Buzz at 192khz?

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onecircles
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Buzz at 192khz?

Post by onecircles »

Is this possible? My sound card supports duplex 192khz, and really wanted to try to experiment in this space. I really think that playing with synthesizers is one area where the sonic characteristics of 192khz could really pop out, but if I set Buzz up to work this way everything is off pitch! The higher the sample rate the higher the pitch. ug.

I normally use WASAPI because it's low latency, but I gave the polac audio drivers a try and had the same situation. I wasn't able to get polac asio to make any sound, which is sad because I know that one is popular.

I don't think the problem is with my card, because I can run guitar rig at 192khz.
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UNZ
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by UNZ »

buzz supports any samplerate just fine, but some machines are broken and / or hardcoded to 44.1khz

just try another one, or better yet try some good VST.
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onecircles
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by onecircles »

Interesting! Well I tested a bunch of my synths, and had the same result with all of them.

I tried:

arguelles alpha
arguelles guru5
cyanphase slide flute
fsm infector
jeskola qsamo
ld jacinth
m4wII

I haven't yet done the same experiment in modes other than wasapi though.
Also, I'm only able to change my sample rate in exclusive rather than shared mode. I haven't tried poll mode yet either though.
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UNZ
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by UNZ »

use polac asio
mridlen
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by mridlen »

Unless you plan on slowing it down by 25% or more, 96khz should be plenty unless your ears are capable of hearing 20khz or higher frequencies (which would be extremely rare). Obligitory Xiph.org video. If you can't hear above 20khz, you can record at 96khz and save to 44khz (in Audicity perhaps) and the two files should be indistinguishable. At normal speed, the only real advantage you get with 96khz is that some older, crappier synths alias at high frequencies in 44khz mode, but this doesn't happen at higher samplerates, or if you run at 44khz and use oversampling.

That being said, I just tested the ones you mentioned at 192khz and Qsamo and Jacinth seem to work fine at that samplerate. However the other ones do not.

Tested with C-5 on all instruments you listed, in your order of listing them.

Buzz file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/7b62yljx5cjby ... 3.bmx?dl=0
Dropbox link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jnerdudpsbooz ... 3.wav?dl=0

Jacinth seems wonky, so if you change your samplerate while Buzz is open, it might start sounding different. So save it, and restart buzz and load it again to test different samplerates.

Hope that was helpful for you and good luck on your journey!
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UNZ
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by UNZ »

yes, plugins are supposed to check the samplerate every work() (or at least tick() i guess) call, but most (old / poor ones) don't, so a restart is always necessary.
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onecircles
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by onecircles »

I'm having some driver issues that have caused me to have another BSOD, my third on this system. I'm going to wait until I update my drivers before I experiment with this further, but yeah so far I can't get any sound out of polac asio.
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onecircles
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by onecircles »

I got it working, although it sounds weird. Sadly I can't really spend some time with it until I get some issues with my sound card Ironed out. At 192khz or near it I get a lot of high pitched noise when I'm operating through buzz. I was able to get polac asio to work by restarting buzz with it in effect, but guitar rig wants to use asio, and they don't seem to want to share, so I ended up going with kernel streaming!?
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UNZ
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by UNZ »

onecircles wrote:I got it working, although it sounds weird. Sadly I can't really spend some time with it until I get some issues with my sound card Ironed out. At 192khz or near it I get a lot of high pitched noise when I'm operating through buzz. I was able to get polac asio to work by restarting buzz with it in effect, but guitar rig wants to use asio, and they don't seem to want to share, so I ended up going with kernel streaming!?
use guitar rig as vst inside buzz ?
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onecircles
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by onecircles »

Hey sorry, I didn't notice your guys last two comments before my post.
Thanks for your attention and for testing my issue yourselves. I figured out that it's necessary to restart buzz for the changes to take effect. I was able to get 192khz working, but the main benefit seemed to be that I heard some very high pitched noises coming from the tweeter! I tested my hearing once online and I can hear higher than average frequencies, I can't remember how high.

This actually has no benefit and is only irritating. For instance any time I am near a CRT television I can hear it whining, and no one else I'm with can. High frequencies just sound like awful pain as far as i'm concerned, although perhaps they have a place in adding texture to ambient sound. This is probably TMI, but I think the reason might be because I happen to have very small ear canals, and smaller ear drums as well. I'm mostly deaf in one ear as a result of this.

Thanks for the link to the video, I'll watch that when I have fast internet this weekend, and I'll do some experimentation at 96khz :)
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by mridlen »

I can hear up to 16khz pretty well, but I have a notch at around 4khz in my right ear so frequency sweeps sound really weird to me.

17-19khz I can't hear too well, although it might be my gear, since a lot of stuff is rolled off heavily after that point and my gear isn't the most high end. It just sounds like someone is sticking needles in my brain, so I don't find those frequencies pleasant at all. 20-21khz I can't hear at all, but yet again it might be my gear. I haven't tested 21-30khz because I would have to buy gear that supported it. Anything over 20khz would require 88khz or higher samplerate, and you have to keep in mind that they typically just use the 20khz-44khz(or whatever the nyquist of your samplerate is, in this case 88khz -> nyquist of 44khz) to slowly roll off the volume so that when it reaches nyquist it is completely brickwalled quiet.

This is a really good hearing test: http://newt.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/hearing.html

High frequency hearing test: http://www.noiseaddicts.com/2009/03/can ... ring-test/
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Joachip
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by Joachip »

onecircles wrote:I tried:

arguelles alpha
arguelles guru5...
Arguelles machines are all hardcoded to 44100 hz, and they are often very buggy.

PS: I had a 192 khz capable soundcard some time ago, and yes, Buzz worked fine with it. These days i'm down to 96000 hz though, because 4x samplerate was a bit too CPU hungry, and 96 khz seems like a fair compromise between quality and CPU.
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wikter
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by wikter »

That problem happens the same way when you try to work at 48k, the workaround is using multiples of 44.1: 88.2, 132.3, 176.4. Most of those 192Hd interfaces support those frequencies.
But in the same way, many machines will fail in frequency sincrnisation because they suppose you use 44k
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Joachip
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by Joachip »

At any rate other than 44100, you might run into trouble with bad machines. For example, if you run at 88200 hz, you will probably have to readjust compressor attack/delay times differently than at 44100 hz. So using exactly 2x, 3x or 4x speed of 44100 will not solve all problems.

So what rate to use then?
Standards: Now, I know that most people in here don't care much, but in case you see any point in following the general audio industry, 96000 and 192000 hz will be the next standard sample rates - 88200 hz won't. Just look at how new soundcards are marketed, or the specs of BluRay discs etc. I don't want to be the one recommeding on settling on a non-standard samplerate.

Compatibility: Resampling from 44100 to 96000 (or the other way) can be done extremely well these days because of proper resampling algorithms, so the "resampling to 2x rate is much less harmful" theory is pretty much obsolete (but I'm sure someone will use this argument in here anyway.)

Quality vs. CPU: Personally I think the quality increase from 44100 to 96000 is worth it, but going to 192000 seemed too small an increase compared to the insane 4x CPU use and file sizes, so I've settled with 96k for now. If this doesn't give you sufficient quality, I believe your trouble is elsewhere.
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UNZ
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by UNZ »

Joachip wrote: So what rate to use then?
Compatibility: Resampling from 44100 to 96000 (or the other way) can be done extremely well these days because of proper resampling algorithms, so the "resampling to 2x rate is much less harmful" theory is pretty much obsolete (but I'm sure someone will use this argument in here anyway.)
true, but so can resampling from 882000 to 96000 or any other rate out there. If you have a mix already at that high rate you're good anyway. I think the conclusion should be to just not use 44100, because it's nyquist frequency is too close to the audible range for filters to operate "gently" (it can be done, but it'll always be a tradeoff of the passband wobbling vs how soon and how steep your filter can cut). And chances are a 88200 mix is already bandlimited in some way anyway because there's no point in keeping the garbage produced up there (for example by many synths), unless you have really good recordings of live instruments. If you work at 44100, everything each machine does has to be bandlimited with very very steep filters.
Tiadiad
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by Tiadiad »

If using VSTs, get ready to start bouncing. 192 kHz will drain your over clocked, monster CPU in a heartbeat, especially if you're using some of the newer plugs. Other than that 192 is uber pro, so if you have the patience I say do it!
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onecircles
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Re: Buzz at 192khz?

Post by onecircles »

I'm likely going to shoot for 96khz. I'm not currently using any syths or effects outside the purview of buzz, but I'm very excited by the idea of using all the most computationally intensive stuff out there, and building my computers around that. I've currently got a 4770k i7 and I'm definitely not utilizing its potential, and I haven't even begun to over clock.

Very illuminating, thanks everyone :)
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