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In Reply to: Attention Presto posted by aljordan on November 13, 2006 at 04:48:43:
Alan:I'll post it from my laptop tomorrow at work. (The copy I have here is the AA copy, where the copy on my laptop was the copy I edited especially for the Thuneau site and has all of the text formatting script in it.)
I would be happy to repost it, but it may require a bit of editing. I've discovered quite a bit in the last 72 hours. I've been experimenting with *video* hardware acceleration settings (since VST plugins share resources with video cards!), audio card acceleration settings, Virtual Audio Cable and ASIO4ALL settings, and Foobar kernel streaming settings. Honestly, I think it's far better to have a higher-end card with a DSP based ASIO 2.0 compliant mixer onboard instead of using a pro-sumer "mixerless" solution with Virtual Audio Cable and ASIO4ALL. VAC and ASIO4ALL are awesome programs - but I am not sure they will be workable with the Allocator just yet. I am still searching for the "magic problem" but every time I think I got it licked, the click/pop problem sneaks back like a bad cold.
I finally got the M-Audio Card working. When I ran dxdiag (direct x dialog utility) I found that the M-audio card was showing "Full" for hardware acceleration. Hmmm... now do Envy 24HT based chipsets lack hardware acceleration JUST for Sensura/3D or in general? In any case, monkeying around with the dxdiag utility suddenly got my M-Audio (Envy 24HT chipset) card working. It sounds WAY better than the onboard Cmedia 9880 codec (no surprise there) but no matter WHAT I try I can't get rid of the clicks and pops. I've tried EVERY tweak and setting I could find/read about - and although I've been able to improve the situation drastically, the odd click/pop/dropout is still plaguing me. I'm heading back into my "lab" right after this post to do more tweaking yet.
Funny thing - I had the whole thing working with the C-media codec with no clicks and pops. I've tried to "go back" to the way I had the PC set up then, but to no avail. I'm missing something stupid and simple. I'll find it eventually.
Truth be told, I really don't much care if the Cmedia or M-Audio Revo don't work. The Allocator is the single best sounding digital crossover app I've ever heard - PC or otherwise - and I will invest in a card that is known to work flawlessly JUST for this progam alone. I've been holding off buying a high-dollar multichannel soundcard solution for good reason - the solutions up until the Allocator really did not have me convinced. In fact, I was about to give up on PC w/active and go with passive crossovers and just a stereo USB DAC. The Allocator changed all that! ;)
Much more trial and error, experimenting, listening, and reporting to come I am sure. I am hoping the Allocator site will grow into a vibrant community of PC Audio / DSP Crossover enthusiasts!
Follow Ups:
Hey Presto,I've found that ticks and pops usually reslt from the wrong buffer size in the sound card's driver control panel; that or some energy saving setting on another device is wreaking havoc with the system.
I have to agree with you regarding the sound of the Allocator as a crossover. I can't match it with the passive crossover nor the active Marchand. The only thing I don't like is the fact that my tweeters are vulnerable if I do something stupid like turn the computer off while my amplifier is on.
I am almost done comparing the multi-channel Lynx to the M-Audio 410. I won't sell the 410, but I won't be using it much longer either. Send me an email if you have an interest in checking it out.
Hey Alan:We could experiment with "failure and shutdown" modes for the Allocator. Using a separate PC for recording, we could record the output of the tweeter signal path for a hard-reboot, regular shutdown, "end-task" program shutdown... etc etc.
I really think that once the Allocator "shuts down" you are no longer streaming... aka NO damage to tweeters. This is the nice thing about it. Also, it would be unusual for Windows "startup/shutdown" or "system" noises to come out of channels used for the tweeter, since these are usually only mapped to channels 1,2 and not 3,4 or 5,6 which are more likely used for the tweeter.
Thanks for the tip on energy saving settings... back to the lab!!
Hi Presto,I have every sound going through the Allocator, and when it is shut down no sound gets to any output channel in my setup. The problem is on system bootup and shutdown. At that point a nasty spike gets generated through the sound card to the amps which doesn't go through the Allocator. No problem as long the amps are off, but a big problem if the amps are left on. Jan recommended a simple 20 uF capacitor to in line with the positive lead on the tweeter to protect it.
Here is another interesting PC crossover withe room-correction.
I whish any one of you could test it agaist Allocator.
A 20 day full functional trial is available..acourate.com
Klaus:Acourate is a crossover filter development tool. It is very powerful by the looks of things. It does NOT, however, act as a stand-alone convolution engine, but instead requires the use of the "Brute FIR" convolution engine. (BruteFIR is available from the Acourate site.)
The major difference between the two is that the Allocator uses IIR filters and Acourate/BruteFIR uses FIR filters. The FIR filters used in Acourate/BruteFIR are inherently linear phase and therefore transient perfect. The Allocator "Full" package comes with a "Phase Arbitrator" which uses special "correction filters" ("Arbitrators") that correct the phase response of the crossover filters without modifying the amplitude response, thus ALSO qualifying as a transient perfect crossover.
Of course, Acourate is a filter (crossover) design suite - where Allocator requires the user to have some knowlege of which filters he wants to implement.
Some prefer the "sound" of IIR filters as opposed to FIR filters. FIR filters have a phenomenon called "pre-ringing" which some associate with an "edge" to the sound. Myself, I'm not at the point yet where I would promote one or the other as a panacea. The fact that the Allocator is the best sounding crossover I've heard yet could be because it uses IIR filters OR for some OTHER reason. (I don't care at this point... I'm just glad it works!) So in fairness to Acourate/BruteFIR, I can't make a fair comparison never having used it or listened to it. But I have used different IIR/FIR filters in Foobar and so far, there is no going back from the Allocator.
My hobby dollar budget does not include for buying the Acourate setup this month, and my hobby TIME budget is getting slowy eroded as well!! ;)
I *will* try Acourate/BruteFIR one day. There is no question.
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