Rant Warning: Computers

[MartinP268]

Ok, you might already know from my posts that I'm not a big fan of a PC in music creation. However, my stance isn't entirely hostile and, from time to time, I give the computer 'another chance' :-)

 

So, while being at work, suddenly I thought how I watched some videos of Vangelis and Jordan Rudess and admired their capability of playing the whole orchestra live from one keyboard. I thought, I could get the same opportunity if I did a little work and sampled my DX7 into a software sampler and mapped different sounds across the keyboard. I imagined what great new kinds of sounds I could get from this synth by using sampled layers of different patches.

 

I quickly browsed KVR for freeware samplers and chose the best - DS-404 (I discovered that I had an old Comuter Music disk with that plug-in handy)

 

First attempt - the samples sound good - but then... no layers overlapping???

Meh.

 

Second approach - Creative Vienna Sound Font Studio. After half an hour I had a full octave of individual sounds from my DX7, just for test purposes :-)

I layered the sounds nicely, clicked on the whole sound font, I put together, to hear my creation. I press the key and OOPs!!! Unable to play a note. The PC rebooted itself two seconds after, no save...

 

Meh?

 

I must buy myself a proper hardware sampler, I think...

[Awake77]

Sounds like you need a new computer...

[pogo97]

Like a Mac and Logic.

[nat whilk II]

My first guess would be lack of RAM for what you're trying to do.

 

Plus, not to be snarkey about it, but free stuff? Expect bugs....

 

nat whilk ii

[Yoozer]

I quickly browsed KVR for freeware samplers and chose the best - DS-404 (I discovered that I had an old Comuter Music disk with that plug-in handy)

Pay peanuts, get monkeys. Try this one - http://www.discodsp.com/highlife/

 

I layered the sounds nicely, clicked on the whole sound font, I put together, to hear my creation. I press the key and OOPs!!! Unable to play a note. The PC rebooted itself two seconds after, no save...

Didn't you have a wonky Soundblaster, too?

 

I must buy myself a proper hardware sampler, I think...

No, get a quality software sampler and a nice ASIO soundcard.

 

Unless it should be really cheap, then just get an ESI-4000. Hangups? None. Nightmares about the dark gods of SCSI? Sure!

[Awake77]

Like a Mac and Logic.

 

Or a PC you built yourself w/Sonar 7

 

Unless it should be really cheap, then just get an ESI-4000. Hangups? None. Nightmares about the dark gods of SCSI? Sure!

 

lol Dark Gods of SCSI...

[MartinP268]

Didn't you have a wonky Soundblaster, too?

 

Yep, I forgot to mention

 

Sounds like you need a new computer...

 

Yes, this is true and will always be, no matter what puter I have at the moment ;-) I don't plan buying a new one any soon but I might think of expanding my 512MB RAM and perhaps add Terratec 6Fire (wonky?) I don't want to stretch the budget too much unnecesarilly because Prophet '08 is in the queue :-)

 

I would be more inclined towards buying a hardware sampler but

SCSI scares me. I've heard it has some shady connections with Terminator .

Perhaps there is something with internal HD or other media.

 

Anyway, the whole idea of computer sampling sounds great (as opposed to computer VA). I actually believe this and the sequencing are areas where software is equally good and more convenient. Or at least the logics tells me so.

 

Thanks for the link, Yoozer. I'm checking that out :-)

[Umbra]

 

I quickly browsed KVR for freeware samplers

Problem #1, freeware.

 

 

Creative Vienna Sound Font Studio.

Problem #2, Creative.

 

If your going to use junk and you don't have a real computer why are you suprised that it doesn't work?

[Awake77]

 

Anyway, the whole idea of computer sampling sounds great (as opposed to computer VA). I actually believe this and the sequencing are areas where software is equally good and more convenient. Or at least the logics tells me so.

 

 

A dual core Core2Duo system (PC or Mac) should suit you well for a long time...believe me it is WORLDS different than the technology of 2 years ago (Athlon XP,Pentium4,etc)

 

I've yet to see my new machine go down, even rewiring Reason into my DAW with 50+ tracks.

 

good luck!!

[Yoozer]

I would be more inclined towards buying a hardware sampler but SCSI scares me. I've heard it has some shady connections with Terminator . Perhaps there is something with internal HD or other media.

An Akai Z4 or something would be my tool of choice. It's got USB, the harddisk can be standard IDE and the memory you put in there is fairly recent (as opposed to the increasingly rare 72-pin SIMMs).

 

Anyway, the whole idea of computer sampling sounds great

It is. Much easier to use .wav files; get yourself a pocket recorder that uses flash media and you can record anything at any time. Editing is a ridiculous lot easier with a mouse and a full keyboard.

 

Ableton's got Simpler - I can immediately drag parts of rendered audio to it and check out how they sound like samples. I did this with a long, compressed reverb tail and I ended up here: http://www.theheartcore.com/music/olivesound.mp3 - compare with http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHODNUlroCk

[carbon111]

For around $200 you can get a 3ghz cpu, fan, mobo, 512 megs of ram and an M-Audio Audiophile 2496 card.

 

Pimp your computer. Then something like Kontact or Gigastudio makes more sense...

[Mook]

If you like the sound of DX why fart arse about with a software sampler. Just buy FM8 and be done with it.

[MartinP268]

 

For around $200 you can get a 3ghz cpu, fan, mobo, 512 megs of ram and an M-Audio Audiophile 2496 card.

 

 

I have all that in my PC except for the sound interface (I use wonky Soundblaster, which I'm not 100% sure is the source of problems.)

 

 

If you like the sound of DX why fart arse about with a software sampler. Just buy FM8 and be done with it.

 

 

Exactly, I like the sound of DX, not the FM8. The FM8 wouldn't get me anywhere close to what I could do with the DX and a sampler. It would take me in quite different direction instead.

 

These days, a good sampler is way cheaper than FM8 + PC expansion, too.

I need to figure out if the computer convenience is worth the premium.

[pogo97]

 

Exactly, I like the sound of DX, not the FM8. The FM8 wouldn't get me anywhere close to what I could do with the DX and a sampler. It would take me in quite different direction instead. These days, a good sampler is way cheaper than FM8 + PC expansion, too. I need to figure out if the computer convenience is worth the premium.

 

 

It's worth it for me but it doesn't sound worth it for you. Go buy a DX and be happy.

[MartinP268]

Thanks for all input. I think you guys recommended me some first class stuff.

Whether I will go software (considering it in sampling area only) or hardware, I haven't decided yet.

 

In my case it is not just a debate between hardware and software. If it was, I would already have one of the leading software sampling packages and a new computer. It is debate between:

 

- price vs. features that I would use

 

Buying a nice hardware sampler today is a complete bargain, almost no matter where you strike.

 

- flexibility vs. convenience (creativity = 1 / convenience)

 

In my nature, I'm a performer type of kbdist rather than tweaker-clicker.

I like vintage and modern instruments, but I strongly prefer vintage ways and techniques of using synths. I see my future studio more the way BBC Radiophonic Workshops worked rather than modern space-ship-one-click- control of everything.

 

- uncompromised immediacy during performance vs. power and editing potential

 

Latency, latency, latency... I want to do drums by hand, I want to do fast arpeggios on the fly, I want to have immediate sound output, regardless how complicated the sound is.

 

The decision isn't easy or straightforward. The more I think about it, the more I bend towards the hardware options, though.

[Awake77]

 

I have all that in my PC except for the sound interface (I use wonky Soundblaster, which I'm not 100% sure is the source of problems.)

 

 

I can almost guarantee its 100% the source of your problems!!

 

 

Latency, latency, latency... I want to do drums by hand, I want to do fast arpeggios on the fly, I want to have immediate sound output, regardless how complicated the sound is. The decision isn't easy or straightforward. The more I think about it, the more I bend towards the hardware options, though.

 

 

With your 3Ghz P4, 1GB of RAM, and a good audio interface, you should be able to get

 

http://www.bayviewproaudio.com/customer/product.php?productid=22834

 

While I love working on PC's for composition, for live playing I would probably choose a hardware sampler...or more likely this beauty:

 

http://www.museresearch.com/receptor.php

 

Its a custom Linux based computer that functions as a dedicated VST host - a friend of mine has one and he loves it.

[MartinP268]

Receptor is a fine piece of equipment. It is a bit expensive, but looks like a great solution and well worth the money. I will consider this when all cheap options fail .

 

Yoozer, nice sound manipulation in the clip. In return I post a short raw clip of something that, fingers crossed, will end up as my DX7 mini-album project.

The background noises are some sound bits from kayaking trip I had with my wife last summer ;-)

 

http://www4.webng.com/martinp268/river.mp3

[synthetica]

 

I have all that in my PC except for the sound interface (I use wonky Soundblaster, which I'm not 100% sure is the source of problems.)

 

 

That IS your main problem, get yourself a real pro-audio soundcard and dump the soundblaster as fast as you can. You will be amazed.

[Allerian]

+1 on the problem-causing nature of the humble Soundblaster.

[Khazul]

If you like the sound of DX why fart arse about with a software sampler. Just buy FM8 and be done with it.

 

Or even just get a DX7 or TX802 - they go for next to nthing these days.

[filterthing]

you have a soundblaster and you are not a fan of music creation on a pc?

 

Well that is a problem.

 

using free software.

 

also a problem.

 

Can't blame pcs for your bad set up.

 

You can get a m-audio 24/96 with midi, for less than a hundred bucks. Most soft samplers, even le versions, will run on older systems. More ram helps, but that is cheap. So for about 150 (the going rate for EMus and Akai samplers these days) you will have a better experience using a pc to make music.

[shaft9000]

:poke: Uhhhhmm, dooooodzzzz....:poke:

 

I tink he all-retty sed he haz a dx7

 

to OP: the 'sample-mapping idea' is quite feasible - if you have the means then you just have do it for the style you like to play.

It could be quite different for you working with a h/w sampler compared to doing it all on a PC - I've done both for many years and the difference in time and sound is significant. Before PCs were around it was done w/ DATs & the sampler itself - it often took me longer to prep the samples than it did to arrange the track they were used in.

The better way is to prepare your samples on the PC and export to a h/w sampler. This can get complicated by old hardware and storage problems (availability of reliable drives and/or memory), so be wary what you are getting in to.

So workflow is the biggest difference between h/w & soft-samplers. Sound is next as many samplers, especially the older ones, impart their own character to the samples...which may or may not belong in your music; that's up to you.