Loving Satin!...but

[Urs]

Hehe, I really wonder where all of that came from. In all our market research we've not come across any big hiss issue for any other company's creations. Otoh maybe we haven't looked deeply enough into it.

Nonetheless, I'm sure it'll come up in our weekly Monday meet and we'll have an appropriate concept at hand before the introduction offer ends.

- Urs

[djsubject]

or just tell em to hiss off!

[sascha]

Hehe, I really wonder where all of that came from. In all our market research we've not come across any big hiss issue for any other company's creations. Otoh maybe we haven't looked deeply enough into it.

Nonetheless, I'm sure it'll come up in our weekly Monday meet and we'll have an appropriate concept at hand before the introduction offer ends.

- Urs

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic ... 28#5486628

That said, Greta needs a fresh diaper, as if to say 'I give a s**t about kvr'

[Gonga]

My own tests confirm that only very large multi-channel uses of Satin could create a hiss problem for users. I had multiple instances running last night, then tried all the stuff that used to create hiss symphonies in the old days, and as long as I turned down the hiss knob, there just wasn't any audible issue. There were, however, splendid old-school sounds. For me it's not an issue as I, like most users I suspect, will only be using a handful of instances per project.

[zvenx]

I too tried somethings similar to Gonga above, except I am sure I did a lot less tweaking than he did....but yes for me too, I won't use a lot of instances and although it does stack up, simply turning the hiss knob down is fine for me currently as it is.

I do have other software that are badly imho in need of a serious hissing knob/hissing off on no audio/ and definitely hissing on transport at stop.

But I am fine with Satin as is. however I do recognise others may not be.

rsp

[Compyfox]

I think it's rather the other way around: when a DAW/host sequencer is not playing, that does not imply that plug-ins should not be processing and outputting sound (e.g. playing a virtual instrument in a host should not require its sequencer to be playing, and neither should a tape effect processing the instrument output); but whenever there is no signal present at Satin's inputs (both during playback and when stopped) there is (subjectively, at least...) an argument to be made for some sort of noise gating / auto-muting.

Then we have two scenarios:
a) the VST3 technology turns on/off the plugin as needed (if there is signal being applied that is - may it be from the wave events or plain forwarded signal), but this doesn't work for more than two to three hosts. If ever

b) A noise gate on the ouput. But this would mean that the plugins are still running and eating CPU/ASIO cycles

Actually, Slate's VTM Hiss Automute should work like a gate, but I didn't really recognize any noise as soon as signal is applied. So was it turned off completely? I'd need further tests to confirm that. Never really bothered me to be honest.

- a "hiss link" switch, so that people can decide to use channel individual hiss (example: Studer A800 channel modules!) or global hiss (example: small scale R2R tape machines)

Doesn't Satin's parameter lock feature already enable users to opt out of global settings for grouped instances?

Ah, the dreaded "Lock Function".

I don't think that this will actually work as I described it. If it's "globally" (meaning it locks over all instances), then you can't mess with individual parameters. And if it's not "globally", good luck editing 32 instances.



So... (does some tests with v1.00)

Apparently, if you link the machines together, the Service Panel is also globally linked "per group" (multiple groups can be setup individually - unlike Slate's VTM with the global noise/bass correction over all available instances - which I always found highly limiting). Use the right mouse click to "lock" a paramter, then it's "unlinked" and you can edit as needed.

So it is possible already, but a bit unintuitive or better said - irritating (IMO!). I always thought "Locking" a paramters makes it impossible to actually edit further. So a link/unlink switch (with a smaller icon btw) would actually be better IMO.



"But what does eet mean?! Whot schould I dooooo?!"

Link your machines, pull back the noise floor globally until you reach x value on the RMS meter in the summing bus, and use a noise gate to turn it into "auto mute" for the time being.

With the upper mentioned SATIN preset and 8 instances, I could pull down the noise with the "hiss" dial to -85dB RMS (non-weighted, sum)/-82,2dB RMS (k-weighted, channel and sum). Turn down the Asperity and you gain another 10dB RMS at least.

A virtual 24-track machine with this preset and Hiss at -100, you are at -71,3dB RMS (unweighted, sum) / -68,0dB RMS (k-weighted, sum) and on an individual channel about -82dB RMS (k-weighted)

That clocks in at about -70dB RMS Noise Floor with really good and well calibrated machines, measured on the stereo output. (I still think only a handful of channels are summed and measured, else the noise floor and crosstalk values in manuals would be WAY HIGHER).

So yes, a knob that goes down to -140dB (if you use the machine "linked") would indeed be more interesting. Even if that means "less noise on individual channels", which was a tad unrealistic back in the days. Again, here the noise floor was -70dB RMS at best! Which inevitably adds up on the summing bus. So I clearly understand and backup Sascha's comments in the other thread.





And I found a bug in the process (I hope Urs or Sascha is reading along):

If you create a machine and "group" on the first channel, and then simply copy it over in Cubase 7 - the knobs are all linked, but the engine won't get any changes according to paramters from the "globally opened GUI".

So, each instance has to be manually "relinked" with the appropriate group again. But once you have like 2-3 instances relinked, simply copy over your channels and you should be fine.



EDIT:
Changed my mind about the Hiss Knob range - should maybe be lower indeed.

[Pipelineaudio]

[...]SUMMARY:
I'm surprised that actually SATIN is considered as "too noisy", while former tape plugin creations (Slate, Nomad Factory, UAD, Waves) are considered not.

I could be wrong, but I don't remember seeing anyone claiming that Satin is too noisy while *also* claiming that the others you mention aren't. But the ones I'm somewhat familiar with - the UA Ampex and Studer emulations - both have a switch to disable noise completely. So at least for those cases, this point seems to be completely moot.

Thank you, compyfox's point was a total Tu Quoque and you pointed that out. I didn't compare it to anything else.

If its worth anything, the only reason i bought this plug is that I've been waiting years to get an exciter resembling the Dolby A, and satin pretty much nails it. After playing with it, I found I also liked some of its other features, but didn't care for the hiss.

You guys who are saying its irrelevant are like saying throwing a dead body in your trunk is irrelevant. Yes, compared to putting two live people, it might not eat as much gas. Might not slow it down as much as two people, but hell, it stinks!

its there, its easily audible in real world use, and it is a problem in some cases.

If we really want to talk about history, one of the ways we dealt with hiss back in the old days was recording WAY the hell too hot. For some instruments, that was ok, even desirable, but for others it really sucked. You pulled your hair out trying to decide whether the distortion and loss of dynamics was worth it to stay above the hiss. You had to guess what the situation would be at mixdown time and you often guessed wrong, and it sucked

I don't want anyone to lose the hiss if they want it, but I'd like to be able to remove it if I want

[Pipelineaudio]

My own tests confirm that only very large multi-channel uses of Satin could create a hiss problem for users. I had multiple instances running last night, then tried all the stuff that used to create hiss symphonies in the old days, and as long as I turned down the hiss knob, there just wasn't any audible issue. There were, however, splendid sound old-school sounds. For me it's not an issue as I, like most users I suspect, will only be using a handful of instances per project.

At a hiss level of -51dBFS for only 16 tracks with an easily "normal" project setup (compressors with 6db of makeup) we are just under a cassette tape's level of noise. I don't know about you, but I'd call that a problem

Is it accurate? Maybe, maybe even probably

Do I want the hiss? No

[Compyfox]

You have to understand the relation of a large scale R2R tape machine with 16 tracks, and a stereo low speed running compact cassette.

16 summed signals at -51dBFS (which should be lower in RMS, at or around -58dB RMS even. Measure noise ALWAYS in RMS, not FS peak!) are actually performing well.

A stereo cassette tape at -51dB RMS is just plain normal behavor. Imagine what would happen if you run 8 machines (16 mono channels) in parallel. The noise would go up to -40dB RMS if not even -38dB RMS. That is something I consider a problem.

[bungle]

Got to find it hilarious in 2013 that people are arguing that hiss is OK, Personally and this is not meant to disrespect Uhe at all here, Not having a hiss on/off switch was a poor design decision that has no basis in modern recording whatsoever and is something whimsical at best.
Modelling these throwbacks to the past and its sound (Yes some of it was nice, and some of us where there to experience it, along with the garbage, and no i don't want to go back to that gear ever) but modelling to the extreme is just silliness
Developer 1
"Lets remake the Titanic"
Developer 2
"Aaaah cool we can steer it into an iceberg"
User
"Yeah man this Titanic is soooo cool, Oh sh*t i'm drowning"

[Pipelineaudio]

16 summed signals at -51dBFS (which should be lower in RMS, at or around -58dB RMS even. Measure noise ALWAYS in RMS, not FS peak!) are actually performing well.

Being that so many of our modern plugins do respond to peak signals to do their decision making, I don't have the luxury of ignoring something just because its RMS level might be (arguably) "low"

I hope I don't need to explain why I don't need to respond to the Argument from Antiquity parts of your post

[zerocrossing]

I don't care how much they used to hiss, its one of the many reasons I love living in the modern world, where I am liberated from the shortcomings of tape.

I also am glad not to be swapping 8" floppies with a whopping 16kb of mix data per disk on my old SSL. I am all for keeping the best of the old, but I am not interested in the worst of it

Then why are you even trying this plug in? There are other very good plug ins that emulate tape saturation without adding tape hiss. I get your point, and I actually agree with it, but if Urs has a concept that he wants to remain unsullied, then it's his right. This is probably the one plug in of U-He that I'll skip but I'm not going to yell about it.

[pdxindy]

My own tests confirm that only very large multi-channel uses of Satin could create a hiss problem for users. I had multiple instances running last night, then tried all the stuff that used to create hiss symphonies in the old days, and as long as I turned down the hiss knob, there just wasn't any audible issue. There were, however, splendid sound old-school sounds. For me it's not an issue as I, like most users I suspect, will only be using a handful of instances per project.

At a hiss level of -51dBFS for only 16 tracks with an easily "normal" project setup (compressors with 6db of makeup) we are just under a cassette tape's level of noise. I don't know about you, but I'd call that a problem

Is it accurate? Maybe, maybe even probably

Do I want the hiss? No

What is your setting for asperity?

[Pipelineaudio]

I havent touched it, I guess I should read what the asperity control does

[Pipelineaudio]

Then why are you even trying this plug in? There are other very good plug ins that emulate tape saturation without adding tape hiss. I get your point, and I actually agree with it, but if Urs has a concept that he wants to remain unsullied, then it's his right. This is probably the one plug in of U-He that I'll skip but I'm not going to yell about it.

I bought it for the Dolby A emulation

I dont know who's yelling