Anacreon Synthesizer | Anacreon 2.5 Released

[Kitt Rainbolt]

@teacue - could you save the preset that causes crackling and upload it here? I would like to test it out and see how it does on my PC.

I have a weaker processor than you - AMD Phenom II X4, 965 Processor@ 3.21 GHz. I can play full 8 note polyphony on some patches, but not others.

At 8 notes, you can be running up to 32 ladder filter emulations simultaneously. With high settings on the oscillator super parameter, you can run up to 1536 oscillators. It gets expensive pretty quick!

I do want to find a way to make these filters run faster, but I need to focus on crashes / usability before I dial in on efficiency more than I already have.

[Kitt Rainbolt]

@resistent

here's a sine wave patch!

[teacue]

@teacue - could you save the preset that causes crackling and upload it here? I would like to test it out and see how it does on my PC.

I have a weaker processor than you - AMD Phenom II X4, 965 Processor@ 3.21 GHz. I can play full 8 note polyphony on some patches, but not others.

At 8 notes, you can be running up to 32 ladder filter emulations simultaneously. With high settings on the oscillator super parameter, you can run up to 1536 oscillators. It gets expensive pretty quick!

I do want to find a way to make these filters run faster, but I need to focus on crashes / usability before I dial in on efficiency more than I already have.

I get these crackles playing a three tones chord with two of the presets you provided:
Plucky Delay Arp
Employee Training Video

I get rid of them only with 4096 buffer size

[bmanic]

Aww shit.. still have crashes with Anacreon 2.5.2.1. Again Reaper crashed when I switched preset while playing. I'm on Windows 8.1 home premium or whatever it is called, in case that helps. Maybe I could get somekind of crash dump for you? I know reaper creates those when it crashes but I could also perhaps generate the one windows creates when an app crashes. Would those help?

I've also noticed Anacreon has huge issues with 'clicks' when it runs out of polyphony.. So a simple 3 voice pattern if there happens to be a 4th voice and it needs to switch, there is always a click.. no matter what I try. I've tried softening envelope attacks/releases. Tried 'soft' mode in main output section.. etc. Basically tried it all but it happens on voice switching. The obvious cure is to never let Anacreon run out of voices but that unfortunately takes away some awesome possibilities with legato and abusing voice switching with low poly stuff. If at all possible, this should be investigated and smoothed out. Maybe a tiny bit smoothing for each oscillator before it switches.. or never do it except at zero crossings or something. I think the click comes from the oscillator ending or starting in the middle of a wave cycle at random phase positions.

[Kitt Rainbolt]

@bmanic - the clicking can be difficult to track down in some cases. Most synthesizers prevent you from having clicks by enforcing a minimum envelope value - I didn't want to limit my users! If you send me your patch, I can fix it up to avoid clicking.

Here's the method I would use:
-set "soft" reset mode
-make sure you have long enough attack and release on all envelopes in use.
-"long enough" is actually different depending on the patch. In some cases, especially when you have a lowpass filter set to a low frequency, clicks will be extra apparent. In this case, you just need to increase that attack/release time. A good starting value for both attack and release is .0100.
-since you're noticing it during "voice stealing" in polyphonic modes, it's probably your attack.

Edit Oscillator clicks can only occur when retrigger is enabled. Every module "freezes" when the voice ends and picks up where it left off unless you're explicitly telling it to reset via retrigger or a sync signal.

Edit2 .0100 is 10ms - these envelopes go down to fractions of a millisecond.

Edit3 does the crash happen only if you switch presets while playing? If so, I think I know how to fix that as well.

[bmanic]

The clicking has most definitely nothing to do with the envelopes. You can get clicks even with very clear attack and release. It has to do with the note stealing, when you run out of polyphony.

.0100 (or 10ms) is way too much for simple click avoidance. I have synths that go basically as fast as Anacreon (sub 1ms) and can avoid clicks. I have other synths that can be much much faster and have absolutely no problems with clicking at all. I'm pretty sure it's about something wonky in the voice stealing.

You can debug it like this:

1) Create a simple arpeggio pattern, going up the scale like 1st 3rd 5th 7th 5th 3rd 1st. No make that so that you have 3 octaves going (aka 3 note polyphony).

2) Now stretch all notes so that they overlap a tiny bit (forcing note stealing to kick in)

3) Listen for clicks. Good luck getting rid of them, especially with any pluck type sound where you have a LP Filter quite down low with an envelope modulating the filter.. you know, the typical trance pluck. Of course make sure each envelope is set to retrigger.

With this simple scenario I get a lot of clicks, unlike any other synth I have available. Pretty sure it has to do with voice stealing where something gets messed up. This is regardless of attack and release settings. Heck you can set it so that it is almost a pad and still get clicks.


As for the crashing. I just had another crash when I tried to delete an Anacreon instance from my project. Boom. Reaper dead. I've only had two types of crashes: While switching presets while playing or playback is enabled in the host.. and when trying to load a new project or deleting an instance of Anacreon (same thing basically).

[bmanic]

Audio example of clicks. A 3 note chord pattern where I set Anacreon to 2 voice polyphony. Envelopes have a minimum of 0.5s attack and release..

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1m21QzF ... sp=sharing

.. so as you can hear, it has nothing to do with envelope speeds. That's the first thing I checked of course.

[bmanic]

And here are some audio examples of how properly working voice stealing sounds. Both examples use 2 voice polyphony, to force voice stealing:

Pigments 2 (note! there ARE some clicks but they are much less noticeable)

ElextraX (no clicks at all, different voice stealing algorithm from pigments)

[Kitt Rainbolt]

@bmanic first off, that's a seriously cool sounding patch. I would love to make that patch not click.

Here's a way less cool patch - could you tell me if it clicks using the same midi score from that sample you sent? Also, I figured the first place you checked was the envelopes - I sincerely apologize for coming across a bit condescending, I'm just trying to be thorough and sometimes my interpersonal skills suffer while I'm focusing on technicalities!

If this attached patch causes clicking, could you send me some midi that makes it click on your computer and I'll try it on mine?

If it doesn't cause clicking, then the only possibilities are:
- you're using a portion of the synthesizer (maybe the limiter?) that is broken and I don't know it yet! (i sincerely hope not)
- maybe an LFO is retriggering? Try setting the retrigger to "legato" if you're using an LFO with retrigger enabled.

Regarding voice stealing - the architecture of this synth is such that an individual component might have a problem with voice stealing while the rest of the synth is fine. This is what I'm trying to rule out.

if you feel comfortable doing so, could you make a clicky patch and post it here so I can see if it depends on the computer running it?

Regarding crashing - does the save/load project problem also only occur when the plugin has active voices running?

I've also attached a scope image of a 500hz lowpassed sawtooth with a main envelope release of 1.2 ms. Although the input signal is dull and lowpassed, the speed of the release is enough to add high frequency content and make an audible click in this case. I could potentially round off the start of the release curve, but I'm trying to emulate how a capacitor would discharge, and I worry that might change the character of the synth.

release click.png

[Kitt Rainbolt]

@teacue - it sounds like you are suffering from buffer underrun. Are you using an ASIO driver? If not, you can get a significant performance advantage by using one. Check out: http://www.asio4all.org/

I'm going to go look into what SSE operations your processor supports just to make sure I'm not missing out on some optimization for your CPU.

[Kitt Rainbolt]

@bmanic - here's an example of the debug run you suggested with and without clicks:
https://vimeo.com/447619073

Edit there might be a little bit of sporadic crackle due to running screen capture, which doesn't really play nice with ableton for some reason. Around 3:16 you can see the high end in the spectrum analyzer showing a click, but that goes away once I adjust the envelopes. I don't think that the issue is voice stealing at this point. I'm worried it's something really specific and hard to track down in the synth, which is why I would SO appreciate a preset file if you have the time/inclination.

Thanks again for all your help so far, by the way!

[bmanic]

Check PM in a few minutes. Will send you a super simplified version of the preset and the actual MIDI clip.

[Kitt Rainbolt]

All,

bmanic sent me a preset that shed light on the clicking - it's the main envelope gain setting. Please leave that at 100% to avoid clicking while I work on an update to fix it. @bmanic, thank you for your help. This bug would have taken me AGES to find - I almost never use the main gain setting! I'll fix this and publish 2.5.2.2 tomorrow.

[pough]

Version 2.5.2.1 is still very crashy here. It crashes in FL Studio. It crashed in Waveform 11 with and without the plugin sandboxing. I have installed it on another computer (desktop Windows 10 vs laptop Windows 10) and it crashes still.

There aren't a lot of plugins that can make FL Studio just disappear like that. It's more common in Waveform 11, but plugins that take out Waveform usually either do it when sandboxed or not sandboxed but rarely both.

Both computers have Intel chips. Could it be processor related?

[pough]

@pough - seriously, you've gone above and beyond on so many occasions, I just want to make this plugin work so you and everyone else can enjoy making music without crashes. I don't think you should have to be dealing with these kinds bugs in software that you paid for.

I'm okay with it. I find it to be relatively standard for new products from small developers. If you have limited resources to test various scenarios you're going to hit snags.

It's much better than another VST I bought recently (no demo, on sale) that has no glitches but I just plain don't like.

I think you'll eventually squash the bugs and then I'll have a VST I enjoy.