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Kassen
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Joined: Jul 06, 2004 Posts: 7678 Location: The Hague, NL
G2 patch files: 3
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Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2005 11:27 am Post subject:
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cebec wrote: | Heh... On the double!  |
Very good, mr. Cebec, as soon as you have put on your lab coat we´ll begin. Let´s get all the civilians out of the lab, fire up the polarity conductor and engage the plutonium cores!
;¬)
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I'm pretty sure you're right -- sines should alias the least. I haven't run any tests on the NM Classic (rack arrives tomorrow) but my findings with the G2s OSCs were that aliasing increased as the pulsewidth decreased and frequency increased. Falling ramp waves also generated some aliasing at higher frequencies.
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Very good, so far reality is behaving properly and acording to the set rules.
We´ll give it a cooky once we are done.
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Originally, I had put this down to the G2s DACs but after more testing I found the same behavior in the G2 Demo on two different DACs.
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Excelent work, we´ll put that down in the logbook.
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A separate, but possibly related phenomenon, is that the use of envelopes with very fast attack speeds or other control signals with fast transients can cause what appear to be large 'spikes' at approx. 24 kHz when the signal is plotted on a spectrum analyzer.[quote]
Yes, that is exactly as the theory would predict too. I´ve been saying for a long time now that it´s all good and proper to have non-aliassing oscilators if you can build them (and you can) but if you ringmodulate two of those or have very fast envelopes then there will still be trouble. Potentially quite a bit of it. The only real solution is to have anti aliassing in ALL modules. This is expensive. of cource you can also reset your osc to a zero crossing the moment you send it into a envelope but that means you lose that nice "each note is different" thing and short attacks won´t be nearly as punchy either.
I fear I´m going to be tempted to asume that the dsp power Clavia put into anti-aliassing went into simply doubeling the samplerate. That´s what a lot of companies do; I think it´s bad engineering but let´s not pretend Clavia is being exceptionally bad compared to the competition.
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On the suggestion of jksuperstar, elsewhere on this forum, lowpassing these control signals, at about 1.05 kHz with a 6 dB slope, I've found, attenuates these 'spikes' by up to 20 dB without causing any noticeable degradation in sound quality or performance. |
Yeah, that´ll smooth out the control-rate steps (asuming the mod inputs aren´t anti-aliased for that), probably decrease the steepness slightly and round the corners. What would be a possible solution to a part of it (asuming once again non-anti-aliased vca inputs) would be audio-rate envelopes. Csound users have been doing this to get rid of "k rate" aliassing trouble. I did a quick test with my G2 editor and it apears you can´t trick envelopes into going audio rate by giving it a a-rate amp-mod signal.
Before we start screaming murder; let´s see how the NM holds up and of cource for simple envelopes this doesn´t matter that much since very sharp attacks will probably fall outside of the brain´s ability to recognise pitch and destabilise feedbackloops anyway but for ringmodulation this is probably a serious issue. I predict sample&hold to have issues too.
Halving the sample rate (if still possible with the current dac´s?), then using the saved cp power to anti-aliasing everything in sight would be a option. Of cource proposing that might create a wave of suicides amongst swedish dsp programers.... _________________ Kassen |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2005 6:46 pm Post subject:
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All tests were done using an E-MU 1820m at 96 kHz, except the two 'no signal' tests, which were done at 192 kHz.
In every case the patches used were functionally identical and the levels going into the analyzer were matched pretty closely.
In their respective screenshots, the 24 kHz 'spike' changed amplitude within approximately the same range on both the NM Classic and the NM G2.
I don't know what to make of these. The thing that troubles me the most is the HF noise at the G2s outputs (even when muted).
I'm glad to have the NM Classic back, though. A qualitatively different sound and feel that I missed -- that much was apparent within the first few hours. The G2s interface enhancements (editor and hardware) have kinda spoiled me, though!
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2005 6:48 pm Post subject:
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more. these are the nm classic and the nm g2 playing a 12.54 kHz 10% pulse wave at approx. the same amplitude. I wanted something that would really alias badly. definitely some difference, here.
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2005 6:52 pm Post subject:
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last two. this is the 24 kHz 'spike' I mentioned elsewhere. Not sure what causes this but it's evident on both synths. I clocked a fast attack/short decay envelope controlling the amp. of a 440 kHz sine OSC, with a fast square LFO. The amplitude fluctuated quite a bit and I couldn't capture them at precisely the same time but these, like the others, give you enough of an idea, I think.
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Chet

Joined: Nov 19, 2004 Posts: 231 Location: Lititz,PA,USA
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Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2005 7:37 pm Post subject:
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The control modules, including the envelopes, are recalculated at a 24kHz sample rate. Perhaps that accounts for those last spikes. |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2005 8:43 pm Post subject:
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that's what i'm thinking, too. but if these control signals are not audible, per se, why do they manifest in this way? that's the part i don't quite 'get' |
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Kassen
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Joined: Jul 06, 2004 Posts: 7678 Location: The Hague, NL
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 3:21 am Post subject:
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cebec wrote: | that's what i'm thinking, too. but if these control signals are not audible, per se, why do they manifest in this way? that's the part i don't quite 'get' |
They often *are* audible; if you multiply a audio signal with a controll one then the controll one gets into the endresult as much as the audio one (as do the sidebands resulting from the modulation which may well be over the nequist). The only sollution is anti-aliassing all amps, mod inputs and frankly all signal processors in addition, of cource, to all oscs; this a well known part of dsp theory, it´s just hard and cpu intensive.
Let´s wish-list anti-alissing and pray. _________________ Kassen |
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Chet

Joined: Nov 19, 2004 Posts: 231 Location: Lititz,PA,USA
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 5:26 am Post subject:
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I don't think that effort is necessary. Clavia's already thrown money at the problem, by using a control sample rate that's so high that it's inaudible. My 45-year-old ears can't hear 24kHz, and my equipment can't record it, so it's not an issue for me. |
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Tusker

Joined: Feb 03, 2005 Posts: 110 Location: Texas
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 7:56 am Post subject:
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Very interesting observations. Thank you Cebec. I am not sure how to interpret the pulse wave plot. The G2 appears to have a large spike above the fundamental, in the audio range (16Khz?). The NM has a small one. Are those aliasing artifacts?
In discussions of control signals, I agree that an artifact at 24Khz is not really a problem. But I wonder if there is an overlooked opportunity. I imagine (not sure) I hear noisy whumps and thumps from the envelope control signals of analog modulars. Perhaps that information simply needs to be low pass filtered to have a musical roundness? Could it be that keeping control signals within the audio range will add beef to the signal ... much as a pitch sweep needs to have a certain duration for the ears to "feel" it's impact ... as in a synthetic bass drum. Or is that an inaccurate observation?
Thanks for any comments,
Jerry |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 8:12 am Post subject:
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Tusker wrote: | ... the pulse wave plot. The G2 appears to have a large spike above the fundamental, in the audio range (16Khz?). The NM has a small one. Are those aliasing artifacts?
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Yes, I think they're just artifacts. it looks bigger on the G2, but they appear to be roughly the same amplitude. Correct me if i'm wrong. They both seem to peak around -70 dB.
One thing I don't understand is why the plots look so similar, but very different. There's more, forgive the word, 'definition', in the lower dBs of the G2's plot and relatively little in the Classic's.
Right, fortunately 24 kHz (and the HF noise) is beyond my hearing (and it's quiet, too) but not beyond my recording equipment's capabilities. If that noise is from delta-sigma shaping, shouldn't some filter in the G2s DACs eliminate it?
Edit: came across this while looking for discussions on noise shaping... Seems the filtering has been taken care of, already, and that's as good as we're gonna get. Where's the Classic's noise? Is it using non-delta-sigma conversion? Anyone know the Classic's D/A converter part numbers?
From Analog Devices: Analog Dialogue, page 16
http://www.analog.com/library/analogDialogue/Anniversary/15.html
http://www.analog.com/library/analogDialogue/Anniversary/16.html
"Q: I intend to use Analog’s AD1800 family of audio D/A converters for a digital audio playback application. I understand that using an interpolator ahead of the D/A will make it easier to filter the D/A output, assuming I want to get rid of all the images at the D/A output. But is it really necessary to filter the output, since all the images will be above the audible range as long as sampling is at >40 kHz?
A: Good question. The audio equipment (audio amplifiers, equalizers, power amplifiers, etc.) that may eventually receive the output of your D/As are typically built to handle 20-Hz to 20-kHz signals. Since they are not intended to respond at frequencies much beyond 20 kHz-and in effect themselves function as filters-they may not have the necessary slew rate and gain to handle incoming signals from an unfiltered D/A output having significant energy well above 20 kHz. With their slew-rate and gain limitations, the amplifiers are driven into nonlinear regions, generating distortion. These distortion products are not limited to high frequencies but can affect the 20-Hz to 20-kHz range as well. Attenuating the high frequency signals at the DAC will therefore reduce the possibility of distortion. CD players often include filters steep enough to reduce the total out-of-band energy to >80 dB below full scale."
Out-of-band energy is >90 dB below full scale on the G2s DACs. |
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ian-s

Joined: Apr 01, 2004 Posts: 2672 Location: Auckland, New Zealand
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 1:01 pm Post subject:
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cebec wrote: | Right, fortunately 24 kHz (and the HF noise) is beyond my hearing (and it's quiet, too) but not beyond my recording equipment's capabilities. |
The specs on the 1820M are 20-20K, do they band limit to 20K no mater what the sample rate as well? |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 1:05 pm Post subject:
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I don't think so. There's a slightly steeper roll-off than some other cards, though. I think those specs are for 44.1 kHz SR.
If they did band limit, then wouldn't I be unable to see the HF noise on these plots (which were done at 96 and 192 kHz sample rates)? |
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ian-s

Joined: Apr 01, 2004 Posts: 2672 Location: Auckland, New Zealand
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 1:55 pm Post subject:
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So what does the noise look like when you sample it at 192K?
Compared to say the NM output (both muted).
And do you have a subjective opinion on the respective sound quality? |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2005 3:09 pm Post subject:
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If I'm understanding you correctly, then the first two pictures are exactly what you're describing -- They are, in turn, sampled separately, while muted, amd with the E-MU 1820m at 192 kHz sampling rate and Visual Analyzer 7.06 set to 96 kHz bandwidth/Hanning/unweighted.
My first impressions and also those based on close listening tests with identical patches are that the Classic sounds a hint 'darker' and 'fuzzier'. The G2 sounds a sliver more detailed and 'brighter'. That's from comparing raw waveforms as well as personal patches with similar timbres for a few hours since yesterday.
Of note: On the spectral analyzer plot, the G2s HF noise remains unchanged except for what may be an occasional 'idle tone' in that region.
Slight noise/distortion is apparent in the raw waveforms of the Classic even when the G2 is silent -- both are powered on and routed to the analyzer. If I switch to 96 kHz (from 192), the noise in the time domain and frequency domain 'disappears'.
On both synths, the 24 kHz 'spikes' remain in the appropriate cases, as described above, when everything's set to 192 kHz SR/96 kHz bandwidth.
From what I've seen here, I may just switch to 44.1 kHz recording...
In the end, though, they both sound great! I had so much fun jamming with the two of them, last night. The Classic seems to have a character and sound all it's own and for now, some unique modules. |
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blue hell
Site Admin

Joined: Apr 03, 2004 Posts: 24447 Location: The Netherlands, Enschede
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 3:16 am Post subject:
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cebec wrote: | The G2 sounds a sliver more detailed and 'brighter'. |
That's about what went through my head when I first heard the G2 (after having had the Classic for about five years). Except that the words were in dutch of course :-)
And indeed the Classic still has some unique modules, otoh the G2 has some as well.
Jan. |
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monokit

Joined: Apr 14, 2004 Posts: 102 Location: Netherlands
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 3:40 am Post subject:
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Do you guys think the other DAC is the only reason why the G2 sounds more bright? I always assumed its mainly the new algorithms in the G2 responsible for the new G2 sound, similar to the NL2 vs NL3 situation. |
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Kassen
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Joined: Jul 06, 2004 Posts: 7678 Location: The Hague, NL
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 4:29 am Post subject:
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Chet wrote: | I don't think that effort is necessary. Clavia's already thrown money at the problem, by using a control sample rate that's so high that it's inaudible. My 45-year-old ears can't hear 24kHz, and my equipment can't record it, so it's not an issue for me. |
It matters. If you don't anti-alias the vertical fronts of the controll rate, will keep ther imuplse-like properties and so will contain *all* frequencies that can be expressed at that sample rate, not just 24KHz. These will be very quiet, but they will affect systems involving feedback and so on. You don't need to be able to directly hear it either: the effects it inderectly causes may wll be audible, leading to such phenomena as the weird spacial immage implied by almost all G2 patches I've heard so far.
"throwing money at the problem"is one way of tryin to solve it, I'd rather see some well placed engineering and math used instead. _________________ Kassen |
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Kassen
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Joined: Jul 06, 2004 Posts: 7678 Location: The Hague, NL
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 4:37 am Post subject:
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robert wrote: | Do you guys think the other DAC is the only reason why the G2 sounds more bright? I always assumed its mainly the new algorithms in the G2 responsible for the new G2 sound, similar to the NL2 vs NL3 situation. |
I still think the DAC has some influence. There were no algorithem changes between the NL1 and the NL2 (apart from the ring modulator, I heard) but the sound quite different due to the different DAC's. Of cource the NL3 sounds still different. In my opinion the NL1 sounds ok, the NL2 lacks most of it's character and the NL3, like the G2, sounds horrible. _________________ Kassen |
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Tim Kleinert
Joined: Mar 12, 2004 Posts: 1148 Location: Zürich, Switzerland
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 4:59 am Post subject:
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Kassen wrote: | In my opinion the NL1 sounds ok, the NL2 lacks most of it's character and the NL3, like the G2, sounds horrible. |
I've used both NL2 and NL3 extensively for years and had the chance to compare them in depth with a NL1 a friend bought second hand some months ago. My perception is exactly the opposite.
Anyway -having control rates at 24 kHz isn't all that bad. Reaktor doesn't give you that. Of course, I agree that in a modular environment, the differentiation between "control" and "audio" is stupid to begin with. At least on the G2 many modules can switch their bandwidth, albeit not all. (Wouldn't mind audio-rate envelopes either9. |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 9:07 am Post subject:
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Yeah, Reaktor's control rates 'only' go up to about 3200 Hz.
Audio rate envelopes and/or a way to force blue to red or engage further anti-aliasing would satisfy me for the time being...
It seems, though, that the Classic and the G2 both exhibit these tendencies for control rate aliasing and that the difference in perceived sound quality could very well lie in the DACs, their implementation, and any revisions of the algorithms. |
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Kassen
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Joined: Jul 06, 2004 Posts: 7678 Location: The Hague, NL
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 9:10 am Post subject:
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tim wrote: | I've used both NL2 and NL3 extensively for years and had the chance to compare them in depth with a NL1 a friend bought second hand some months ago. My perception is exactly the opposite.
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Yeah, it's taste there; I freely admit it's the rough edge of the 1 that I like.
[/quote]
Anyway -having control rates at 24 kHz isn't all that bad. Reaktor doesn't give you that. Of course, I agree that in a modular environment, the differentiation between "control" and "audio" is stupid to begin with. At least on the G2 many modules can switch their bandwidth, albeit not all. (Wouldn't mind audio-rate envelopes either9.[/quote]
You are right, you are completely right, it's a respectable number, I enjoy samplers with lower sampling rates. However, what *is* a problem is that now cv signals will get into the audio chain through multipliers and so on and so will go on to the DAC's where the totall get's filtered for aliassing based on the audio rate, meaning the controllrate stepping will get sloped instead of removed like the audio rate stepping (ideally) will be. Audio rate envelopes, intended to act as a envelope of the VCA in conventional synth designs would probably be the easiest and perhaps one of the most effective ways of dealing with a lot of this. This probably wouldn't cause as many suicides amongst Swedish programers as a complete overhaul would; it wouldn't be that much harder then normal envelopes but of cource it would be a bit more expensive. This would be a cost-effective improvement. Tuning normal OSC's down would also be preferable as sources of amplitude modulation.
We are still dealing with the problem that modulation can cause sidebands that may well be beyond the nequist and how the excess, nonharmonic, energy could disballance feedbackloops.
As a side note; we know that between the nequist and half that the only waveform we can safely use is the sine. another octave beyond that we can have a harmonic. As long as no modulation is involved you could use that, combined with some logic, to make your own aliassing free oscilators out of summing sines. As soon as you also want ring mopdulation the math for this probably becomes too nasty to do in a patch.... _________________ Kassen |
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Chet

Joined: Nov 19, 2004 Posts: 231 Location: Lititz,PA,USA
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 9:31 am Post subject:
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Kassen, when I look at cebec's plots, I can't help but think that you're making a mountain out of a molehill. |
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Kassen
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Joined: Jul 06, 2004 Posts: 7678 Location: The Hague, NL
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 1:51 pm Post subject:
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Chet wrote: | Kassen, when I look at cebec's plots, I can't help but think that you're making a mountain out of a molehill. |
When I listen to the G2 I can't help but wonder how anybody could possibly climb it.
There is something wrong. I don't claim to know what it is but there is something profoundly wrong about the G2 sound; something is off in the high-end that reacts like ice-picks with my ear and that throws off my sense of spacialisation. Specs and test results are one thing, but how this reacts with my hearing is quite another. I get headaches and desorientation from the G2 and it's contemporaries, I can instantly tell recordings must be new because the current generation of hardware digital synths all share a yet unknown phenomenon that throws off the high-end that I'm willing to bet will be the clue to future generations that a certain recording was made in this era, much like the enthousiasm for certain reverbs in the 80's, except that there is no context where it sounds good.
I'm not making up the concept of audio-rate envelopes either; the C-sound scene has been using them for a long time now.
I wish Clavia would do a Nord Modular2. _________________ Kassen |
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cebec

Joined: Apr 19, 2004 Posts: 1098 Location: Virginia
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 2:15 pm Post subject:
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Kassen wrote: | ...something is off in the high-end that reacts like ice-picks with my ear and that throws off my sense of spacialisation... |
i admit i had a somewhat similar experience in my use of the G2 particularly with headphone monitoring.
right now, i'm not as concerned with recording inaudible high frequency noise or instantaneous, masked, alias-noise as i am about subjective sound quality and some of the things kassen's mentioned.
again, i've been really pleased with the sound quality of both instruments and use the G2 almost exclusively these days, but the 'symptoms' kassen mentions and the 'data' we've seen, and the fact that i now have a classic at my disposal -- i feel i'll sort things out soon enough for myself. Last edited by cebec on Sat Jul 02, 2005 6:05 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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elektro80
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Joined: Mar 25, 2003 Posts: 21959 Location: Norway
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Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2005 3:04 pm Post subject:
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Yes, there is a difference in sound quality between the NM-1 and the G2. I spent 45 minutes messing about on a G2 today. The NM-1 is far from perfect, but I don´t want perfect from an instrument. I simply want something useful and exciting. I guess I am predisposed to liking the grit in the NM-2 and the G-2 is simply far to modern sounding. I managed to set up some easy patches that I think made the G2 sound just great. However, remember way back in the odl days when you would patch a synth or an organ into some analog gear and then into a keyboard amp or a PA? -And you would then record this using microphones. I am fairly sure the G2 will benefit from this if you find the sound uncool.
It might be wrong to focus too much on the G2 here, because I think the G2 sounds very much like a lot of the high end polka board stuff. This does not make it bad in any way, but at least to me these instruments still sound a bit weird. They can make some very decent sounds, but now and then I really hate "something" in there. The most evident examples of this would be a lot of the new age ambient world music stuff made with polka boards. The music can be very nice and cosy, but "something" in there sounds horribly wrong. Frankly, I don´t think the G2 is bad at all. I am even lusting for one right now. However, I am also considering a stack of A-Station synths and more controllers. Those have grit and personality and are dirt cheap. They aren´t modular though. These are merely eight-note polyphonic analog substitutes. And yes, I am that kind of nerd who really thinks that parts written for an eight-note polyphonic synth cannot be played well on some 128 note polyphonic polka monster from hell. _________________ A Charity Pantomime in aid of Paranoid Schizophrenics descended into chaos yesterday when someone shouted, "He's behind you!"
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