Blue Cat's Fader Hub 1.3 "Multitrack" Released & Connector 1.43 Free Update

[Blue Cat Audio]

Please welcome Blue Cat's Fader Hub 1.3 "Multitrack", an exciting free update for our network mixing and recording console, and Connector 1.43, yet another free update for our virtual cable utility plug-in!



***NEW IN FADER HUB 1.3***

New Network Audio Multi-Channel Mode (Multitrack):
- Send individual input signals (instead of just the stereo mix) to other Fader Hub or Connector instances, thru the network, the Internet or on the same machine.
- Visualize and remix individual channels from remote instances in the LLAN Mixer, which gets automatically upated upon remote changes.
- Aggregate, mix and record up to 64 stereo inputs (128 audio channels) from up to 8 different computers (and even more by loading Fader Hub inside itself).

Performance:
- Major audio processing performance improvements.
- Major user interface perforamnce improvements on Windows.

User Interface:
- Windows multitouch support (manipulate multiple controls at the same time with several fingers).
- Changed Mute button color to yellow to avoid confusion with record buttons.
- Improved skin loading time on slow hard drives.
- Optimized size of image resources for GUIs.
- Fixed factory FX strips not listed in FX Strip menu.
- Fixed window opacity changes not shown in plug-in when host application modifies it.
- Fixed selected text in text edit box sometimes not easy to read on Mac depending on the color scheme.
- Fixed text edit boxes sometimes loosing focus when hovering mouse over other controls.
- Minor Graphics resources optimizations for Hi resolution displays.
- Fixed Mac installers not showing brand image in dark mode.
- Windows: fixed context menu not always displayed in the right position when the window spans across several screens with different DPI.
- Windows accessibility: native system widgets are now scaled according to text size settings on Windows 8 and newer in settings windows.
- Windows: fixed return key sometimes unexpectedly forwarded to host while typing in a text edit box.

Macros Parameters:
- Select Macro params control style: knob or switch.
- Set macro params default/neutral value (the value set upon right click or alt-click).

Plug-ins Hosting:
- A missing plug-ins report is now displayed in case plug-ins are missing upon loading a session or presets.
- Improved synchronization of hosted plug-ins to host transport when using plug-ins with latency.
- Built-in plug-ins can now follow host zoom.
future updates of Blue Cat Audio VST, VST3 and Audio Unit plug-ins will be able to follow Fader Hub's zoom like built-in plug-ins (previews available).
- Plug-in format is now displayed in the title bar of the plug-in window.
- Recording status is now reported to Audio Units that support it.
- It is now possible to use different oversampling options for realtime and offline rendering.
- Fixed two memory leaks in VST3 plug-ins host (causing potential crashes upon VST3 plug-in unload too).
- Fixed plug-in latency not always fully compensated when using plug-ins with latencies of more than 1024 samples.
- Improved undo management with built-in and VST3 plug-ins, now detecting non-parameter changes (for Axiom: Destructor skin changes etc.).
- Fixed built-in multitap delay high DSP usage upon first load when syncing delay to host BPM.
- Fixed offline rendering mode not always reported to hosted plug-ins.
- Fixed some VST3 plug-ins taking several minutes to load (HALion and several other plug-ins with multiple audio busses).
- Fixed unexpected bypass control behavior with some Audio Unit plug-ins.
- Fixed VST3 plug-ins not loading when moved to a directory with the same name as the original .vst3 library file.
- Fixed revert current preset not always triggering undo properly

Audio Recording/Playback:
- Recorded audio files now contain current transport position to help synchronizing recordings when imported into a DAW (BF format).
- Audio file recorder now switches automatically to RF64 file format for files larger than 2 GB.
- Fixed mp3 files loaded in audio player not always in sync with transport.
- Audio recording and playback now take plug-ins latency into account (with latency compensation).
- Improved playback and recording synchronization (locally and remotely).

MIDI Control:
- All plug-in parameters can now be controlled with MIDI notes, pitch bend, NRPN, 14-bit CCs, aftertouch or channel pressure, in addition to existing MIDI CC.
- MIDI settings window can now be resized to display more parameters.
- Optimized MIDI settings window display on Windows (load time and scroll).
- MIDI Settings window now splits parameters into multiple pages for faster access.
- MIDI Settings window now shows custom display names if any.
- Optimized preset load upon MIDI messages when using several hundreds of user presets.
- Fixed plug-in sending Bank number 0 when loading a preset that is not located in a bank.
- Fixed audio dropouts when navigating presets via next/previous and plug-in set to send MIDI Program Change messages.

StandAlone Application:
- Windows: ASIO driver now keeps running when ASIO Control panel is opened from the app audio preferences.
- Windows: the application now follows ASIO driver buffer changes made in the ASIO control panel or external ASIO configuration app.
- Performance: application now automatically selects the minimum number of I/O required from the driver.
- Fixed audio dropouts when selecting MIDI output devices in preferences when using many MIDI devices.

***NEW IN CONNECTOR 1.43***

- ASIO driver now only sends the minimal number of audio channels requested by the app, instead of all possible channels accepted by the destination.
- Lossless audio compression is now the default option for network audio.
- Multiple performance improvements (user interface and audio processing).

User Interface:
- Windows: multitouch support (manipulate multiple controls at the same time with sevral fingers).
- Fixed window opacity changes not shown in plug-in when host application modifies it.
- Fixed selected text in text edit box sometimes not easy to read on Mac depending on the color scheme.
- Fixed text edit boxes sometimes loosing focus when hovering mouse over other controls.
- Fixed revert current preset not always triggering undo properly.
- Fixed Mac installers not showing brand image in dark mode.
- Windows: fixed context menu not always displayed in the right position when the window spans across several screens with different DPI.
- Windows accessibility: native system widgets are now scaled according to text size settings on Windows 8 and newer in settings windows.
- Windows: fixed return key sometimes unexpectedly forwarded to host while typing in a text edit box.

MIDI Control:
- All plug-in parameters can now be controlled with MIDI notes, pitch bend, NRPN, 14-bit CCs, aftertouch or channel pressure, in addition to existing MIDI CC.
- MIDI settings window can now be resized to display more parameters.
- Optimized MIDI settings window display on Windows (load time and scroll).
- MIDI Settings window now splits parameters into multiple pages for faster access.
- Optimized preset load upon MIDI messages when using several hundreds of user presets.
- Fixed plug-in sending Bank number 0 when loading a preset that is not located in a bank.
- Fixed audio dropouts when navigating presets via next/previous and plug-in set to send MIDI Program Change messages.

Enjoy!

[original Fader Hub announcement]
[original Connector announcement]

[audiojunkie]

Please reconsider your stance on Linux native apps. Connector is the only one we would need to be Linux native. We could run everything else from a virtualized Windows environment or Wine. The only item that really, really needs to be linux native would be Connector.

[Shabdahbriah]

^^^ +1

[Blue Cat Audio]

Please reconsider your stance on Linux native apps. Connector is the only one we would need to be Linux native. We could run everything else from a virtualized Windows environment or Wine. The only item that really, really needs to be linux native would be Connector.

I don't have a stance on this topic, it's just a matter of priority and being quite busy . I have been looking at it a little bit lately, and it looks like it's getting really worse these days!

[audiojunkie]

Please reconsider your stance on Linux native apps. Connector is the only one we would need to be Linux native. We could run everything else from a virtualized Windows environment or Wine. The only item that really, really needs to be linux native would be Connector.

I don't have a stance on this topic, it's just a matter of priority and being quite busy . I have been looking at it a little bit lately, and it looks like it's getting really worse these days!

I'm seriously curious. What makes you think anything is getting worse? Everything is getting better and better.............unless you are referring to the problems with using Windows apps on Linux.

Granted, there have been several problems with WINE and the available bridging tools. WINE continues to move forward and improve as they constantly do. However, part of that process is making changes to further improve WINE. WINE recently made some big changes this past year, and these changes affected bridging software (ie yabridge).

The developers of these bridging packages haven't had time to work on these projects, so they have left it to contributors to code the fixes. This has left users of Windows plugins on Linux stuck for months and months without a fix. (Luckily, there have been several patches contributed that have almost completely fixed the problem). So soon, this problem will be fixed.

The other major problem with WINE, is that the JUCE framework recently moved to supporting Direct2D 1.3. WINE only supports Direct2D 1.2. This has caused problems with Linux users that have been using WINE and a bridging software (like yabridge) to run Windows plugins in Linux. This issue hasn't been resolved, because no one on the WINE team has stepped up to add support for version 1.3 to WINE.

https://forum.juce.com/t/juce8-direct2d ... idge/64298

So, to be clear, the problems have everything to do with running Windows applications in Linux, but have nothing to do with running Linux native software. Running Linux native software has gotten better and better with every passing year. The problems with WINE are part of a continuing process of improvement, and developers of the bridging software need to make changes to their software to match these changes in WINE. It's all about progress--like MacOS does with every new version that comes out. Developers have to make changes to match the progress of the OS. Only, in the case of the Open Source projects like WINE and yabridge, there hasn't been development available to fix the software to accommodate those improvements in WINE.

So, as I said in my other post to you, things are getting better and better on Linux--especially with native Linux software. The X11 vs Wayland concern you mentioned in the other post is a non-problem, as I mentioned, because of XWayland.

I'm sure if you dig into it more, you will understand that while the experience for those who have been using Windows plugins through bridging software and WINE has been less than satisfactory, that's because of progress being made in WINE. Providing native Linux plugins for Linux would be awesome and helpful for everyone, and it wouldn't be affected by any of the WINE changes.

[Blue Cat Audio]

It's definitely not about running Windows stuff on Linux (although it's a pity it does not work as smoothly as it used too). XWindow is definitely (still) the only way to go for plug-ins, but it's quite a lot of work since you cannot use any higher level frameworks in plug-ins. All in all it's a pretty big task.

[audiojunkie]

It would sure be great for us Linux users though.