Which is the hungriest Synth CPU wise nowadays?

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yay! another 'mac vs pc battle.

is this really necessary? everyone uses the computer they own, & the OS they are comfortable with. and (hopefully) we're all making the music we want to make. so... who cares? :ud:

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Still seems to be Opsix. Fortunately I have the hw too, so no problem there. Possibly the hw Opsix uses a fantastic amount of CPU too, but it doesn't show me and I don't care. TBH - even if the plugin uses a silly amount of CPU - I'm an old fart that renders regularly anyway, so unless they throw 100% CPU at a plugin...won't ever bother me. And I struggle to play any more than 4-finger chords too...

...so having a shit computer and CPU hungry plugins is negated by shit playing and out-dated recording practices. :P

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I have a 5950x on my extremely non-Mac PC so don't pay as much attention to CPU usage anymore. Repro maybe? I don't recall anything else using as much as Repro in highest quality mode.

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kritikon wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 10:03 pm ...so having a shit computer and CPU hungry plugins is negated by shit playing and out-dated recording practices. :P
YOU'RE HIRED!!!

I'm kinda the opposite, but i also suffer shit playing and out-dated practices... I'm so used to running a central sequencer (generally a DAW) into tons of synths. I hit record whilst i play and mix all the synths live and capture it all and render the master. Now it's all soft synths, I barely render anything to audio, except a master.

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There's a few Serum patches that choke my Mac Pro at 96Khz. Breaktweaker had some as well. Both were easily tamed by using VePro on the same computer as it spreads the cores better than Logic does on Active Tracks.

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Atlatnesiti wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 6:42 pmApple M1 is not the chip itself that makes a difference, it’s combination of M1 and macOS
Except it isn't because in pretty much every test of an M1 powered Mac against Intel and AMD powered PC laptops, both Intel and AMD outperform the Mac across the board. It was the case against Intel's 11th Gen and the current 12th Gen has just widened the gap, such that even Apple's newer, more powerful processors are still not able to best them. Apple's silicon is competitive but it is NOT class-leading in any way.
DJ Warmonger wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 7:33 pmPeople have been producing music on rigs many times less powerful that current tech. There's no need for latest synths with cosmic requirements, and no need for high-end CPUs either.
There was a time I would have agreed with you but in the last 5-10 years, devs have taken full advantage of the power of modern CPUs to make synths of much higher sound quality that definitely won't run on low-end processors. I was using a Core i5 laptop only 5 years ago but when I started getting into things like bx_oberhausen, Korg's ARP Odyssey and RePro 5, I quickly found that I needed more grunt.

That said, my 11th Gen Core i7 (4 cores, 8 threads) is plenty for my needs and I rarely see the CPU even approaching 50%. So you definitely don't need a high-end machine but you do need something at least half-decent.
chk071 wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 8:18 pmWell... check where the M1 is residing in that ranking.
I did and it's about 10 spots below a 12th Gen Core i3 - 14,687 for M1 as opposed to 14,955 for the i3 - which even you have to admit is pretty f**king embarrassing for Apple. And nobody knows yet how much a Mac with an M1 Ultra will cost (do they?) but it's probably going to be north of 10 grand, so it's not going to be a cheaper option than the CPUs around it.
vertibration wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 8:48 pmFunny thing is people crackin on M1, but dont even own an intel or AMD that can beat it LMAO
According to the benchmarks I've seen, any of my last three laptops would comfortably outperform an M1 powered Mac and the most expensive of those only cost me about US$1200.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.

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To answer the OP's question, probably Dimitri Sches's DIVERSION. I've not tried it but I have never seen so many complaints about CPU usage for any other plugin.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.

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BONES wrote: Thu May 12, 2022 2:52 am
Atlatnesiti wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 6:42 pmApple M1 is not the chip itself that makes a difference, it’s combination of M1 and macOS
Except it isn't because in pretty much every test of an M1 powered Mac against Intel and AMD powered PC laptops, both Intel and AMD outperform the Mac across the board. It was the case against Intel's 11th Gen and the current 12th Gen has just widened the gap, such that even Apple's newer, more powerful processors are still not able to best them. Apple's silicon is competitive but it is NOT class-leading in any way.
DJ Warmonger wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 7:33 pmPeople have been producing music on rigs many times less powerful that current tech. There's no need for latest synths with cosmic requirements, and no need for high-end CPUs either.
There was a time I would have agreed with you but in the last 5-10 years, devs have taken full advantage of the power of modern CPUs to make synths of much higher sound quality that definitely won't run on low-end processors. I was using a Core i5 laptop only 5 years ago but when I started getting into things like bx_oberhausen, Korg's ARP Odyssey and RePro 5, I quickly found that I needed more grunt.

That said, my 11th Gen Core i7 (4 cores, 8 threads) is plenty for my needs and I rarely see the CPU even approaching 50%. So you definitely don't need a high-end machine but you do need something at least half-decent.
chk071 wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 8:18 pmWell... check where the M1 is residing in that ranking.
I did and it's about 10 spots below a 12th Gen Core i3 - 14,687 for M1 as opposed to 14,955 for the i3 - which even you have to admit is pretty f**king embarrassing for Apple. And nobody knows yet how much a Mac with an M1 Ultra will cost (do they?) but it's probably going to be north of 10 grand, so it's not going to be a cheaper option than the CPUs around it.
vertibration wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 8:48 pmFunny thing is people crackin on M1, but dont even own an intel or AMD that can beat it LMAO
According to the benchmarks I've seen, any of my last three laptops would comfortably outperform an M1 powered Mac and the most expensive of those only cost me about US$1200.
I'm in the market for a new music computer. I have used custom built PCs for years until I got so fed up with the stability issues that I switched to a 2015 Quad Core 2.9 GHz MacBook Pro in 2016. That's worked great in combination with my MOTU 16A Thunderbolt audio interface and my OWC ThunderBay Thunderbolt drive enclosure for four SSDs.

You would think that I would just go out and buy a Mac Studio Ultra but I thought I would compare prices of a similarly outfitted PC from a custom builder. (After building probably 10 PCs over the years I'm done with that. I just want something that works out of the box.)

I chose the current top of the line Intel 16-core 3.2 GHz 12900K processor and then matched the same specs for a Mac Studio Ultra in terms of storage and RAM. On the Fundamental AV site (www.fundamentalav.com), a PC with the 12900K processor, a 4 TB NVMe drive, 64 GB of RAM, the cheapest video card on offer, and a water cooled enclosure comes to $5,198.00.

A Mac Studio Ultra with similar specs is $4,999.

What about performance? Because the 12900K chip runs at a higher clock speed (and thus must be water cooled to get the noise down to even remotely acceptable levels) it's not surprising that the Intel chip outperforms the Apple M1 Ultra chip (which runs at a base clock speed of 2.0 GHz) by about 15%. However, the M1 Ultra beats the Intel 12900K chip by 30% (!) in multicore performance.

Given the Mac Studio is much smaller, runs much quieter, uses half the power, and is about the same price as the PC, that's the direction I'm heading.

So your claim that an equivalent Mac Studio Ultra would cost over $10,000 is just nonsense.

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I forgot about Mac Studio, I 've been looking at MacPro listings, which are all still Xeon powered. The thing is, though, reports I've read say the Mac Studio's fans are still noisy so I wouldn't make too many assumptions about how quiet it is. Also, if the i9 is liquid cooled, it will be silent, won't it? Or had you not realised that in your rush to prove the superiority of Apple's consumer level krap?

Also, 1 x 4TB NVMe drive is going to cost you about 250% more than 2 x 2TB drives, so that alone will reduce the price of a PC build to a few hundred less than the Mac Studio. I'm sure there'll be plenty of other ways to make it much cheaper.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.

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So far the intent of Apple is not to be the fastest, it’s to be the fastest efficient CPU primarily for mobile users. Unless they change their philosophy, they’ll likely get further and further behind in raw speed. The same that would happen in battery life when Intel tries to compete - they suck down battery much faster than Apple chips. Both are awesome. Both suck.

The focus here is on software synths and relative performance on each system, not between systems of different people.

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For me Chromaphone is killing my ten core with a single instance… No other instrument does that…

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vitocorleone123 wrote: Thu May 12, 2022 6:32 am So far the intent of Apple is not to be the fastest, it’s to be the fastest efficient CPU primarily for mobile users.
Don't be ridiculous. Apple don't give a shit about their customers. Their reason for doing this is to harmonise OS dev between iOS and macOS. It will save them billions.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.

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OllieBoi wrote: Thu May 12, 2022 4:44 am
BONES wrote: Thu May 12, 2022 2:52 am
Atlatnesiti wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 6:42 pmApple M1 is not the chip itself that makes a difference, it’s combination of M1 and macOS
Except it isn't because in pretty much every test of an M1 powered Mac against Intel and AMD powered PC laptops, both Intel and AMD outperform the Mac across the board. It was the case against Intel's 11th Gen and the current 12th Gen has just widened the gap, such that even Apple's newer, more powerful processors are still not able to best them. Apple's silicon is competitive but it is NOT class-leading in any way.
DJ Warmonger wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 7:33 pmPeople have been producing music on rigs many times less powerful that current tech. There's no need for latest synths with cosmic requirements, and no need for high-end CPUs either.
There was a time I would have agreed with you but in the last 5-10 years, devs have taken full advantage of the power of modern CPUs to make synths of much higher sound quality that definitely won't run on low-end processors. I was using a Core i5 laptop only 5 years ago but when I started getting into things like bx_oberhausen, Korg's ARP Odyssey and RePro 5, I quickly found that I needed more grunt.

That said, my 11th Gen Core i7 (4 cores, 8 threads) is plenty for my needs and I rarely see the CPU even approaching 50%. So you definitely don't need a high-end machine but you do need something at least half-decent.
chk071 wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 8:18 pmWell... check where the M1 is residing in that ranking.
I did and it's about 10 spots below a 12th Gen Core i3 - 14,687 for M1 as opposed to 14,955 for the i3 - which even you have to admit is pretty f**king embarrassing for Apple. And nobody knows yet how much a Mac with an M1 Ultra will cost (do they?) but it's probably going to be north of 10 grand, so it's not going to be a cheaper option than the CPUs around it.
vertibration wrote: Wed May 11, 2022 8:48 pmFunny thing is people crackin on M1, but dont even own an intel or AMD that can beat it LMAO
According to the benchmarks I've seen, any of my last three laptops would comfortably outperform an M1 powered Mac and the most expensive of those only cost me about US$1200.
I'm in the market for a new music computer. I have used custom built PCs for years until I got so fed up with the stability issues that I switched to a 2015 Quad Core 2.9 GHz MacBook Pro in 2016. That's worked great in combination with my MOTU 16A Thunderbolt audio interface and my OWC ThunderBay Thunderbolt drive enclosure for four SSDs.

You would think that I would just go out and buy a Mac Studio Ultra but I thought I would compare prices of a similarly outfitted PC from a custom builder. (After building probably 10 PCs over the years I'm done with that. I just want something that works out of the box.)

I chose the current top of the line Intel 16-core 3.2 GHz 12900K processor and then matched the same specs for a Mac Studio Ultra in terms of storage and RAM. On the Fundamental AV site (www.fundamentalav.com), a PC with the 12900K processor, a 4 TB NVMe drive, 64 GB of RAM, the cheapest video card on offer, and a water cooled enclosure comes to $5,198.00.

A Mac Studio Ultra with similar specs is $4,999.

What about performance? Because the 12900K chip runs at a higher clock speed (and thus must be water cooled to get the noise down to even remotely acceptable levels) it's not surprising that the Intel chip outperforms the Apple M1 Ultra chip (which runs at a base clock speed of 2.0 GHz) by about 15%. However, the M1 Ultra beats the Intel 12900K chip by 30% (!) in multicore performance.

Given the Mac Studio is much smaller, runs much quieter, uses half the power, and is about the same price as the PC, that's the direction I'm heading.

So your claim that an equivalent Mac Studio Ultra would cost over $10,000 is just nonsense.
both seem overpriced honestly. I don't think 5,000 on a computer is reasonable for music production, 2000 should be more than enough and that's a lot of good components already (i9, M2 4 TB drives, 32 Gb or DDR5 ram)

I just build a cheap one for 900 USD with an i5 12600k, at 128 buffer I can run 200 tracks of the demo project in Ableton Live at only 80% of the CPU, that's quite absurd honestly. I can't imagine spending 5 times that for like maybe double the performance?

I don't know how the motu interfaces perform in windows nowadays, specially the thunderbolt ones, but I would look into RME with all that money or maybe just order one form vintage king audio an compare performance, curious if motu has closed the gap on PC.
dedication to flying

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Out of the virtual instruments that I own, the ones that have the highest CPU usage is the ARP Odyssey, Triton Extreme (when set to Classic/Combi), Chromaphone 3 and Respiro. They can easily start to hit around 7-10% load per instance. In comparison, something like FM8 and Polysix take around 0.30%... :hihi:

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That's because FM8 and PolySix are ancient and originally had to be able to run on single-core Pentium processors, or maybe Core-2-Duo, if they were lucky. OTOH, Odyssey and Triton are two of Korg's newest VSTis, so they'd have been made with more modern, faster processors in mind.
NOVAkILL : Asus RoG Flow Z13, Core i9, 16GB RAM, Win11 | EVO 16 | Studio One | bx_oberhausen, GR-8, JP6K, Union, Hexeract, Olga, TRK-01, SEM, BA-1, Thorn, Prestige, Spire, Legend-HZ, ANA-2, VG Iron 2 | Uno Pro, Rocket.

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