KVR Audio

analoguesque · Post by **analoguesque** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 1:57 am

Okay, so I finally received my Emulator X.

Setting it up was a snap - plugged it all in, installed the software, and it worked like a charm.

Now to the first impressions .....

1. Supplied Soundbanks.
I loaded up the stock set of banks, which are very meagre BTW! A huge piano, some drum kits, and a few loops, and that's pretty much it. Maybe I missed something but this should have come with the usual stock sounds!! Don't get me wrong, they sound okay, but I definitely expected a full compliment of sounds.

2. SoundFonts
I loaded up my soundfonts which, for the most part, sound like the originals. The conversions are not completely accurate so I have some quirks that definitely don't sound right.

3. EOS (E4b) banks
Wow, now this is a complete mess! The E4B banks I loaded sound nothing like the originals, and these were created on an Esynth. After looking through the bank and checking out the waveforms, something's completely screwed in the conversion to EmuX format. The same waveform seems to be used throughut the bank, instead of the originals. Completely useless!

4. SONAR 3.1.1
Okay, some some people have got this thing down to 2ms, which is amazing. I can get it down to that easily while running the Emulator X software ... no problem. However, after loading up Sonar 3, I cannot get rid of the crackles no matter what I set it to. Granted, this might be due to my inexperience with ASIO and the whole software synth thing, but this is my experience:

* Messed with the Latency in the ASIO panel - went from 2ms to 50ms, all the while trying out Sonar and changing the latency there from 10ms to 50ms. Still experienced crackles.

Interestingly, the crackles are consistent no matter what latency I set. One would expect more clicks at 2ms than 50ms, but no .....! Anyway, this happened no matter what softsynth I loaded - EmuX, Synth1, Triangle II ... etc. At least it's consistent!

I will probably post another subject but would definitely appreciate any help from someone with a 1212m card and Sonar 3.

It's a friggin non-returnable item too!!

Thanks
Ian

analoguesque · Post by **analoguesque** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 3:37 am

Okay, now don't I feel like an idiot!

The problem was one of the settings in Sonar 3 under Audio Options, Driver Profiles.

Seems the Wave profiler brought back crap ... changed one of the parms (by luck) and now the thing smokes!!!

2ms without a hitch, and the sound is crystal-clear!

Ian

ObsoleteAcc99 · Post by **ObsoleteAcc99** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 3:52 am

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bioroid · Post by **bioroid** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 4:50 am

I saw and heard the EmulatorX in action yesterday at the Game Developers Conference in San Jose. They had normal PC speakers but the filter sounded ok to me but I was focusing more on the actual integration with a host like Cubase.

I was told that the EX ships with the Proteus 2000 soundbank which is only 32mb in size but has 1000 sounds like the real hardware. Have you been able to check that out? How does it sound?

Martin
bioroid

analoguesque · Post by **analoguesque** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 11:01 pm

ttoz, yup, I'm the same Analoguesque

I guess everything needs tweaking nowadays, but I expected the conversion to go a little better, given that E-Mu are the masters behind both formats. It's not that my SoundFonts don't sound okay, but I kinda liked exactly how they sounded before. They have lost some of their punch.

It might just be because the filters are so different.

As for shipping with a Proteus soundbank - maybe I have to search through the CDs. I thought I installed everything and all I got was a few drum kits, lots of loops (ugh!!!), and a huge Stereo Grand piano.

The integration with Sonar seems to be perfect from what I've found.

Ian

aMUSEd · Post by **aMUSEd** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 11:11 pm

Can it load the soundfonts in hardware like a soundblaster live or is it more of a software sampler like SFZ?

ObsoleteAcc99 · Post by **ObsoleteAcc99** » Mon Mar 29, 2004 8:44 am

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ObsoleteAcc99 · Post by **ObsoleteAcc99** » Mon Mar 29, 2004 8:46 am

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lex_strooder · Post by **lex_strooder** » Mon Mar 29, 2004 8:51 pm

I never figured this out:

What is dsp and what is software -> filters and fx is dsp ???

/ Lex

bioroid · Post by **bioroid** » Tue Mar 30, 2004 12:35 am

I think only the FX in the external mixing application use the DSP. The EmulatorX sampler seems to be completely software and uses the DSP card as a dongle more than anything.

Martin
bioroid

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » Tue Mar 30, 2004 5:58 am

Analoguesque... hi, did you update to the latest drivers yet? They came out with them rather quickly. I don't know, but I believe the update is supposed to correct some kind of phase shift issue. what do you think?

analoguesque · Post by **analoguesque** » Wed Mar 31, 2004 3:55 am

ttoz, I was actually using an SB Live!

I recently upgraded a sh*tload of stuff so everything's new to me - Sonar, the EmuX, even ASIO!!

Anyway, as far as I can tell the SoundFonts are okay, but they're different. Only real problem seems to be some of the slower Amplitude attacks, and the pitch ADSR, which isn't working on some sounds.

The Esynth E4B banks? Those are a wash ... completely useless. E-Mu is taking a look at one of my E4B banks right now to determine what the deal is.

Gerard, the drivers came out just before I got the card so everything was installed in one go.

I have started a simple review of everything at http://www.analoguesque.com/emuxreview.htm if you want to check it out. It's just a daily account of my findings as I go through more and more of the card, software, and it's interaction with Sonar.

Ian

amenbrother · Post by **amenbrother** » Wed Mar 31, 2004 8:33 am

Nice rewiew.

Jeremy_NSL · Post by **Jeremy_NSL** » Wed Mar 31, 2004 8:44 am

any thoughts on the dsp effects analogesque?

and is the proteus bank simply the 16mb worth of soundfont thats been available through EMU for a few years?

analoguesque · Post by **analoguesque** » Thu Apr 01, 2004 1:10 am

amenbrother, thanks

.

floyd, yes, I think it might be the same Proteus bank tweaked a little, although I'm not sure about that.

Ned at E-Mu helped me get my Esynth banks loaded today so I'm stoked - another 500 patches for me to play with

I have been updating the review as I go along, but haven't had much time to mess with stuff ... you can find it here: Analoguesque.com

As for the DSP FX, I have only messed with them a little to get an idea of how they sound. The preset reverbs are pretty subtle but you can warp the crap out of them with the editor. To my ears they all sound excellent, but I'm not big when it comes to FX on instruments - more vocals for me and I haven't tried that out yet. I have a new Behringer B-1 waiting to be tested but haven't had a chance to get to it ... you know how it goes

.

In short, the DSP FX sound pretty sweet but I'm sure there will be detractors ... there's a host of E-Mu haters out there who, I'm sure, will disagree with me.

I got the Emulator X