ishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleishkabbibleFYI –
I received a reply from the developer, and indeed this release does have multiprocessing “issues” (which I am welcome to fix). Looks like I have interface coding in my future 😥
At any rate, I do think I can get used to recording “the Podium way” – the only thing I am still waiting for before buying the license is word on whether the KA6 is compatible with Windoze XP. I can’t honestly evaluate latencies through Podium until I can test it with a decent audio system with native ASIO drivers.
ishkabbibleThank you. Disabling the multiprocessing eliminated the funky noises, and it also seems to bring the CPU load down just a bit from the free version. Although I do find it a bit odd that the Podium CPU load indicator is bouncing between 60 – 90, yet the windows performance monitor is showing one core at around 40%, and the other 3 below 10% (yes, I am monitoring kernel time as well). I have been (incorrectly, it seems) assuming that the DAW simply spawns each instance of a given plugin off in its own thread, and lets Windoze manage them from there.
So it appears that if I am going to adopt this new recording paradigm, one of the first things I will need to do is make the ZynAddSubFx VST play nicely with itself in a multiprocessing environment. If you don’t mind my asking, where should I start? Is Steinberg the arbiter of all things VST? Which VST SDK version does Podium use? Any forums you can recommend for plugin developers? I had really hoped to avoid delving into interface issues (because I know all to well how quickly they can eat your lunch) and just work on the synth engine, but one of the beauties/curses of an open source project is that I can fix whatever bugs me, and this will get to bug me pretty damn quickly.
Thanks!
(Cross posting this to the ZynAddSubFx VST forum on KVR – will see what the developer has to say)
ishkabbibleAssuming I follow what you mean :Confused:
No no no – my discrete setup does not use Podium (or any DAW, unless you consider Audacity a DAW-lite), and it used a stand-alone (.exe) build of ZynAddSubFx. I used MIDI-OX as the MIDI mapper, and MIDI-Yoke to connect the output of MIDI-OX to the input of the Jazz++ MIDI sequencer / recorder, and to connect its MIDI output to the MIDI input of the synth. Then I used Virtual Audio Cable to route the audio output of the synth into Audacity.
(in essence, I used windows itself as the DAW, and plugged in windows executables, and used windows drivers as “patch cables” to interconnect the various apps)
ishkabbibleIf you’re looking to build a plugin studio
Nope, but it may be a necessary evil.
:frustrated:
You can follow the path that brought me to Podium over on KVR:
http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=308947&&postorder=asc&start=8
and
http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=337612&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15
My goal here is to do some serious development work on and recording with the ZynAddSubFx open source synth. Personally, I think the idea of a DAW is absolutely nuts (how can adding one more layer of software make anything go faster, I wonders?), but it DOES seem to solve some of my latency issues, so I am off evaluating DAWs simply because I need a host for this one specific plugin. In parallel, I am looking at discrete solutions:
MIDI controller –> MIDI mapper –> MIDI sequencer / editor –> Stand alone ZynAddSubFx build –> Audacity (or some multitrack recorder) –> sound card.
I already have versions that I like of all the links in that chain, and this is how I recorded the 2 clips I have up on soundcloud. But the problem seems to be in those pesky arrows – passing MIDI and audio streams between apps in windoze seems to be the sticking point where my latency problems arise.
ishkabbiblethe demo version might create *.pod files incompatible with (previous versions of) Podium Free
I posted about this in the support forum – apparently the incompatibility may go both ways? I tried to load a project I created in free into the demo and it makes all manner of strange noises mixed in with the actual music – not buffer over/underflow type noises, but more like it is sending random patches to the synth (or some synth – does some synth come bundled in the demo version?)
ishkabbibleso you can get everything just right before you commit to it.
😆 I almost spewed my coffee when I read that 😀 Compared to the analog tape era, the level of “commitment” in digital recording is about the same as a Kim Kardashian marriage!
And you are right – it doesn’t take much to max out 1 core with Podium – I will definitely have to buy a license if I want to keep using it. I haven’t even finished setting up the drum track and I am already maxing it out. I just wish there was a way I could see how well it scales to multiple cores before I commit.
ishkabbibleThank you very much, Kim. I guess that makes sense in a strange sort of way. Looks like I have a lot to learn – apparently the whole philosophy behind recording / editing music has changed from my generation (which is not necessarily a bad thing, I come from the days when editing was done with 2 tape decks, a razor blade, and a roll of scotch tape – this digital editing seems like cheating 😕 )
So it appears that I need to learn to edit in 2 domains – first edit the keystrokes (if necessary), then render / bounce the audio to a track somewhere, unload the synth, rinse and repeat as necessary. Then in a second step pull all the bounced audio tracks together for the final edit / mix. I guess I could get used to this.
OK Thanks. I’m off to learn a new paradigm. Let’s see if this Podium thingy lives up to the hype 😉 If it does, I’ll have something new up on soundcloud by the end of the weekend