Commodore Remix

Tonka wrote:I have since done a test on my regular PC with DS2 and my trusty old SB Audigy with far better results, leading me to think that there must be something wrong with my other setup/drivers/etc.
I have uploaded my (rather tuneless!) 6 channel test here for you to 'enjoy':
http://www.monotron.co.uk/SyncTest.mp3
ink it's about as good as it gets for SIDs, once you take into account the ADSR bugs and necessary hard restarts, etc (damn you Bob Yannes), so I'm happy!

Call me weird, but I really enjoyed you sync test It sounds very nice to me. I just wish it didn't end so drastically
I'm glad you're both on the way to find a stable VST/ASIO environment/configuration.

Please don't hesitate to contact me directly with any questions.

p.s.: Did you know that DreamStation is also developed in Budapest, Hungary?
http://www.audio-simulation.com/?page=about

*Edited*

Hmmm, discovered another thing.

If I try to play around with HS4U on a MIDI-keyboard (hooked up via USB), the note is not released when the key is. In fact, it's never released. When pressing another key there's either a legato-thing, or no response at all. If the note does the legato-thing, it's usually released when the key is released, but the initial note drags on. I have to switch the HS4U box off for it to stop. It's happened both in Cubase SX 3 and in DreamStation 2.

It's not the MIDI-keyboard acting up, although it is a quite crappy keyboard, because all other VSTi's react normally to it.

Has anyone else had problems with HS4U not pinging up on note-off?

*Edited*

Makke wrote:In fact, it's never released. When pressing another key there's either a legato-thing, or no response at all. If the note does the legato-thing, it's usually released when the key is released, but the initial note drags on.

Is it possible that your MIDI keyboard doesn't send note-off events?
I've discovered such oddities on Mac OS X with a virtual MIDI keyboard. It was sending note-on events with zero velocity instead of standard note-off events.

I've made a new version:
The new version (v1.0.0.1) interprets zero velocity note on events as note off events.
Please download it from here:
http://www.hardsid.com/files/other/hardsid_4u_vsti.rar

Read the UPGRADE.txt before trying.

Please let me know if this helps with the stuck notes on older/odd sequencers and MIDI keyboards.

need4sid wrote:Is it possible that your MIDI keyboard doesn't send note-off events?

Quite possible. As I said, pretty crappy/cheap keyboard. Still it's an M-Audio, which makes me a bit surprised that it doesn't follow standards.

need4sid wrote:Please let me know if this helps with the stuck notes on older/odd sequencers and MIDI keyboards.

It definitely seems to be the MIDI keyboard, because with the update HS4U releases notes as it should.

Makke wrote:It definitely seems to be the MIDI keyboard, because with the update HS4U releases notes as it should.

Great!

need4sid wrote:Great!

Thanks for the fast support, btw!

On to a couple of other things. (I never stop being a pain in the @ss. ) The first thing is about the HS4U VST-plug. If I have the VSTi-window "active", i.e. if I have it open to mess around with the sounds, it always plays osc #1, even if osc #2 or #3 is selected, and the correct midi channel is given. If I close the window, the selected osc will play. Has anyone else seen this? It's a bit of snag when trying to tune a sound.

The second thing I've discovered is that I have absolutely no clue what I'm doing when trying to set LFO's values and parameters. I sort of just do one thing, without a clue what it does, and then see what it sounds like. It's a bit frustrating. Does anyone know of a good tutorial or something on how to control the SID? I've looked around a bit, but not really found anything. I suppose there's some general basis to these things, but being a preset-user I've never really designed sounds from scratch. It's a bit embarrassing, actually. Where do I start?

Oh, almost forgot. I recorded Cybernoid 2 twice, using a different SID for each take. Then I placed one recording hard left, and the other hard right, making the slightly different sound of the chips more audible.

http://makke.c64audio.com/mp3/hardsid/Cybernoid_2.mp3

(messed up the ending, sorry...)

*Edited*

Makke wrote:If I have the VSTi-window "active", i.e. if I have it open to mess around with the sounds,it always plays osc #1, even if osc #2 or #3 is selected, and the correct midi channel is given. If I close the window, the selected osc will play. Has anyone else seen this?

You're confusing things here. The VSTi window itself has nothing to do with MIDI channels at all.
The VST host is responsible to send incoming events to a given MIDI channel on a given MIDI port.
Make sure your VST host sends events to the desired channel of HS4U's MIDI port.

Makke wrote:The second thing I've discovered is that I have absolutely no clue what I'm doing when trying to set LFO's values and parameters. I sort of just do one thing, without a clue what it does, and then see what it sounds like. It's a bit frustrating. Does anyone know of a good tutorial or something on how to control the SID? I've looked around a bit, but not really found anything. I suppose there's some general basis to these things, but being a preset-user I've never really designed sounds from scratch. It's a bit embarrassing, actually. Where do I start?

If you're not familiar with LFOs generally, you should learn about them on the internet and the HS4U VSTi manual.
If you're not familiar with the SID itself, it will be harder, since the SID is pretty special. You have to learn about it pretty much if you don't know it at all.

@Tonka: I've kind of already decided to move from Renoise to something else. I need to switch programs and gear to get the creative lust back. Don't know what I'll switch to yet, but DS2 is a likely candidate - it's fairly cheap, looks great, plus I've got you to ask when I run into trouble.

@need4sid: I guess I best start learning then.

*Edited*

So let me get this right. The USB connection feeds the sound of the SID back to the PC? or is it audio connectors only. Is it that much better than QuadraSID for example?

It does not feed the audio back. You have to connect via AUDIO IN of your audio interface. I was a bit disappoited by this at first, but not anymore as it made me find out how connect external sound devices to Cubase, and now I also get the signal of my microwave digitally in, which makes my whole setup rock

I don´t know how the PCI-card sounded, but the HS4U (Studio) playing SIDs through ACID64 is a wonderful C64-retro experience