Do you curse at your computer?

 Computer rage is a well-known phenomenon of the times. But apparently 61% of people don't suffer from it at all.

By David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

Have you ever shouted at your computer? Which part did you shout at - the system unit? The screen? The keyboard? The mouse? Or maybe it was at the software, although it's difficult to know which way to direct your venom.

Computers are a common cause of frustrations. My own personal bête noire is printing. At home I have four computers connected through the network to one printer. Some days it will print, some days it won't. Just the other day it decided not to print and showed an error message I had never seen before... "Can't print". Yes really.

But according to a recent survey, 61% of computer users have never cursed their computer, nor merely shouted at it. I'm not the only one to find this hard to believe.

Where this links to audio is that the people who never have cause to complain at their computer, and there are some, are the people who only use it very lightly, and for the common tasks that everyone else does. If all you do is browse the Internet, send e-mail, word process and play with the occasional spreadsheet, then there's nothing to go wrong. As long as you don't want to print of course ;-)

But audio stresses the computer much more than that, and in relation to all the other activities that people use computers for, audio is very much in the minority. So you can expect problems, and we hear a lot about people's many and varied problems here at RecordProducer.com

So if you are not having problems with your computer, congratulations to you.

Wait...

If you're not having problems with your computer, that means you're not stressing it, and that means you're probably not being sufficiently creative.

Yes, being caused to shout and curse at your computer is a GOOD THING! It shows you're doing good original work.

Just remember that next time it happens.

Publication date: Wednesday February 09, 2011
Author: David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

Korg Pa3X Video Manual Part 5- Vocal Processor

What is the difference between gain and level?

Gain... Level... Are you confused? And does it make any difference if you are?

By David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

Having thought carefully, I really can't imagine any scenario in practical audio operations where it would matter if someone confused gain and level. If anyone can think of such a situation, then I'd love to know. But it doesn't hurt to have these things clear in one's mind, so here is a simple statement that should help...

Gain=change in level

So a signal has a certain level, whether it be sound pressure, voltage or digits. If you do something that changes the level, you have applied gain. So if the level of a signal is -26 dBFS and you apply 6 dB of gain, the signal level rises to -20 dBFS.

The word 'gain' of course implies more of something. Like 'profit' means more money. The opposite of 'profit' is 'loss'. The opposite of 'gain' is 'attenuation'. So if we want to make a signal lower in level, then we have to apply an attenuation. If the level of a signal is -6 dBFS and you apply 12 dB of attenuation, the signal level drops to -18 dBFS. With the magic of negative numbers, which have been with us for more than 2000 years now, we can indeed talk about negative gain just as easily as attenuation. So once again if the level of a signal is -6 dBFS and you apply -12 dB of gain, the signal level drops to -18 dBFS.

But...

In electronic audio, there is a way of thinking that positive gain is provided by active devices - devices that take electricity from a power source and use it to boost the signal. Level in a downwards direction - attenuation - can be controlled by passive devices that need no power source - a couple of resistors will do nicely.

So an electronic engineer may think in terms of controlling gain with active devices and controlling level with a passive device such as a fader.

But how can a fader provide +10 dB of gain at the top of its scale? Simple - by actively applying that 10 dB of gain before the fader. When the fader is set to 0 dB, it attenuates the already-boosted signal by 10 dB.

And...

I do feel a mild sense of irritation when, for example, I see a 'gain reduction' meter on a compressor. It should be 'level reduction' or 'attenuation'. Or it could just be labeled 'gain' and calibrated in negative values of decibels.

At the end of the day however it isn't that much to worry about in practical audio operations. Just keep in mind that 'gain=change in level' and you'll be fine!

 

Publication date: Saturday July 07, 2012
Author: David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

Korg Pa3X Video Manual Part 4- Song Play

How much would you like to play an amazing keyboard instrument like this?

You don't often see keyboards like this one. A delight to the eye as well as the ear...

By David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

 

My role as an occasional composer of cheap and cheerful television music gives me a great excuse to watch daytime TV if I feel like it. And today I spent a few relaxing minutes watching a little of the BBC's Bargain Hunt, in which two teams of contestants buy junk at boot sales and sell it on as 'antiques' at auction. The winning team is the one that makes the smallest loss! On the odd occasion, they might even make a small profit and get to keep it.

In the middle of the program there is normally a slot where presenter Tim Wonnacott enthuses over some piece of genuine antiquery. And today's didn't look very promising to start with. But it turned out to be quite amazing. Here's the video...



Wow! Well, it probably doesn't work fully and, even if it did, it would take a lot of maintenance to keep it going. But it's an amazing instrument with so much character. And I want one like it.

Now... who can I see about a MIDI retrofit?

Publication date: Friday July 06, 2012
Author: David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

Korg Pa3X Video Manual Part 3- Styles

Windows 8 brings performance improvements to Sonar

Lower latency, better CPU load balancing, reduced memory usage, better disk performance... Something to look forward to?

By David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass

Here's an interesting article written by someone who knows about the inner workings of DAW software. That someone is Noel Borthwick, CTO of Cakewalk Inc., so he should know quite a lot. Really, quite a lot. These are the inner workings that users don't need to think about on a day-to-day basis. But a little knowledge or awareness of how a DAW works 'under the hood' must have a certain value.

It is also a useful reminder that OS developers don't care that much about pro audio because it is a very small part of their market. As Borthwick says, "Call me cynical but in the multimedia/DAW industry we're bottom feeders. Most operating systems vendors don't really care about high performance audio, so most benefits we see tend to be 'happy accidents' or side effects of other more commercially viable features."

As you might have heard already, Windows 8 has two modes of operation - Metro and Desktop. Metro, so it seems to me, is Microsoft's answer to Apple's iOS, as found in the iPhone, iPod and iPad. Although it is almost inevitable that audio and music apps will be created for Metro, that is going to be something for the future rather than right now. So Desktop mode will be our playground for some time to come.

When it comes to upgrading something as important as an operating system, my inclination is always to play safe. I have working DAW systems and I want to keep them working. Upgrading always carries a risk, so I will only upgrade a test system, not a production system. When the test system is proven to work properly, then I will put it into production, but I will always have a backup running the old software until I am absolutely sure.

So Windows 8 doesn't fill me with excitement in that sense. On the other hand, one cannot ignore the relentless march of progress. Sooner or later, upgrading becomes essential. And if Windows 8 offers advantages in any way, I want to have those advantages.

At this point you might like to read Borthwick's article in its entirety. Or perhaps just skip to the conclusions.
Borthwick's conclusions are encouraging. To quote...

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SONAR CPU gains were observed when using Windows 8 for Low latency performance tests. These gains mean you can run bigger loads in Win8 at low latency without audio glitching.

• low latency plugins… 15.5% CPU reduction
• input monitoring… 8% CPU reduction
• high track count… 23% CPU reduction
• High bandwidth audio …6.2% CPU reduction

Workloads for cores are more evenly balanced at low latencies on Windows 8. Better balanced core workloads translate to more efficient use of multiple CPU core hardware and thereby better workload scaling for large projects.

• low latency plugins… 23% improvement
• input monitoring… 31.7% improvement
• high track count… 30.6% improvement
• High bandwidth audio …17.5% improvement 

A 7.9% reduction in memory use under Win8 was observed when loading a large real world SONAR project (Cori Yarkin project from SONAR sample content) under identical system configuration. Reduced memory load can be observed in most of the tests.

A 78% improvement under Win8 was observed in disk read/write performance while reading large buffer sizes. Improvements were more moderate at smaller buffer sizes.

An 85% reduction in system calls was observed under Windows 8 in the input monitoring case and more moderate gains in the other cases. Fewer system calls translate to improved CPU load as well as fewer user mode to kernel transitions which mean fewer audio glitches.

25 – 50% reduction in kernel use can be observed in some of the tests with Win8. Lower kernel use results in fewer audio glitches since it leaves more headroom for audio drivers.

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From these data, the future for Windows 8 in Desktop mode as a DAW platform looks very bright. Basically, you get more performance from your existing DAW software. Of course, this test only applies to Sonar, but hopefully similar improvements can be achieved in other Windows DAWs.

Oh, and by the way - I like the $39.99 upgrade pricing a lot! This isn't what we normally expect from Microsoft.

And I like the new Metro look too. My iPhone looks a mess with all those jazzy icons which, compared to the clean lines of Metro, now all seem rather dated.

 

Publication date: Thursday July 05, 2012
Author: David Mellor, Course Director of Audio Masterclass