.
These features are essentially done and just need to be merged into the main line code.
I already have NVidia GPU processing working for buffer calculation, but eventually I wanted to get it working for full oscillator processing. If this is possible it will essentially provide infinite CPU speed since with over 1024 parallel GPU threads it would be next to impossible to max it out even if you filled up the signal flow view with units and played 64 notes all at once. This would also make it possible to have signal flow layers. My own testing seems to indicate that latency is not an issue which is not surprising since most HD games run at 60+ frames per second, and 44K / 512 samples per block = 86, which is the same order of magnitude.
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- KVRist
- 260 posts since 30 Mar, 2019
I'm extremely impressed by Fathom. It's definitely the most fun synth to use over anything else. The potential is huge.
Messing with the wavetables and FM is really interesting and fun. For pure synthesis this is really very interesting. The visual side helps make it very creative.
There are some issues though. The audio still kind of breaks up a lot for me in Reaper on Windows, fast CPU etc. It's just a bit clicky and on and off, hit or miss with whether it comes out sounding clear and usable.
Here is one question: say I send one Wavetable into another Wavetable to modulate it. Why can't I modulate the parameters on the first Wavetable? I can do so manually, but I can't actually modulate them using the LFO, it doesn't work. I'm still kind of confused about the FM and how that works, because pitch doesn't effect it. It's really fun to play with but I feel like some of the potential is unmet.
Is CPU the issue? I'd be willing to pay a fair amount to see a Waldorf tier wavetable playground like this is offering, but in the box. I don't get how the actual FM works, it seems like there could be more possibilities of FM modulating wavetables with filtered signals, etc.
Messing with the wavetables and FM is really interesting and fun. For pure synthesis this is really very interesting. The visual side helps make it very creative.
There are some issues though. The audio still kind of breaks up a lot for me in Reaper on Windows, fast CPU etc. It's just a bit clicky and on and off, hit or miss with whether it comes out sounding clear and usable.
Here is one question: say I send one Wavetable into another Wavetable to modulate it. Why can't I modulate the parameters on the first Wavetable? I can do so manually, but I can't actually modulate them using the LFO, it doesn't work. I'm still kind of confused about the FM and how that works, because pitch doesn't effect it. It's really fun to play with but I feel like some of the potential is unmet.
Is CPU the issue? I'd be willing to pay a fair amount to see a Waldorf tier wavetable playground like this is offering, but in the box. I don't get how the actual FM works, it seems like there could be more possibilities of FM modulating wavetables with filtered signals, etc.
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- KVRAF
- Topic Starter
- 1579 posts since 25 Mar, 2017
I'm not sure what you mean by "can't modulate parameters on the first wave table" since all the wave table dials can be modulated except the algorithm and direction. You'll need to give me more details on that.
In terms of audio break ups and glitches. I spent most of this year addressing those issues, so I'm not sure what else can be done other than the jump to Intel AVX coming out shortly.
The user manual has an entire chapter on CPU and avoiding such issues, have you tried reading it?
The windows optimization section alone gave me a CPU boost on my own system of double! When I recently upgraded my entire development system to Windows 10 there were extremely bad audio glitches. Fathom presets which ran at 25% CPU in Windows 7 were maxing out at 100% in Windows 10. All the new Windows 10 services going on under the hood were robbing processor time from the DAW and randomly causing overloads, clicks, dropouts and horrible distortion. After performing all the steps in the Windows Optimization procedure my system performance returned to normal in Windows 10 and I had no glitches at all, which is why I put all the steps and the correct settings now in the manual.
Also, there is a difficult subject to talk about and that is Reaper. Nine out of ten times when people report glitches they are using Fathom in Reaper. I don't want to say it's Reaper's fault since I'm sure it is something that I am doing wrong not Reaper, and also since I know so many people love Reaper, but the combination of Fathom and Reaper always seems to be especially problematic.
There are hundreds of settings in Reaper and most people have no idea what any of them do.
Even worse, some of them need to be set correctly to avoid glitches and they are not set correctly by default. A good example is having to tell Reaper that you expect tracks to be automatically assigned to separate processor cores, an obvious choice which DAW's like Ableton do by default. Any of of these settings could completely screw up your audio and if you don't go through every single setting in Reaper knowing exactly what each one does, then you are going to get glitches. If you try to run a multi-track project on one processor core then of course you are going to get glitches.
Anyone serious about recording should spend the money on one of the professional level DAW's like Ableton, Cakewalk, Cubase, Digital Performer, Bitwig, Studio One or Pro Tools. Ableton and Fathom is a particularly great combination and I do all my work with Ableton since it runs so perfectly under the hood and there are never any problems.
In terms of quality and stability I can't imagine any reason someone would want to use anything except Ableton, unless there are specific advanced features you need that are only in a super DAW like Cubase, Digital Performer, Studio One or Pro Tools, or if you prefer the fancy graphics.
I'm not saying Reaper is a bad DAW, just that you have to know what you are doing to use it correctly since it does set up things automatically for the best CPU usage.
Also, I've noticed glitches in some audio drivers and not others so just changing your driver can impact it.
There is also a massive design change I will be making in the AVX release which will establish a minimum processing sample block size inside Fathom so DAW's like Reaper or FL Studio can't cause distortion by sending blocks of one or two samples. This will be coming out with AVX and should help a lot with those DAW's.
Also, which version of Fathom are you running. Version 2.33 fixed all the audio glitches which occur during dial movement, so make sure you have that most recent release.
In terms of audio break ups and glitches. I spent most of this year addressing those issues, so I'm not sure what else can be done other than the jump to Intel AVX coming out shortly.
The user manual has an entire chapter on CPU and avoiding such issues, have you tried reading it?
The windows optimization section alone gave me a CPU boost on my own system of double! When I recently upgraded my entire development system to Windows 10 there were extremely bad audio glitches. Fathom presets which ran at 25% CPU in Windows 7 were maxing out at 100% in Windows 10. All the new Windows 10 services going on under the hood were robbing processor time from the DAW and randomly causing overloads, clicks, dropouts and horrible distortion. After performing all the steps in the Windows Optimization procedure my system performance returned to normal in Windows 10 and I had no glitches at all, which is why I put all the steps and the correct settings now in the manual.
Also, there is a difficult subject to talk about and that is Reaper. Nine out of ten times when people report glitches they are using Fathom in Reaper. I don't want to say it's Reaper's fault since I'm sure it is something that I am doing wrong not Reaper, and also since I know so many people love Reaper, but the combination of Fathom and Reaper always seems to be especially problematic.
There are hundreds of settings in Reaper and most people have no idea what any of them do.
Even worse, some of them need to be set correctly to avoid glitches and they are not set correctly by default. A good example is having to tell Reaper that you expect tracks to be automatically assigned to separate processor cores, an obvious choice which DAW's like Ableton do by default. Any of of these settings could completely screw up your audio and if you don't go through every single setting in Reaper knowing exactly what each one does, then you are going to get glitches. If you try to run a multi-track project on one processor core then of course you are going to get glitches.
Anyone serious about recording should spend the money on one of the professional level DAW's like Ableton, Cakewalk, Cubase, Digital Performer, Bitwig, Studio One or Pro Tools. Ableton and Fathom is a particularly great combination and I do all my work with Ableton since it runs so perfectly under the hood and there are never any problems.
In terms of quality and stability I can't imagine any reason someone would want to use anything except Ableton, unless there are specific advanced features you need that are only in a super DAW like Cubase, Digital Performer, Studio One or Pro Tools, or if you prefer the fancy graphics.
I'm not saying Reaper is a bad DAW, just that you have to know what you are doing to use it correctly since it does set up things automatically for the best CPU usage.
Also, I've noticed glitches in some audio drivers and not others so just changing your driver can impact it.
There is also a massive design change I will be making in the AVX release which will establish a minimum processing sample block size inside Fathom so DAW's like Reaper or FL Studio can't cause distortion by sending blocks of one or two samples. This will be coming out with AVX and should help a lot with those DAW's.
Also, which version of Fathom are you running. Version 2.33 fixed all the audio glitches which occur during dial movement, so make sure you have that most recent release.
Last edited by FathomSynth on Sun Oct 20, 2019 10:03 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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- KVRAF
- Topic Starter
- 1579 posts since 25 Mar, 2017
All modern Intel Processors have AVX2.
AVX2 was introduced with Haswell in 2013 so unless your system is over seven years old, you probably have it.
I'm not sure if the AMD RYZEN supports AVX2 or not but it should be fairly easy to look up.
According to the AMD's spec page on Ryzen it does support AVX2.
I will be releasing a pre-installer which will detect if your system's processor is AVX2 compatible. This will be a free download which anyone can run in order to see if buying Fathom Extreme would be worth it.
AVX2 was introduced with Haswell in 2013 so unless your system is over seven years old, you probably have it.
I'm not sure if the AMD RYZEN supports AVX2 or not but it should be fairly easy to look up.
According to the AMD's spec page on Ryzen it does support AVX2.
I will be releasing a pre-installer which will detect if your system's processor is AVX2 compatible. This will be a free download which anyone can run in order to see if buying Fathom Extreme would be worth it.
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- KVRAF
- Topic Starter
- 1579 posts since 25 Mar, 2017
The very first Intel Vector release will be AVX2 only.
However, converting AVX2 back to AVX1 is very easy, so the very next release will cover AVX1.
The time between releases will be pretty fast like maybe two weeks at the most.
The reason it is easy is because both AVX 1 and 2 are essentially the same (same register sizes). The difference is that AVX2 added a bunch of instructions which for convenience implement multiple steps at once inside the processor. So converting AVX2 back to AVX1 is a simple matter of locating all the AVX2 only instructions and implementing them manually in AVX1. There is a lot of code to go through, but the process is relatively simple, especially since I will be creating AVX1 methods to cover the missing AVX2 instructions, and once those methods are done it is a simple find and replace. So that is why the very next release will cover AVX1.
Also the CPU improvement for AVX1 will be almost as fast as AVX2.
However, converting AVX2 back to AVX1 is very easy, so the very next release will cover AVX1.
The time between releases will be pretty fast like maybe two weeks at the most.
The reason it is easy is because both AVX 1 and 2 are essentially the same (same register sizes). The difference is that AVX2 added a bunch of instructions which for convenience implement multiple steps at once inside the processor. So converting AVX2 back to AVX1 is a simple matter of locating all the AVX2 only instructions and implementing them manually in AVX1. There is a lot of code to go through, but the process is relatively simple, especially since I will be creating AVX1 methods to cover the missing AVX2 instructions, and once those methods are done it is a simple find and replace. So that is why the very next release will cover AVX1.
Also the CPU improvement for AVX1 will be almost as fast as AVX2.
