Scope NSA Offer 2: All Zarg synths (Solaris, Quantum Wave..)

[yayajohn]

Got the other set of keys. Thanks Gary
I had to balance out the other side of my system
My Zarg arsenal is now complete.

[garyb]

[HUROLURA]

Already have all of them on my Xite from the Revolution day offer ...
... but I just went on and ordered them for one of my old PCI system.

So, already upgrade this system thanks to SC NSA offer last month.
Now upgrade to Zarg NSA.
What would we have next month ?

[dawman]

Osiris and ZPlane are all that's left for me......

[borg]

the zplane surround plugin has always been something I wanted to play around with...
Osiris, got it with a scope I bought for its DSP, but never tried the program though.

[YiannisK]

I got my keys yesterday and have been playing with ZARG synths for hours.
Thanks Gary for your help!
Although really heavy for my smaller setup of 15 dsps at the midi studio, I love the sounds of all of Bowens synths.

I have the zplane surround plugin and have not used it to it's proper potential.
You need to send each channel to an individual monitor.
I think this plug is more useful for theatre setups.

[dante]

I have the zplane surround plugin and have not used it to it's proper potential. You need to send each channel to an individual monitor.
I think this plug is more useful for theatre setups.

...or making your next live gig quadraphonic...?

[garyb]

it doesn't work properly in v5.

[HUROLURA]

And keys received.

Thanks Gary.

[Bud Weiser]

it doesn't work properly in v5.

Well,- I installed all Zarg this nite on Win XP Pro SP3 32Bit machine, SCOPE 5.1 and XITE-1 connected.

I didn´t test RD Drum up to now ...

Pro-Wave works,- 5 voice polyphony easily, WC Pro One works,- didn´t try polyphonic up to now but I think it will.
Pro-Wave gives very loud clicks when changing patches even no keys depressed or notes triggered.
I think it´s because Pro-Wave re-builds itself when different OSCs, Filters are been used in different patches,- but it´s not good for connected speakers.

Red Dwarf EX,- not usable up to now,- can´t change patches even w/ only 2 voices without getting SAT and DSP assigment error messages ...
Maxing out polyphony impossible when loaded w/ 1 or 2 voices and a patch loaded.
Sometimes doesn´t play a note at all when loaded and trying to load a patch from preset list,- this even w/ only 1 voice.
I tried manual placement on DSP #7,- no change.

Rotor EX,- can´t change patches w/ only 2 voices,- DSP and SAT errors when trying to load "Basic Strings" p.ex. which I expect is a more simpler patch.
Otherwise same results as w/ Red Dwarf EX.

Solaris v5.0,- no chance at all, unoperatable here. I load into project, it comes up w/ 2 voices automatic, I load preset list, try to load a patch and dang,- SAT and DSP error.
From that point you cannot do more.

I got some polyphony (4-6 voices) w/ QWave and only 1 instrument loaded w/ a patch and was able to switch some patches.

In general,- not being able to switch patches w/o getting SAT- or DSP errors happens by switching patches w/ mouse and/or MIDI Prg.-Changes.
I load only 1 synth at a time in a non-cluttered project,- only 4 channels ASIO, XITE-1 MIDI, 8 ADAT In, STM 2448X and hardware outputs (Ctrl.Room / Studio), mixer busses wirred to ASIO (VST),- no FX.
That´s my most basic "go-to" project when I want to do something new and it eats almost no DSP and loads fast.

Disappointment until I´ll find out what I´m doing wrong.

Do I ?

The result is so much different from what I can do w/ stock S|C devices on XITE-1.

Today, I´ll do a dual boot setup w/ another old XP machine,- it will run SCOPE 4.5 and SCOPE 5.1 on different system partitions but both access 15DSP PCI card.
Since I now have the smaller ZARG synths (Ambient, Orion Custom, Dark Star) for v4.0 (4.5) and 5.1 and for PCI and XITE-1,- I´ll see where ZARGs run better.

Unfortunatly, I now don´t have keys for PCI card and the big ZARG synths mentioned above, so cannot test these on PCI.
In fact, I wanted the big ZARG synths for XITE-1 because of much more DSP power compared to a single 15 DSP PCI card I own as also because of the future developments which possibly make PCI cards obsolete when SCOPE 6 will be released.
I hope John will update his devices !

Bud

[YiannisK]

Scope6 will make pci cards obsolete?
I hope not

[yayajohn]

Bud; Sorry to hear about your troubles. My experience has been just the opposite. I have not had time for thorough testing yet but they seem to be performing way better than I expected them to. I am on WinXP 32bit SP3 as well with an Xite-1 and PCI simultaneously (Scope Pro+2 Scope Projects). The only thing I can think of is you may want to check that you installed all of the files in their proper folders.
Note: I am not manually assigning any DSP's on the Xite-1
Here are some of my results:
Xite-1:
Pro-Wave - no clicks or pops btwn presets and was able to switch presets smoothly with 8 poly.
Red Dwarf - 12 poly while switching presets.
Solaris - stepped up poly to 8 voices on some presets, no problems switching with 2 voices
QW - same as Solaris

PCI side performed about the same although less DSP avail.

SolarisQuantum1.jpg (1011.12 KiB) Viewed 4776 times

A couple of things I've learned to do with the Zarg:
I always switch presets with low DSP then step them back up as needed
In Solaris and QW you can bypass all effects, a button at the top right which stays on or off as you switch presets. I usually leave it off and add my own outside of the synth to lighten the load that the synth draws. (I do not know if this affects the DSP load or not though)
Try not to switch presets until the synth is completely silent.
I hope you get them to work, they really are great sounding synths although not set up for live stage performance unfortunately.

Dan

[Eanna]

Set the number of voices to zero before selecting presets. Increase the polyphony once you determine what dsp one voice uses.

[yayajohn]

Set the number of voices to zero before selecting presets. Increase the polyphony once you determine what dsp one voice uses.

ya....that's what I meant low voices thanks Eanna

[Eanna]

Setting voices to zero ensures you cut the envelopes of the previous preset too, so the whole speaker-shaking partially-loaded-preset behaviour isn't a problem...

[Bud Weiser]

Bud; Sorry to hear about your troubles. My experience has been just the opposite. I have not had time for thorough testing yet but they seem to be performing way better than I expected them to. I am on WinXP 32bit SP3 as well with an Xite-1 and PCI simultaneously (Scope Pro+2 Scope Projects). The only thing I can think of is you may want to check that you installed all of the files in their proper folders.

Hi yayajohn !
I waited for a post like your´s here, thinking about what might have going wrong w/ installations.
OTOH, the only special stuff I´ve seen and where I was unsure where to place was in Solaris device folder when unzipped.
Precise: SCOPE\App\ ... and then there were 2 folders named TTF and Vxd which didn´t exist in my original SCOPE 5.1/XITE-1 installation at all,- so I copied these 2 folders to SCOPE\App\ ...
I hope that´s correct for Solaris v5.0.

I don´t see any other specialities for the other ZARG synths from that bundle except Red Dwarf EX needs additional modules,- but when I load presets, that should be considered by software routines.
I got no warnings there wasn´t found something necessary.

Note: I am not manually assigning any DSP's on the Xite-1

That´s what I did too,- I just only loaded the devices one-by-one into my (smallest) project to save activation keys, then loaded preset banks and tested some sounds to make sure the instruments will be usable on XITE-1.

There was only ONE case I tried to load on a different DSP manually after the synth failed and to see a different result,- but that didn´t happen.

Here are some of my results:
Xite-1:
Pro-Wave - no clicks or pops btwn presets and was able to switch presets smoothly with 8 poly.
Red Dwarf - 12 poly while switching presets.
Solaris - stepped up poly to 8 voices on some presets, no problems switching with 2 voices
QW - same as Solaris

PCI side performed about the same although less DSP avail.

O.k. that looks very good and I´d like to get same results.

Can you send me a project you use for these ZARG synths so I can try ?

A couple of things I've learned to do with the Zarg:
I always switch presets with low DSP then step them back up as needed

O.k.,- and I have read the posts below, so I know what that means.
I have to mention it´s cumbersome workaround to set voices to ZERO before loading any patches.
That makes live usage impossible,- but might be o.k. for studio/sequencing.
I also have the impression, most guys here are interested in studio/sequencing only.
I myself, I´m more or less a sequencer hater and only use it when I have to record something (unplayable) and as a tape recorder replacement.
I prefer real playing anyway,- so all the discussion about polyphony for me is senseless.
When I play an instrument and it isn´t a monophonic one (physically limited to 1 synth voice),- I always feel free to press as many keys as I need and don´t think about a 2 or 3 voice limitation.

For me, it´s easy to deal w/ 5 voices because the Prophet-5 was my 1st poly-synth and I worked w/ that for a long time.
Nonetheless, there are disadvantages when dealing w/ small amounts of voices available when it comes to longer release times or sustain pedal usage.
AND,- when playing polyphonic or block chords p.ex., there´s a masking effect and the patch doesn´t need to be top notch audio quality sound in opposite to a monophonic line which is up front and in your face,- so the sound quality argument isn´t always highest priority.

Now and after I had large synth projects running on XITE-1 w/ ~50% load, I wondered why I get SAT connection errors as well as DSP limit warning w/ under 30% load because I use the BIG ZARG synths.
I didn´t change anything to my setup, it´s the same SCOPE installation as well as the same OS and computer hardware.

In Solaris and QW you can bypass all effects, a button at the top right which stays on or off as you switch presets. I usually leave it off and add my own outside of the synth to lighten the load that the synth draws. (I do not know if this affects the DSP load or not though)

Yes, the internal FX of the synths cost DSP too,- what else ?
But,- when I had an always working "stock S|C" project w/ STM 24/48X,- all hardware I/Os active, MIDI and ASIO and 8 S|C instruments incl. Minimax(monophonic), Prodyssey (5voice), B2003, Profit5 (5voice), Lightwave v5(8voice), Uknow7(8voice), Vectron Player(8voice), STS-4000(32voice), FX on all synths switched ON,- plus 4 aux FX units,- I wonder why it is impossible for me to play more than 1 or 2 voices on a ZARG Rotor EX or Red Dwarf EX alone, you know ...

Try not to switch presets until the synth is completely silent.
I hope you get them to work, they really are great sounding synths although not set up for live stage performance unfortunately.

Dan

Well yeah, we´ll see.
I hadn´t that experience when I installed ZARG Ambience, Comb Plus Pro, Dark Star and Orion Custom on XITE last year already.
Also these sound excellent,- no question.

Bud

[yayajohn]

Hmm that is very strange. Nothing wrong with the install from what you described, I assume you loaded the DSP's and SYS files in their appropriate folder too?
-Also just to make sure you're not trying to run the 64bit Zarg files? (just covering all the basses)
- I'd send you my project but there really isn't anything special about it. Just some ADAT i/o and ASIO i/o and a couple of midi filters etc. so I don't think that's going to help you.
- The only other thing I can think of is I just recently reinstalled my whole Xite-1 files. I ran into some sort of cross wire/corruption when I tried to run the STS on the Xite and PCI at the same time and they wouldn't load again on either side until I reinstalled the Xite software. So you might want to try that. Maybe even uninstall the whole Xite files and install fresh though you'd have to spend the extra time reloading all the extra DSP's, SYS etc from the Zarg .zip's?
(don't forget to save your presets though)
That's all I can think of to do. Maybe someone else has something else for you to try.

btw I am like you. I like to play my synths live too. The other night I cooked up a really beefy polysynth sound and it time warped me back to the late 70's/early 80's. I was up half the night......didn't get thru too many presets though.....doh!

Dan

[husak1970]

to load SOLARIS 5

i got to much problems to load dsp rountime " Can´t find DSP file JBCtrlSh VxD . Please check installation "


" A capacity of XITE 1 card hs been reached:

NO more SAT conections from DSP 10 to DSP 4 "


woooo to bugy SOLARIS 5

[Eanna]

Hi, the idea of setting the number of voices to zero is to allow you reliably have an approach for discovering how many voices your DSPs can handle per preset. I need to have this going on myself, since I'm on 21 DSPs of PCI cards, so I don't have the same DSP power as ye Xiters. I've started to put the voice count in my preferred presets in brackets at the end of the preset name in a separate preset bank file.
And indeed, I am not a live-player of Scope stuff. Some day, maybe if/when I get an Xite, but I'm not lugging out a desktop PC with PCI cards now - for many obvious reasons. The few synth bits I play in my little band, I happily use my Micron for latched sequences (I'm the bass player mostly)...

If you're setting up a Scope Project for Live use, I think you should consider setting up many slots with Zarg synths, all routed to your mixer, each with a voice count of zero. If the voice count for a device is zero, then the device won't be loaded in your DSPs.
Then, to change presets, you set to voice count of your currently-playing device to zero, and increase the voice count for the 'next' device to whatever you need.

Alternatively (and I haven't tried this), setting the voice count to zero, then spinning your Program Change knob on your hardware device, will move thru presets quickly, without the latency of loading the DSP with that preset.

It is a strategy that may or may not work for you. I understand that it's (unnecessarily!) fiddly. But it would work.
If you're changing presets mid-song, yeah it'd be a nightmare.
Ideally, you wouldn't need a mouse for setting the voice count - but I'm not aware of any midi-controllable interface to setting voice counts in device slots...

I think the reason why you get that behaviour of noisy partially-loaded presets is because those particular synths themselves have slots for other devices. That is the power of such devices like Solaris and RD... Self-contained devices won't exhibit that behaviour. What's unfortunate is that it appears that Scope loads these 'sub-devices' synchronously - there's no ability to load these asynchronously, and then 'move' the fully-loaded synth into the DSPs that are connected to the mixer.

Given that I'm not a live Scope user, I'm not the man best place to give good advice!

[Sounddesigner]

Those who are having trouble with Solaris 5 might want to switch to version 4 of Solaris since it runs a little better on XITE-1 than the newer version. Atleast it did for me.