To A&H : SoundGrid

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This topic contains 40 replies, has 15 voices, and was last updated by Profile photo of Stealth Stealth 12 years, 2 months ago.

Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 41 total)
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  • #22721
    Profile photo of xvisionbelgium
    xvisionbelgium
    Participant

    Any plans for a SoundGrid plugin card ?
    So I would be possible to use a SoundGrid Server to run Waves Plugins without any extra D/A-A/D conversions.

    #27901
    Profile photo of woutert
    woutert
    Participant

    quote:


    Originally posted by xvisionbelgium

    Any plans for a SoundGrid plugin card ?
    So I would be possible to use a SoundGrid Server to run Waves Plugins without any extra D/A-A/D conversions.


    see Dante card…

    Wouter
    My prayers have been heard, Dante is coming!

    #27903
    Profile photo of xvisionbelgium
    xvisionbelgium
    Participant

    Yeah
    I know about the Dante card,
    But the latency on the DVS (Dante Virtual Soundcard) makes this a good as useless…

    #27904
    Profile photo of woutert
    woutert
    Participant

    quote:


    Originally posted by xvisionbelgium

    Yeah
    I know about the Dante card,
    But the latency on the DVS (Dante Virtual Soundcard) makes this a good as useless…


    So 5ms roundtrip (4ms DVS + 1ms ASIO driver on the returnpath) is too much??

    check this article:
    https://mixaction.com/latency-theatre-sound-cues-asio-and-your-theatrical-production-project/

    “Round Trip Latency” – should be less than 11 milliseconds for best results.

    Wouter
    My prayers have been heard, Dante is coming!

    #27905
    Profile photo of abstractnoise
    abstractnoise
    Participant

    5ms is quite a lot of extra latency in smaller venues I would think. In mine that’s the difference between live vocals/speech being clear and turning into mud. Funnily enough a couple of days ago I was experimenting with input delays to play with the Haas effect, among other things. Up to 3ms extra delay was tolerable, and is even desirable if one wishes to make speakers “disappear”. Then from 4ms up we started to hear two discernable sound sources, neither more clearly than the other and it really impacted on overall intelligibility.

    If we were able to run the house >30dB higher than the stage (as I’d imagine most bigger “arena” or “theatre” shows would likely be able to do) then we might be able to get away with it. But when you’re more like 6-12dB above stage then even small latencies can make a big difference.

    Work web: https://www.allsouls.org
    Home web: https://abstractnoise.co.uk

    #27909
    Profile photo of xvisionbelgium
    xvisionbelgium
    Participant

    Assuming that you can actually use the “best” setting in DVS…
    I hope this works (I’m actually waiting until a I can test this with a dante card in an ILive….)

    With a Yamaha or Digico Console and soundgrid server/network it is possible to get in down to 2 to 3ms, including the plugin processing (plugin dependant), and that is useable, even for in-ear monitoring (Love the C4 compressor for this)

    I’ve also checked the latency using Ethersound (ASIO Streamer), also the same problem and way more expensive.

    The only “acceptable” on paper seems to be MADI with an RME interface on the PC end. But native soundgrid would be way better

    quote:


    Originally posted by woutert

    quote:


    Originally posted by xvisionbelgium

    Yeah
    I know about the Dante card,
    But the latency on the DVS (Dante Virtual Soundcard) makes this a good as useless…


    So 5ms roundtrip (4ms DVS + 1ms ASIO driver on the returnpath) is too much??

    check this article:
    https://mixaction.com/latency-theatre-sound-cues-asio-and-your-theatrical-production-project/

    “Round Trip Latency” – should be less than 11 milliseconds for best results.

    Wouter
    My prayers have been heard, Dante is coming!


    #27911
    Profile photo of woutert
    woutert
    Participant

    I perfectly see that a dedicated hardware can be faster :-)
    no reason to trash Dante however :-) they offer this too:

    https://www.audinate.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=241

    Latency Network latency as low as 150us.
    Round trip latency (including the audio application)
    as low as 2.99ms
    Onboard hardware

    Although I don’t know how they can say something about roundtrip including the audio app, if they don’t know what the audio app will be. However I you build a custom server just to use waves, there are no apparent technical reasons why Dante could not be just as fast as Soundgrid. Soundgrid seems interresting, however don’t know their prices.

    *correction*
    Approx 560 for a 16×16 card. proprietary layer 2 protocol…

    Soundgrid seems nice but it only allow for waves plugins to be used…

    Update: I asked them if they couldn’t make a Dante-enabled version of their soundgrid server.
    Update on 21/11: Waves now also have a “SG Driver” which can be used as a standard ASIO driver for Soundgrid. This is no longer a sole advantage for Dante.

    Wouter
    My prayers have been heard, Dante is coming!

    #27912
    Profile photo of Stix
    Stix
    Participant

    Just shift your speakers forward to compensate (:0) hehehe

    Cheers

    Richard Howey
    Audio Dynamite Ltd
    IDR48/IDR16/T112/R72

    #27913
    Profile photo of xvisionbelgium
    xvisionbelgium
    Participant

    Well if they can develop a ExpressCard (notebook) with the same specs it would be great.

    quote:


    Originally posted by woutert

    I perfectly see that a dedicated hardware can be faster :-)
    no reason to trash Dante however :-) they offer this too:

    https://www.audinate.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=241

    Latency Network latency as low as 150us.
    Round trip latency (including the audio application)
    as low as 2.99ms
    Onboard hardware

    Although I don’t know how they can say something about roundtrip including the audio app, if they don’t know what the audio app will be. However I you build a custom server just to use waves, there are no apparent technical reasons why Dante could not be just as fast as Soundgrid. Soundgrid seems interresting, however don’t know their prices.

    655€ for a 32×32 card. proprietary layer 2 protocol…

    Soundgrid seems nice however, so I do support you asking for this :-)

    Wouter
    My prayers have been heard, Dante is coming!


    #27914
    Profile photo of SteffenR
    SteffenR
    Participant

    quote:


    Originally posted by abstractnoise

    5ms is quite a lot of extra latency in smaller venues I would think. In mine that’s the difference between live vocals/speech being clear and turning into mud. Funnily enough a couple of days ago I was experimenting with input delays to play with the Haas effect, among other things. Up to 3ms extra delay was tolerable, and is even desirable if one wishes to make speakers “disappear”. Then from 4ms up we started to hear two discernable sound sources, neither more clearly than the other and it really impacted on overall intelligibility.

    If we were able to run the house >30dB higher than the stage (as I’d imagine most bigger “arena” or “theatre” shows would likely be able to do) then we might be able to get away with it. But when you’re more like 6-12dB above stage then even small latencies can make a big difference.


    It looks like your system is broken or maybe not the right one for your venue…
    Can we have a picture of your PA system in the venue?

    SRV-AVB
    R-72, iDR-16, xDR-16

    #27915
    Profile photo of SteffenR
    SteffenR
    Participant

    quote:


    Originally posted by xvisionbelgium

    Well if they can develop a ExpressCard (notebook) with the same specs it would be great.


    GBit ethernet would be enough for 64 channels …no express card needed

    SRV-AVB
    R-72, iDR-16, xDR-16

    #27916
    Profile photo of SteffenR
    SteffenR
    Participant

    btw
    5ms in latecy are lesser than 2m in length…

    SRV-AVB
    R-72, iDR-16, xDR-16

    #27917
    Profile photo of xvisionbelgium
    xvisionbelgium
    Participant

    Gig Ethernet is ok, I know, but with DVS all the audio framing is done in software and this takes “time”…

    quote:


    Originally posted by steffenromeiss

    quote:


    Originally posted by xvisionbelgium

    Well if they can develop a ExpressCard (notebook) with the same specs it would be great.


    GBit ethernet would be enough for 64 channels …no express card needed

    SRV-AVB
    R-72, iDR-16, xDR-16


    #27933
    Profile photo of millst
    millst
    Participant

    5ms = 1.72 meters
    3ms = 1.03 meters

    The difference between a latency of 5ms and 3ms is 0.69 meters.
    You are dreaming if you think your ears are good enough to tell the difference between a signal delayed by just over half a meter.
    There isnt a person on earth who can discern the difference.
    Most stages have the sources spaced significantly further apart than half a meter.
    Some performers vary the distance to their mic by more than this distance during an actual performance.

    If you can detect a delay then most likely your system is setup wrong or you have sucommed to the psychological marketing of the audiophiles.
    If your whole system is turning to mud with the introduction of a 5ms delay then something is very very wrong with your pa setup.

    What plugins are you using?

    For most effects you don’t really care about latency as there is a desired predelay anyway. Especially with verbs?

    What are you doing in a small venue that requires plugins that can’t be achieved inboard with the ilive?

    I think the easiest solution would be to unplug your plugins :)
    I would say they are causing your system to sound like mud, not the 5ms delay.

    Toby

    #27934
    Profile photo of woutert
    woutert
    Participant

    I was confused at first too, but we’re talking amongst others about compressor and EQ plug-ins to be inserted in the signal path to for instance in-ear monitors. In that case 3ms is indeed the maximum latency that’s considered doable for a musician to hear himself in his ears.

    Waves now provide a customized linux based system with a version of their multirack software (split in too, UI is handled on another computer), but unfortunately they are trying to sell this with a fixed combination of their own audio-over-ethernet solution. “Unfortunately” because their platform isn’t open-ended, it’s also a proprietary layer 2 protocol, and more like that… so first of all we should really ask audinate to provide Linux drivers for their PCIe card to be able to built something similar to the SGS.

    Or, as xvision asked, indeed also an expresscard version of their PCIe card for ultra-low latency :)
    And moreover, ask audinate to help us create customized linux versions with the lowest possible latency. Anyway, seems like an interesting topic.

    I’m really glad that focusrite joined forces with Audinate,
    I simply don’t want any more proprietary protocols and closed standards… at least Dante offers a standard Asio driver so you are free to choose which ever software or plugins or whatever you like to use, not just waves stuff however good it may be. Other than that I really expect Dante to keep up with developments from other companies… maybe they should start talking to Waves to help them created a Waves over Dante server for instance, since we only have one port B :-)

    Now if Waves manages to get the round-trip latency under 1ms using standard Ethernet ports, other audio-over-ethernet providers should really be able to do the same by also customizing Linux for this purpose. Things would indeed get interesting with a generic VST-plugin server or so… any developers listening out there? :-)

    Wouter
    My prayers have been heard, Dante is coming!

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