ohhey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/18 13:43:14
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ORIGINAL: dan le
Hi Yep:
Thanks for the eloquent explanation.
I have 2 questions then:
1. if they are all sound the same then, let's say, for a computer using XP and AMD, who or what produces the sound, XP or the AMD chip?
2. then what is the role of the audio engine, when someone touts that they have an improved audio engine as in the case of Sonar 3, wherein the audio engine was definitely improved.
sincerely
dan le
1. The tracks are combined by software, it has nothing to do with what chip or operating system is used. That is unless the chip has a math flaw or something and none of the ones used in computers today do as far as I know. It's just code. You wouldn't expect any other software to be different on different machines right ? Does an AMD chip edit and print better photographs or documents ? I think not. And as with all software there is more then one way to do the same thing but the results can be the same without getting sued by some other software company. 2. Improvements can come in many forms with an audio engine or any other software. For example math accuracy can be improved so you use bigger numbers that don't have to round off as much. Older software might have had round more to get the thing working on slower PCs with less powerfull CPUs we had back then. Today you can do a lot more number crunching and still be able to achieve low latnecy and run all the plugins you need. It's a sweet spot in history for this, PCs are WAY more powerfull then they need to be for just e-mail, web surfing, and running some Office type programs. We got to a point some time ago when they could do real time audio proecessing and lots of it. woo hoo !! Back to improvements the math example is just one way they can improve, the developers might adjust things like pan law or any number of operations to make the output true to the source tracks as best they can or even tweek with it a bit. At some point you might see configuration items on the audio engine to emulate what happens in an analog console and tracks that sound like they were recorded on analog tape. In the audio world some times "worse" is better then accurate if it's musical. This can even apply to sound cards and converters. Some folks love the "sound" of Apogee converters others say they don't sound real and like Lynx converters better. There is no such thing as perfect in the audio world and that's why there is room for competition that drives the price down for all of us to enjoy. If one company could make the "perfect" system that no other could match we would have to buy only that system and they could charge anything they want for it. So the fact that different systems exists and that people have different opintions of them is a good thing. Let's keep them guessing and keep buying so they can keep developing and competing.
post edited by ohhey - 2007/10/18 13:53:55
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dan le
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/18 15:20:34
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Thanks to both of you for the explanation.
So, who is responsible for producing the SOUND. Windows, or the guy that wrote the audio engine.
Thanks again
dan le
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ohhey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/18 15:27:33
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ORIGINAL: dan le
Thanks to both of you for the explanation.
So, who is responsible for producing the SOUND. Windows, or the guy that wrote the audio engine.
Thanks again
dan le
The folks who wrote the audio engine, all Windows does is help write the data (as is) to a wav file. Or in the case of realtime playback help the driver pass it on to the sound card. In fact if Cakewalk wanted to they could make Sonar work without Windows or with an embeded version and make a stand alone rack device with the some audio engine. That won't happen now but they could have if there had been a market for the devices. Mackie gave up on the HDR because it was just a shrinking market. Tascam still makes one I think.
post edited by ohhey - 2007/10/18 15:45:20
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yep
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/18 19:07:56
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ORIGINAL: DaveClark
...For example, it is responsible for such tasks as "Follow Project Pitch." This type of task involves resampling, and in turn, data-window and filter designs... Well, yeah, there are definately audible differences between say different pitch-shifting and time-stretching algorithms. If you count that stuff as part of the core "audio engine" then I suppose there are differences. But I think that is different from the stuff people are talking about when they say so-and-so's audio engine is better quality than this other one's. Most of those debates are really about the mix engine and essential integrity of the audio files, and not about integrated effects or sound-processing. But I guess that to be technically precise about it we should say that digital *summing busses* are all the same, within the limits of the overall system architecture. ...speed, reliability and robustness... These are certainly different between different DAWs, and maybe sometimes the differences are due to the audio engine itself, but in that sense, does it really matter? If a DAW is slow and crash-prone, does anyone care whether it's the result of the audio engine, or the GUI, or the copy-protection or whatever? I mean, from a user POV, is it any real benefit to say that my DAW has an extremely reliable and robust audio engine if it crashes constantly due to some other flaw? I do not for instant contest that there are major differences between different DAWs, but I do think it is useful to distinguish between the very real differences in user experience, UI, included effects and processors, and so on, and the mythical notions of "better sounding" audio engines in the sense of something that is just "better" across the board, as we might say of for instance a Trident console compared to a Behringer mixer, which is how I think most of these debates are framed. Cheers.
post edited by yep - 2007/10/18 19:18:52
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DreamzCatcher
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/18 21:44:21
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ORIGINAL: yep
ORIGINAL: DaveClark
...For example, it is responsible for such tasks as "Follow Project Pitch." This type of task involves resampling, and in turn, data-window and filter designs...
Well, yeah, there are definately audible differences between say different pitch-shifting and time-stretching algorithms. If you count that stuff as part of the core "audio engine" then I suppose there are differences.
But I think that is different from the stuff people are talking about when they say so-and-so's audio engine is better quality than this other one's. Most of those debates are really about the mix engine and essential integrity of the audio files, and not about integrated effects or sound-processing.
Exactly. 
"Don't forget to imagine." Intel 965P-DS4 F5, Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU 6300@1.86GHz (x2), 2,096,620 KB RAM. Cubase SX 4, SoundForge 9.. Dynaudio Acoustics & Adam A7..
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DaveClark
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/19 13:47:54
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Greetings all,
The fact that there is rampant misunderstanding elsewhere is not a good excuse for propagating that same misunderstanding here, especially given that the original poster appears to be trying to escape that misunderstanding and obtain some measure of clarification.
The comment that raised the question was not "The mixers in Reason and FL Studio are bad" --- which it very well could have been --- but instead "The audio engines are bad." In my opinion, too many people with little or no experience with this type of program (which differs from that of SONAR) and little or no audio programming experience were trying to answer the question about audio engines.
Again, the correct answer is NOT "Audio engines are all the same" but instead something close to "Yes, audio engines differ, but not enough to justify the simplistic label 'bad' for programs such as Reason and FL Studio as a general description of the audio engine."
Regards,
Dave Clark
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bdickens
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 10:58:49
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Arrghh!!
I have nowhere near the technical expertise of some of you, but a lot of this kind of discussion sounds like "my dad can beat up your dad." It's a lot like arguing about which flavor of ice cream is better: choccolate, vanilla, strawberry, or pistachio? Which one do you like?
I think the real test is in the end result. When you put on a CD, can you tell whether it was recorded with Pro Tools, Sonar, Logic, Cubase, or a cassete boom box? I doubt anyone can. I remember reading somewhere that the modern cassete portastudio had better specs than the four-track reel-to-reel decks that Geoff Emerick and George Martin used to record the Beatles. How many productions today sound better? Or even as good?
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jacktheexcynic
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 11:27:37
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actually modern recordings have more presence and high-end clarity than older recordings. to me that sounds "better" although modern recordings have gotten more sterile over time as well. there's kind of an organic energy that is missing in a lot of newer stuff.
in the last 10-15 years though the loudness war has definitely "squashed" any improvements in recording quality. while i couldn't tell you what DAW a CD was recorded on, i think anyone could tell the difference between a CD recorded in the 90's and a Beatles tape.
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bdickens
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 12:12:22
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Well, yeah, but does it really matter? Which would you rather listen to?
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jacktheexcynic
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 12:18:02
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just the good ones, from either generation.
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ru
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 12:48:04
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ORIGINAL: bdickens
Well, yeah, but does it really matter? Which would you rather listen to?
do we want to go into musical quality or taste in this discussion? like jacktheexcynic mentioned, we've lost an organic quality in much of our digital recordings. often you hear recordings that seem aurally bent in the direction of a technology. that is, a technology is available and being exploited. examples might be fleetwood mac's tusk, touted as the first major all-digital release (though in fact, i think there was another before it), or maybe katy lied era steely dan, regarded as stellar sound at the time. you can feel the medium in such recordings, as if the latest clear, crisp upper frequency range had to be put on display, even if it detracted from the whole. i'd even say stuff from the fifties and sixties has an earthy, black and white photo sort of coldness to them which can sound very organic and refreshing compared to the effervescence of later recordings. can we truly get that feel with our current technology, or is it intrinsic to the technology used?
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jacktheexcynic
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 13:10:14
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i don't think we'll ever go back to the way things were tone-wise, but i think that if the focus returns to the music and not the technology then we can get back to the same kind of organic sound. it'll be crisper and more present, but still organic.
i think what we've done to music can be compared to what has been done recently in movies with digital movie cameras. if there's a digital part and a film part, it's easy to tell the difference. digital cameras are the same way unless you use the super-high-quality-raw-photo setting. i've got wedding pictures taken with a digital camera, and i can tell they are digital (even without pixelation, it's that lack of warmth and occasional bluish line at the edges...).
of the three mediums, i think that audio has the most potential to remain unaffected and movies the least. with both pictures and audio, compression seems to be the real culprit. one thing that yep has pointed out on several occasions is that with 24-bit digital sound, people tend to be pushing the meters (and their equipment) a lot more than they used to, so the result is harsh and brittle. if we used 24-bit depth as it was intended (more headroom) that would be one step in the right direction. not compressing the crap out of everything would be another, and not intentionally adding digital overs for more volume would be a third.
but i think the biggest problem with technology and recording music is that we now have the ability to cut and hack and autotune the "perfect" take. instead of a few good bands getting together and jamming to tape, we've got a lot of mediocre bands jamming to pro tools and mixing engineers erasing everything that went outside the lines. music production turned cosmetic surgery if you will.
i'm not against technology, i'm one of those mediocre (or less than mediocre) musicians myself. i just think that most of the music world has lost its direction. i spend way more time mixing than recording or practicing, it's a sickness.
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ru
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 14:55:56
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the real telling thing for me is how little time i spend listening to music anymore. i don't romanticize older material; a great deal of it was junk. but there doesn't seem to be much compelling music to be found. it's as if we've shifted into disposable product mode. about technology...i think the shift away from instrumental technique is inevitable and necessary.
post edited by ru - 2007/10/20 15:14:06
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droddey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 15:30:21
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Everyone keeps saying there's no good music anymore. You just cannot be looking very hard if you can't find any good music. It's out there.
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jacktheexcynic
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 17:34:34
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well i haven't been alive very long (just 26 years), and maybe it's just a generational thing, but i've had to look harder and harder to find decent stuff. when i was a teenager it was hard to miss even though some of the good stuff had already been out for awhile (nirvana, pearl jam, STP, soundgarden, "early" metallica).
no one is saying there isn't anything good out there, but you didn't used to have to look for it if you just listened to the radio. besides that, even the good bands suffer from bad production values. i prefer music that doesn't sound like it was stitched together, audio-snapped and auto-tuned. it's like airbrushed models on magazines, nine times out of ten not worth a second look.
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droddey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 19:13:47
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Well, I'm like 44, or maybe it's 45, I can't remember. If anything, I should think even more so that there's nothing good anymore, but I don't find that to be the case. I find it trivial to dig up stuff I like.
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jacktheexcynic
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 19:54:12
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well we probably have different tastes in music. i'm pretty narrow-minded about what i like.
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joshhunsaker
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 20:04:44
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ORIGINAL: bdickens
Arrghh!!
I have nowhere near the technical expertise of some of you, but a lot of this kind of discussion sounds like "my dad can beat up your dad." It's a lot like arguing about which flavor of ice cream is better: choccolate, vanilla, strawberry, or pistachio? Which one do you like?
I think the real test is in the end result. When you put on a CD, can you tell whether it was recorded with Pro Tools, Sonar, Logic, Cubase, or a cassete boom box? I doubt anyone can. I remember reading somewhere that the modern cassete portastudio had better specs than the four-track reel-to-reel decks that Geoff Emerick and George Martin used to record the Beatles. How many productions today sound better? Or even as good? i don't like the beatles all that much. and the demo recording of paul mccartney's yesterday sounds better than the mastered recording anyway. Most of the oldies stuff is way way to grainy for my taste. Noise floors on those old vintage microphones are ridiculous too. modern electronics are light years ahead of the old stuff. class d amplifiers (as an example) are very quickly catching up with the high-end AB class stuff available today. They are more efficient and don't deal with the signal in the linear way that a or b class amps do (keeping the signal in the audible range of 20-20,000hz).
post edited by joshhunsaker - 2007/10/20 20:19:17
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droddey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 20:07:09
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I like lots of different types of music, from the earliest roots of rock to what's out there now. There's always good stuff being made, if you want to find it.
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ru
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/20 20:08:13
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oh, i'm, looking...i've been a relentless musical seeker for a long time. i'm not saying there isn't good stuff being done, but there seems to be a spirit of exploration lacking in much of it. popular styles have become so conservative it's scary. each new layer of artists does something more extreme for their particular genre, but very little happens from a musical perspective. speaking from this angle of progressiveness, if not for electronica and some noise artists, it would be a very sad state of affairs. it's as if the archetypes of rock star, rapper, hip hopper, country singer, dj, etc., have frozen their followers into loops.
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bdickens
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/22 07:52:26
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i don't like the beatles all that much. Blashpemer! Burn the heretic!
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DreamzCatcher
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/22 13:04:07
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It was all I ever needed to hear about this issue. winner = yep 
"Don't forget to imagine." Intel 965P-DS4 F5, Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU 6300@1.86GHz (x2), 2,096,620 KB RAM. Cubase SX 4, SoundForge 9.. Dynaudio Acoustics & Adam A7..
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ohhey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/22 14:07:22
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ORIGINAL: jacktheexcynic
actually modern recordings have more presence and high-end clarity than older recordings. to me that sounds "better" although modern recordings have gotten more sterile over time as well. there's kind of an organic energy that is missing in a lot of newer stuff.
in the last 10-15 years though the loudness war has definitely "squashed" any improvements in recording quality. while i couldn't tell you what DAW a CD was recorded on, i think anyone could tell the difference between a CD recorded in the 90's and a Beatles tape.
Back when I only had cassettes and LPs the sound quality was never bad enough for me to wish it were better, quality was not the problem. What made the experiance bad for me was noise and wow and flutter. I was trying to get lost in the music as if I were listening to a live band and any time my ears detected a click, hiss, or tape wow and flutter, it caused my brain to think "this is not real, this is a machine !"  and that ruined the illusion for me and I could no longer suspend disbelief. Think of it this way.. what if you were trying to watch a movie of a World War II battle and every few seconds you could see a Starbucks coffee shop off in the distance... that's what is was like for me trying to listen to LPs and Cassettes.  So my love of CDs had little to do with extra frequency response or even dynamic range over LP or cassette, what I loved about digital recording was what was NOT there.
post edited by ohhey - 2007/10/22 14:22:04
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jacktheexcynic
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ru
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/23 01:16:21
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yes, but one of the worst things to come of this, though not actually the fault of digital sound, is the loss of a sense of proportion, flow and cohesiveness in the musical program itself. we now find albums running upwards of seventy minutes, which may be appropriate in some cases, but not in most. it used to be that a bad song would be a glaring ear sore on an album side of four or five tunes, but now there can be several of them scattered about twelve, fifteen, whatever tracks. most albums don't stand up as a piece, but are an uneven hodge podge. seems the ones clocking in at forty minutes or so still go down the best.
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ohhey
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/23 11:32:01
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ORIGINAL: ru
yes, but one of the worst things to come of this, though not actually the fault of digital sound, is the loss of a sense of proportion, flow and cohesiveness in the musical program itself. we now find albums running upwards of seventy minutes, which may be appropriate in some cases, but not in most. it used to be that a bad song would be a glaring ear sore on an album side of four or five tunes, but now there can be several of them scattered about twelve, fifteen, whatever tracks. most albums don't stand up as a piece, but are an uneven hodge podge. seems the ones clocking in at forty minutes or so still go down the best.
There are some things I like to listen to on LP, it's a different experiance then CD. I was able to get a heavy vinyl copy of Amy Winehouse - Back To Black and it just sounds "right" on LP. I may have to make a CD of the LP to play in my car, the sound of LP, the turntable, and phono preamp, is just the perfect tone for that type of music. She has a retro Motown sound and it just works.
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jacktheexcynic
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/23 21:30:22
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i really haven't had the same experience in terms of long albums, although when i buy an album it's usually because i like the whole thing, 10 songs or 17. i think the increase in album filler is partly to the marketing strategies of the major labels and partly the pressure most signed bands have to release albums under their contract. i've cut plenty of songs of my own that were second-rate, but since i'm just a hobbyist, i don't have lawyers threatening me with breach of contract and producers concentrating on one or two radio singles.
i think losing the album as a work of art in itself is a terrible thing but that's the direction we're headed.
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Jessie Sammler
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/24 03:22:35
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.
post edited by Jessie Sammler - 2008/07/08 20:06:57
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Mark D.
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/24 04:35:43
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Almost as much fun as the summing bus debates I see now and then.
Me being one who hears a difference others often don't. The lil' 64 bit
mixdown button isn't there for for it's good looks. I think the extra bit
of headroom allotted means you get less distortion in subtle ways so
many won't notice. So both answers are sort of correct. Not many if
any will notice, especially if it's poorely mastered at a later step. If
a person masters it better themeselves, the headroom may help...
Much like the folks who say 44.1 khz or 48 isn't better than 88.2/96
respectively. I couldn't disagree more But they are not wrong going
on their hearing ability, it may not be any better, to them. For me it
is and I don't lament if they don't agree. Though I've always found,
that once you hit 24 bit, there's not a big an improvement going up
to higher bits. Mainly more headroom. How you work within limits of
headroom will net what you get & you can work around it somewhat.
But in addition to that, I'll say I hear a bigger difference in doubling a
sample rate. I did blind testing of all this, I know placebo effects, and
took it into consideration and that was a conclusion in all of my tests.
It may be why a Bruce Sweiden or Jack Joseph Puig mixes better than
one of the brothers Lord-Alge. It's not what they do that matters, it's
what they hear, or don't hear. Or won't admit they don't hear, or just
can't hear what they are missing. And many let slight differences go.
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yep
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RE: DAWs sound engine! Is there any difference?
2007/10/24 10:21:56
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ORIGINAL: Mark D.
...I did blind testing of all this, I know placebo effects, and took it into consideration and that was a conclusion in all of my tests...
Could you please post your test on stashbox or some such so that this debate can be settled once and for all? If you have in fact discovered proof of differences between digital summing busses it would be a great favor to share it instead of just claiming that you have it. Thanks. Cheers.
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