Musik Messe 2017, a new low for Keyboardists

[EvilDragon]

Not to mention they would need to get license to do this from Microsoft or Apple (good luck).

Absolutely not a problem with Microsoft. This is why Windows Embedded exists (now named Windows 10 IoT), exactly for those purposes. Try asking Apple the same thing - not gonna happen.

[Bachus]

I am using a laptop, Windows 10, and Cantabile to host VSTs. I know some people who are running embedded rack computers instead of laptops to do the same. I also know of several players now who are pretty much now VST only using such a combination.

Having said that, having that in a keyboard form factor would be most interesting.

So far the strongest combination for this is a MAC and Mainstage..
Works very well for hosting instruments and making them accessible

Also Gig performer comes close to Mainstage as a Host, its rather new.. works on windows 10..

For those reading German, on Bonedo.de there is an extensive comparrison on this kind of hosts..

https://www.bonedo.de/artikel/einzelans ... arder.html

[EvilDragon]

The only thing that worries me about Seelake is that business appears very quite, too quite.

You mean quiet, right

Where can you even buy one?

http://www.seelake.com/en/contacts.html

See "Distribution".

[vEddY]

Having said that, having that in a keyboard form factor would be most interesting.

I think it's pretty difficult to expect for that to happen. But, I'd be nicely surprised it if happens

Meanwhile, I really like this concept:

http://musiccomputing.com/tanto-macos-x-61-key/

But, as it is, I'm currently gigging with a rack (if I need VSTs), or with iPad/Fireface UCX setup (if I need backing tracks only). But I guess that will end up being a same setup as I need some other things to have a "complete" setup (TR-rack, line mixer, stereo compressor, in-ear monitoring).

[SeedyLee]

Although the VST standard fulfils its purpose well on personal computers, and despite the vast library of VSTs available, developing a standalone workstation or synthesizer capable of running VSTs is likely to be ineffective and cumbersome - and therefore not something I believe synth manufacturers should aspire to.

There's nothing inherently wrong with VSTs, but the standard doesn't impose sufficient restraints to be able to allow them to run on a wide variety of platforms and architectures. It's important to remember that VSTs are really just stand-alone software applications, with the VST standard specifying how a host and instrument can interact. There are no restrictions placed by the standard on what operating system or hardware facilities a VST can use.

The biggest area this has become an issue in I think is copy protection - piracy of VSTs is a huge issue, and vendors have devised all manner of elaborate schemes to stem the massive loss of revenue they face. Unfortunately, this often involves the use of internet authorisation, tokens and dongles - all of which would then need to be supported by a hardware instrument.

There are also no restrictions on the use of external libraries for a VST, so if a VST developer wishes to use a UI toolkit for their VST, or an application framework such as .NET, they are free to do so. That would mean that any hardware instrument also needs to potentially support Cocoa/Carbon, QT, .Net etc.

Finally, there's the overarching issue of the suitability of a general purpose computing platform for music creation - and latency and jitter. A high-end PC may be able to manage 3-7ms latency with many VSTs, but the Kronos does significantly better because all the audio generation runs in the kernel, which simply isn't possible on Windows and Mac OS X.

So, what's the solution?

In my opinion, if extensible hardware was realistically going to become viable, a new standard needs to be devised that:

* Provides and overarching cryptographically-backed copy-protection framework that can be used by all plugins (something similar to what the Kronos, iOS etc have).

* Restrict the use of dynamically-linked external libraries - static linking only

* Restrict plugins from presenting their own user interfaces - the UI should be drawn and managed by the host exclusively.

All of these things could potentially be done with the Kronos if Korg wished to develop such a standard.[/list]

[SeedyLee]

Although the VST standard fulfils its purpose well on personal computers, and despite the vast library of VSTs available, developing a standalone workstation or synthesizer capable of running VSTs is likely to be ineffective and cumbersome - and therefore not something I believe synth manufacturers should aspire to.

There's nothing inherently wrong with VSTs, but the standard doesn't impose sufficient restraints to be able to allow them to run on a wide variety of platforms and architectures. It's important to remember that VSTs are really just stand-alone software applications, with the VST standard specifying how a host and instrument can interact. There are no restrictions placed by the standard on what operating system or hardware facilities a VST can use.

The biggest area this has become an issue in I think is copy protection - piracy of VSTs is a huge issue, and vendors have devised all manner of elaborate schemes to stem the massive loss of revenue they face. Unfortunately, this often involves the use of internet authorisation, tokens and dongles - all of which would then need to be supported by a hardware instrument.

There are also no restrictions on the use of external libraries for a VST, so if a VST developer wishes to use a UI toolkit for their VST, or an application framework such as .NET, they are free to do so. That would mean that any hardware instrument also needs to potentially support Cocoa/Carbon, QT, .Net etc.

Finally, there's the overarching issue of the suitability of a general purpose computing platform for music creation - and latency and jitter. A high-end PC may be able to manage 3-7ms latency with many VSTs, but the Kronos does significantly better because all the audio generation runs in the kernel, which simply isn't possible on Windows and Mac OS X.

So, what's the solution?

In my opinion, if extensible hardware was realistically going to become viable, a new standard needs to be devised that:

* Provides and overarching cryptographically-backed copy-protection framework that can be used by all plugins (something similar to what the Kronos, iOS etc have).

* Restrict the use of dynamically-linked external libraries - static linking only

* Restrict plugins from presenting their own user interfaces - the UI should be drawn and managed by the host exclusively.

All of these things could potentially be done with the Kronos if Korg wished to develop such a standard.[/list]

[SanderXpander]

I am using a laptop, Windows 10, and Cantabile to host VSTs. I know some people who are running embedded rack computers instead of laptops to do the same. I also know of several players now who are pretty much now VST only using such a combination.

Having said that, having that in a keyboard form factor would be most interesting.

So far the strongest combination for this is a MAC and Mainstage..
Works very well for hosting instruments and making them accessible

Also Gig performer comes close to Mainstage as a Host, its rather new.. works on windows 10..

For those reading German, on Bonedo.de there is an extensive comparrison on this kind of hosts..

https://www.bonedo.de/artikel/einzelans ... arder.html

MainStage is pretty good but in my experience it's too limited in letting you decide memory management. That means you'll run into trouble with large projects, like having the equivalent of the Kronos' 3000 sounds available simultaneously. The whole "global" bus/instrument thing is also geared heavily towards small to medium sized projects.

[vEddY]

MainStage is pretty good but in my experience it's too limited in letting you decide memory management. That means you'll run into trouble with large projects, like having the equivalent of the Kronos' 3000 sounds available simultaneously. The whole "global" bus/instrument thing is also geared heavily towards small to medium sized projects.

Never had an issue with that. With my i7/16GB/SSD MacBook Pro, I never had so much as a hiccup with Mainstage. And I had some (live) projects where Mainstage was used as a "central" point of my rig, running projects with 40+ audio tracks (backing tracks with separate submixes for FOH, click track and separate mix for me) and 10-15 synth VST tracks, with UAD plugins on top. I wouldn't call that a medium-sized project

Also, I tested it with a project similar to this one, but with a combo of Kontakt instruments (10+) and VST synths, and it was still running without a problem.

That being said, if you have 10 separate u-he Diva VST tracks, of course, that wouldn't work. But that wouldn't work on any other computer anyway (maybe 8-core Mac Pro trashcan could pull that one off, not sure).

That's what you get when Apple goes "we want to try to look nice" design approach, and ends up with something that's completely and utterly useless (Mac Pro trashcan).

[EvilDragon]

A high-end PC may be able to manage 3-7ms latency with many VSTs, but the Kronos does significantly better because all the audio generation runs in the kernel

Does it, really?

http://si7-lab.blogspot.com/2011/06/oth ... ronos.html


That doesn't look significantly better to me, even if you measure from the end of the MIDI note event, like Dan mentioned in one of his posts.


You can get tighter latency with a finely tweaked PC, and a good audio interface with great ASIO drivers (say, RME, Antelope) than Kronos. Even on Windows running other stuff apart from a DAW with VSTs. There are limits to the Atom CPU that's in Kronos...

[Bachus]

A high-end PC may be able to manage 3-7ms latency with many VSTs, but the Kronos does significantly better because all the audio generation runs in the kernel

Does it, really?

http://si7-lab.blogspot.com/2011/06/oth ... ronos.html


That doesn't look significantly better to me, even if you measure from the end of the MIDI note event, like Dan mentioned in one of his posts.


You can get tighter latency with a finely tweaked PC, and a good audio interface with great ASIO drivers (say, RME, Antelope) than Kronos. Even on Windows running other stuff apart from a DAW with VSTs. There are limits to the Atom CPU that's in Kronos...

7 or 8 ms latency, who cares? As long as its under 20 ms you will not notice


The problem indeed is running out of memmory... or irregular peeks making your cpu stutter like a 80's deejay scratching...



Which brings me back to mainstage... its indeed as said.. dont make your concerts to big, and you will never run out of memmory.... dont add to much high CPU sounds and you will never run out of CPU power...

I am running mainstage with komplete and omnisphere perfectly well on a 2011 macbook...

I dont see any reason like another scott said, to have a few hundred sounds in a concert... just make a new comcert for every gig... also make sure that you save every performance and channel strip seperately...

[EvilDragon]

7 or 8 ms latency, who cares? As long as its under 20 ms you will not notice

Not quite true, especially for a trained musician, and it's also not a fixed value, it can be variable depending on the tempo of the performance.

Hell, even as an amateur in guitar, 20 ms round trip latency can definitely be felt when playing guitar through an ampsim... Numbers below 10 are necessary here, around 5 is ideal.

[Bertotti]

I never thought much about latency, that is until my firebox stopped being supported and my os would not run it anymore. I now have a Antelope audio Zen Tour and I can say the difference to my ear is amazing and e everything is lightning fast. I have no clue how to measure it nor will I probably ever try but I am a firm believer now that it does make a difference.

[SanderXpander]

MainStage got buggy for me with large projects is all I can say. I haven't tried it for a good while though, it may be better now. Or it may have depended on an external factor like a certain plugin or the interface I used, that's very often the case too.

As for latency, 20ms is nuts. I get seriously annoyed if it's above 10ms and I can feel the difference between 7 and 5.

[SeedyLee]

The Kronos is less than 2ms latency ...

[Bachus]

7 or 8 ms latency, who cares? As long as its under 20 ms you will not notice

Not quite true, especially for a trained musician, and it's also not a fixed value, it can be variable depending on the tempo of the performance.

Hell, even as an amateur in guitar, 20 ms round trip latency can definitely be felt when playing guitar through an ampsim... Numbers below 10 are necessary here, around 5 is ideal.

Let me rephrase that... Noboddy hears latency under 11 ms, while most people domt hear anything under 20 ms...

But if your friend was playing guitar trough your PC.. He might have had both input as well as out put latency of 20ms which makes it actuall 40 ms... Which imdeed is a problem..

Check this link https://us.novationmusic.com/answerbase ... -explained


So 7 or 8 ms is not an issue at all, when just playing a keyboard,mand converting midi to audio... Unless your midi also has some latency...as long as the total stays under 11 ms noboddy will hear it... While most people will not hear or notice things under 20 ms..