mixers

ARCADIOS · Post by **ARCADIOS** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 5:28 pm

is there a difference in quality of sound among scopes mixers?
i suppose that you have observed that STM1632 makes small ticks(gltches) when moving the sliders of the channels. so when you raise or decrease the volume from one of 16 channels these small pops are audible, especially on headphones. the strange thing is that the master volume does not make these glitches. STM2448 and STM4896 mixers do not produce these tickscks....ckt..ckt........kt...kt
in addition to that, after i installed the same project with STM4896, i had the feeling that the sound was more crystal. is that correct?

Post by **irrelevance** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 10:51 pm

Strange? I use the 1632 all the time and have never experienced clicks. Are you automating the faders via midi or just moving them with the mouse cursor?

Post by **garyb** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 12:38 am

are you using a usb mouse?

beerbr · Post by **beerbr** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 1:25 am

I'm sure that STM2448 and STM4896 are better sounding and have more dynamic than STM1632.., especially summing bus.. And if you use "Phrase Comensation" in the STM1632, it seems that the sound is narrower. (which is not happen in STM2448 & STM 4896)

Post by **garyb** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 1:26 am

i think you're right...but i don't have a zipper noise problem with the 1632..

ARCADIOS · Post by **ARCADIOS** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 3:29 am

just load a synth, play a note and move up and down the slider of the channel.
you will hear it surelly if you test it with headphones. but the master slider is clear, all of the 16 other sliders have that little dirt.
it is difficult to listen without headphones but it happens for sure.
please test and tell me.
thank ycktcktcktcktcktcckctcktcktscshhhtck.

it is not that loud

djmicron · Post by **djmicron** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 5:20 am

here no glitches with stm1632.

About the quality, stm2448 and up, are better in dynamic range and mixing is more accurate.

Micron

Stige · Post by **Stige** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 6:02 am

Noticed the clicking sound in stm1632 long ago. Test with pure sine wave, it's more difficult to notice with 'dirty' sources.

spiderman · Post by **spiderman** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 6:38 am

I've notice some clicking too with this mixer :

http://www.philadelphiamixers.com/maelstrom/

steffensen · Post by **steffensen** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 7:06 am

does the Dynamic Mixer click then? i for one havent noticed it anyway..

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 7:48 am

no mixer clicks by default

it's an interaction with the Window's graphic driver.

I could exactly reproduce Arcadios' observation, interesting addition: the zipping does NOT show up on external channels (analog or adat io), only on synth sources, and in fact a low level sine makes it most easy to detect.

anyway, went to Windows control panel - set graphic acceleration one step back and the zipping was gone.
Which may explain why some experience it and some not, as there are quite some variations in graphcard and driver setting.
Nevertheless - good observation, Arcadios

cheers, Tom

virtualstudio · Post by **virtualstudio** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 8:47 am

did you do this?: Start > Settings > Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance Settings > Visual Effects Tab > Adjust for best performance

this could make a difference

Shayne White · Post by **Shayne White** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 10:09 am

Isn't it just because there isn't an interpolate/dezipper in the slider circuit? All CreamWare sliders/faders are "steppy" unless an interpolate module is added to the circuit. I'm pretty certain I've had clicky problems with the STM-1632 too, especially when doing MIDI input.

Shayne

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 10:53 am

Shayne, if I can de-zip the fader immediately by modifying a parameter of the graphcard then it's for sure not a problem within the mixer

it's a side effect of screen interaction - like the graphcard steals CPU cycles.
Don't forget that while the actual loudness control is performed on the DSPs, the 'amount' of change is determined by the number of pixels the visual control item is moved - and that's entirely within the GUI, hence the OS.

I have a fairly old ATI RageXT (or so) under Win98, dunno if that panel exists in XP anymore. Possibly it's the thing Virtualstudio mentioned. The control is a 4-stage slider: no acceleration, some, most, all.

cheers, Tom

Post by **irrelevance** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 2:42 pm

I must admit that I find the larger mixers a little unwieldly and have thus never used them. I also only ever mix in cubase so I guess there wouldn't be much point wasting dsp on a larger mixer, although it's interesting to find out that they do allow for a higher quality of sound.

djmicron · Post by **djmicron** » Fri Nov 04, 2005 5:18 pm

i've checked it with the sine wave and i've noticed the glitches

The 2448 glitches are different and less noisy than in the 1632, but it's not related to the pc performance, in fact the master fader does not produce glitches.
I've made a test with the mixer modules in the modular and the problem is the same, but using the flexor control smoother the problem is solved.
As Shayne told, it's not a performance issue.

Micron

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Sat Nov 05, 2005 11:10 am

well, whatever it is - it's kind of interesting... and strange...

I wanted to be sure and tried to reproduce my setup from yesterday to detect a pattern.
Impossible - I swear it has been exactly as written above, I've been really careful - and no, it wasn't four in the morning after a sleepless night(before)

So I withdraw my 'solution', I have no clue and I'm fed with zipping sines.
This has been tested with the headphone amp full throttle on and if only one single regular beep had slipped into the lines it would have blown my ears off...

I don't mix automate anything so it's of few relevance for me anyway - I'm off the game

cheers, Tom

voidar · Post by **voidar** » Sat Nov 05, 2005 12:33 pm

On 2005-11-05 11:10, astroman wrote:
well, whatever it is - it's kind of interesting... and strange...

I wanted to be sure and tried to reproduce my setup from yesterday to detect a pattern.
Impossible - I swear it has been exactly as written above, I've been really careful - and no, it wasn't four in the morning after a sleepless night(before)

So I withdraw my 'solution', I have no clue and I'm fed with zipping sines.
This has been tested with the headphone amp full throttle on and if only one single regular beep had slipped into the lines it would have blown my ears off...

I don't mix automate anything so it's of few relevance for me anyway - I'm off the game

cheers, Tom

Excuse me, but wasn't this a problem that occured when there was actual sound passing through the mixer and not necessarily when there was not?

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Sat Nov 05, 2005 3:19 pm

yes, there needs to be a signal of at least a certain level and the zipper noise isn't homogenous.
It seems to affect internal sources only, not the analog or digital inputs, and it changes over the range of the fader.

Even the noise itself varies from clear clicks to a distorted click signal (the loudness of the noise remaining the same).
But in some situations (when th fader approaches the zero dB mark) the clicks seem to truely clip and the interval is shorter.

as mentioned, I've had the noise completely eliminated - and it reminds me on one of my previous installations where I had a lot of zipping noises with mouse movements and window drags.
This installation was known for it's messy state as it served to test any kind of stuff.
After a clean install the problem immediately vanished.

Nevertheless it would be nice to know the source, but of course one should keep in mind that observing an isolated source under such enormous amplification is pretty exotic

yet there could be fades where it becomes noticable (at least theoretically)

cheers, Tom

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: astroman on 2005-11-05 15:21 ]</font>

ARCADIOS · Post by **ARCADIOS** » Sun Nov 06, 2005 8:23 am

so this should be considered as a small bug and be fixed by creamware. i wonder if creamware could give us a small update or something (not scope 5 necessarilly) to fix these little problems.
the biggest i have observed so far are:
1. instabillity on 96khz
2. "pot movement 1" 12 o'clock jump.
3. zipper noise of STM1632 channels(not on master voulme)