Xhun Audio LittleOne : version 4.x Released

[JerGoertz]

No, not until he says what year

I smell a distant !Epoch scent here... (it was in it's "final development stage" this may, wasn't it? Although I want it as great as it can get, I would not exactly call this a rush )

Heh, I'd rather have high-quality and stable than sooner but buggy. But yeah, Bruno sure likes to build the suspense.

[xhunaudio]

Well, if you consider that from may 2015 to may 2016 I had to rebuild an entire delopment environment (while making LittleOne ver.3.0 at the same time), so yes, I could say I was in the final stages in may 2016 (the dev env was complete and LittleOne GUI and DSP were almost complete, let's say 99.9%).

Then it was time for the public betatesting this summer, at the end of witch several bugs had to be fixed and other things had to be improved on both DSP/GUI side. It required some additional time but now it is complete and solid.

...And the presets conversion (!), factory presets are about 400 + additional hundreds of commercial presets + additional bonus presets (downloadable for free at release). And the audio demos, the website, etc...

I'm the first who lives a continuous suspense every day for this release I'm making really of my best to release it in a reasonable time, but it unavoidably requires some time to wait...

[kylie]

take your time, bruno

speaking of "additional hundreds of commercial presets"... which would that be? I only know about the status PLUS bank (and big steps, of course). curious to hear about the others.

-kylie-

[xhunaudio]

take your time, bruno

speaking of "additional hundreds of commercial presets"... which would that be? I only know about the status PLUS bank (and big steps, of course). curious to hear about the others.

-kylie-

Well, there are the factory presets (400) + additional presets collections:

"Big Steps" (commercial bank) : 125 presets, already converted.

"Plus" bank by Daniel, who said that he was interested in convert it.

Daniel also said to me that he had an interest also to make additional stuff/presets/banks for LittleOne version 3.0 in the future.

And there's at least 1 additional new bank that will be available some days/weeks after the release of LittleOne.

In addition there will be a special "bonus" pack that will be released for free and will be updated costantly adding some "example presets" from all the available commercial banks but it will include also completely new presets.

[Taurus]

LittleOne sounds very nice, but the usability is horrible.

[xhunaudio]

LittleOne sounds very nice, but the usability is horrible.

Hi Taurus,
too much ungenerous ! (kidding)

Seriously, I really think that by spending a few time on it is sufficient to appreciate its usability! It is not based on the "everything, in front of me, immediately!" concept, but surfing its O.S. pages to discover new modulation sources, selecting the effects from the rack by clicking on the sticky note above the unit could be a pleasant user experience. And, anyway, remember that for advanced purposes, all parameters are accessible at any time by using MIDI automation (this is the important thing in my opinion).

[mladi]

Map to controller, problem solved.

[xhunaudio]

Map to controller, problem solved.

Indeed, for any scenario that requires full, real time usability and intensive interactions with ALL parameters at the same time, MIDI controls are mandatory for any pro audio software on the planet.

LittleOne's faithful reproduction of a real synth, o.s., analogue gears, rack setup, involves the GUI only, and as any GUI it should be used for things like presets design or sometimes *limited* real time automations. And it does not represent a bottleneck for this kind of stuff.

Scope of a GUI is not to provide the *main and only* access to a synth for real-time usage.

[kylie]

any news you want to share with us, bruno?

[xhunaudio]

any news you want to share with us, bruno?

Hey kylie,

currently I'm working *very* intensively to try to complete everything in time for the release without further postponements. A few features will not be available at the release, but they will come shortly after that (for example 2k high res GUI scaling , additional commercial soundbanks , etc...).

Currently I'm improving the CPU-hit, but at one condition only: mantaining 100% inalterate any aspect about the accuracy of the simulation. No shortcuts here,

Please consider that LittleOne ver 3.0 is very different from the previous versions of the software. They (previous versions) were nice-sounding synths but with a CPU-friendly approach/attention (you could use a high number of instances simultaneously for production purposes). LittleOne ver 3.0 in comparison is a CPU-eating beast.

In general, I think today the time for this kind of approach (special attention to CPU instead of full accuracy) has reach its limit. Other developers too seem to share the same approach (and I'm very happy for that, the whole pro audio industry is moving giant steps forward ) : to provide a full, accurate analogue components simulation and give the user to deal with something that has to be treated as a real hardware analogue synth (at a fraction of the costs and in a virtual format, we all know the immense advantages of a digital/virtual studio)

(And also : don't mind if a plugin synth is monophonic only. The important is that its single voice is totally accurate).

At now LittleOne ver 3.0 has basically the same CPU-hit of other contemporary major synthesizers (for example, it is very similar to u-he Diva). I'm trying to reduce the cpu hit where possible, but I can't promise miracles, when a certain limit is reached, it is impossible to move on further

So, please consider that LO ver 3.0 will be a lot more CPU hungry than its previous versions! (but I bet we will have a lot of occasions to *fight* in this thread about this matter )

[kylie]

apart from "cross-platform optimization" it reads "complete" in every aspect on your november status page.
duke nukem, I hear you: "whadda you're waitin' for? chris'mas?"

[xhunaudio]

apart from "cross-platform optimization" it reads "complete" in every aspect on your november status page.
duke nukem, I hear you: "whadda you're waitin' for? chris'mas?"

Well, it is impossible for me to make it ready for XMAS. A lot of things have been improved from November's Post. But I have to make also the audio demos, update the price, inform all 3rd p resellers, and a LOT of additional stuff...

I think also the AAX version may be delayed a few weeks after the "main" release. But I don't want to postpone the release date further. I think February 2017 could be reasonable/realistic.

And to avoid some fights here I'm trying to squeeze every transistor and save CPU where it could reasonably be done - as I stated before, LittleOne is very demanding.

[JerGoertz]

And to avoid some fights here I'm trying to squeeze every transistor and save CPU where it could reasonably be done - as I stated before, LittleOne is very demanding.

Rename it "BigOne."

[xhunaudio]

And to avoid some fights here I'm trying to squeeze every transistor and save CPU where it could reasonably be done - as I stated before, LittleOne is very demanding.

Rename it "BigOne."

Too much pain/work, too many "items" and "lables" and "images",... to rename on website, on product pages / etc.

[kylie]

what would that "lots of additional stuff" be?

if you ask me (I know you won't anyway) I'd say - ditch AAX for now, but then, february is something that still sounds promising. would have been happy to see it this year, though...