Matrix 12 latency questions

[zimbodel]

Question 1

On a modern computer, say 6 or more cores 2.5+ GHz 16GB memory, what kind of latencies do you experience typically with the  Matrix12 as VST when played by a midi keyboard. ?

Anyone did the measurement ?

Question2

Does arturia sell a hardware version of the matrix 12 ?  If so what is it called and what is the typical latency (as it is likely digital and not analog).

Thanks

[LBH]

Hi,

I wonder What latency you need and what problem you seek to solve.

It's not possible to give you an excact answer about the latency. Latency depend on many variables. It's not just about the CPU and the synth application.

- The application it self use some time to calculate.
- The efficiency of your CPU - providing they do work optimal - also depend on your other system parts and on your system settings.
- Then you have the latency introduced by your soundcard including the connections and settings.
- The more voices playing in a softsynth, the more it demand off the CPU, so that also affect the latency you can get without overloading your CPU. And the more tasks your CPU is doing beside for the single synth, the higher latency you can exspect to be able to get as all ongoing tasks will have an impact on the settings you can have, as they all demand CPU power.
- Also a host application add to latency, if you use a host. That latency depend on the hosts efficiency.
- Also your controller have some latency to add, even if it's very small.
- Getting the roundtrip latency can doubble the above latency or so.
- To that you have the psycical sound travel from your speakers to your ears, and whatever you use that can add to the latency you exsperience.
- There are so many variables.

You should be able to play Matrix 12 V2 in CD quality with a acceptable latency, if you do things right, with a modern 2.5 GHz CPU, depending on how much else is going on on your system. But you will perhaps not have much headroom, as 2.5 GHz CPU just is Arturias minimum requirements to run a single Matrix 12 V2, as you can read on the product page.
Also if you are a very skilled player that feel very low latency, then perhaps you can't get that kind of latency in every performance. It's hard to tell excactly.
I can't give you any guarantees.



Arturia does'nt make a hardware Matrix 12 as you can find out on the product pages.
A true analog hardware synth played throug an hardware amp and perhaps into a analog recorder will in example not have the latency from a soundcard added or depend on a CPU.
But in modern days synth also is used with computer recording and such, so in that case it also will get the latency that signal line will introduce. It might not be easy to work with a old hardware synth.
The Oberheim Matrix 12 afaik did'nt have the fastest envelopes. Quite slow i think.

[zimbodel]

I know all that:
You misunderstood my question:

My question is what latencies users generally encounter currently.
Surely users must know.

Is it unusable 10ms
Is it stick in the mud-feeling 5ms
or is it acceptable 1.5ms

This is the most basic thing a serious player will check as latency really influences your playing.

This is crucial before I invest in any purchase of software synth vsts.
Therefore I asked.

[LBH]

You can download Matrix 12 V2 and run it in demo mode and try it out yourself.

The math for latency is buffer size divided with samplerate.
But if you actually know all about what i wrote, then you also know, that even if we isolate it to the soundcard, then all people dont have to have the same latency using the same soundcard settings unless they in example have the same soundcard, as it also depend on other things including the soundcards converters that i btw think i forgot to mention in my first post. Buffer and sample rate informations is in it self useless.

So in example settings at 64/ 44100, 64/ 48000, 128/ 48000 samples buffer/ sample rate give about the 1.5 ms latency, you just say is acceptable. But then you have to add the time your soundcard use for other processing including for the audio conversion.
What i wrote about is your biggest concern, and you don't even mention anything about your soundcard, even though you use the word "serious".
I did'nt misunderstand you.

Provided you have a soundcard cable of 1.5 ms latency, And you have a modern CPU that's suited for music production with a base frequency at 2.5 GHz, then i would say you can get the a 1.5 ms latency for a Matrix 12 V2. Matrix 12 V2 is'nt the most demanding synth out there.
I think your greates concerns is about the things i wrote about. Especially your soundcard. My soundcard can do the buffer and samplerate settings that give a 1.5 ms latency, but taking other things in consideration it in reality has a higher latency. You need a very good soundcard to get 1.5 ms latency in one direction. I think most people having a soundcard cable of realtime 1.5 ms latency also have a better CPU.

Just to give some perspective.
The latency you only call acceptable is less than a classical piano player exsperience sitting normally by the piano, as the ears then probably is 1.5 feet - 0.45 cm or more away from the played pianos strings. How to get better than acceptable latency with your demands? A 1/1024 notes in 120 BPM has a 2 ms duration.

[zimbodel]

Thank you for all the detail, but i already covered that.
I run at 1.5ms latency with buffer size 64 samples.
I dont get x-runs.
So there is nothing the matter with my system/daw/interface.
But this is on Linux with Mixbus.
I gave up on windows as I could only work reliably at 11.6ms/512samples which is unacceptable using it live or for monitoring.

I am currently working on a Motu interface which theoretically could give me about 0.8ms, but that is going to be in the future.

The reason I asked my question as I did is to avoid exactly the technicalities.
I just wanted to know what latencies users experience using the VST with the TYPICAL system I suggested on windows mac or linux doesnt matter which.

I  could have asked the question more directly that would solve the issue easily, but I am sure no one will answer that.
The question would be:
How many clock cycles does the VST typically use to complete it's processing (wrt interface clock). In my case I use 44.1kHz

Manufacturer should know that but I doubt I will get an answer.
Therefore I asked it in the manner I did.

What I hope for is that the VST will finish within 1 clock cycle for a system as specified (and 44.1kHz clock) although I use a much faster and larger system than that.


 

[LBH]

Just keep in mind, that the 0.8 ms you mention you can get is the latency you get from the soundcard only. And i doubt it's in 44100 Hz you get that latency,. That mean you need more power to run the application with that latency.
How good a computer perform is'nt only about the CPU either.
Your whole system also need to work stable - even in a long time with heat building up.
Beside that you still have to add the latency from a controller, if you shall use one.
And the applications including any host you might use can also add latency yes. It can be a latency factor like anything else. I would also like to know more about this technical question. And i think it should be in a products specifications. Who knows it it might be 0.3 or 0.7 ms or more in differnt applications, and if and in whichh situations it shall be added to latency, if one are'nt technical and know about this stuff.

If you need 1.5 ms latency in total, then i think you shall have the best equipment and connections, if it's possible at all even with todays equipment. You also have to use headphones as you otherwise also shall add the latency from your speakers and a small latency can perhaps also come from speaker connections, to get the total latency in a live situation.

It does'nt sound like you even have the right computer to do it.

I think i gave the possible answer in my first post.

As said - you can download and run Matrix 12 V2 in demo mode. Perhaps you find out, that you actually can get good ebough results allready. People are reporting they use the software live,

BTW: I don't know about manufactors that officially support Linux.

[zimbodel]

I already run at 1.5ms latency which is completely acceptable, with some x-runs, but the x-runs are introduced by Alsa.
~1.7ms is the nyquist limit for an interface of 0.8ms latency, so I am already very close to optimum. I just need to optimize alsa to complete within one clock cycle and then it will be stable at 1.5/1.6ms without x-runs  and will be usable at 0.8ms with some x-runs.
When I started out I was at 10ms with windows, then 5.8 with Linux and after further refinements, now at 2.8ms without x-runs.
Parallel processing helps and luckily linux and its applications allows full use of all processors unlike what I found on windows.
I have 24 processors and 64G memory, and that clearly helps the software to use parallelism to optimize and complete operations WITHIN one clock cycle.
Furthermore the software source code is available and it is very easy for me to optimize it and make changes to make it work better. this is impossible on windows currently.
The bottleneck currently is with Alsa and once I get a solution I might get to 1.6 without x-runs (which should be possible by nyquist's theorem if instructions complete within a clock cycle)  or even 0.8 with minimal xruns which the interface does run at (verified with Motu) but in the latter case everything needs to be done within one clock cycle. If all your applications can do concurrent processing, it is actually very possible.

BTW I run a LOT of windows VSTs flawlessly in Mixbus  under linux so I dont understand your claim.!?
But you have to at least be a Linux sysadmin to make it work. Usual joe-point-the-mouse will not be able to.

Ok, from the responses/non responses it is clear that no-one really knows what latencies they are currently working with on mac/windows  as I received no number.
I just wanted some gauge of what they experience before I delve into making the arturia VST work in  Linux. I wont be booting windows again and was hoping to get a latency number from windows users before I try it on Linux so I know what the realistic constraints are.

But fair, I will just do it blindly.

thanks.

[LBH]

BTW I run a LOT of windows VSTs flawlessly in Mixbus  under linux so I dont understand your claim.!?

Just saying Linux not officially is supported.

Cheers

[zimbodel]

Linux support has nothing to do with my question, it is my problem. all I wanted was a latency number from  existing windows/mac users to see if it is even worth it.

[MajorFubar]

Mac user here.
I haven't measured the latency but it's low enough not to matter. As in, I've never noticed it and thought wow that's cr-p latency. Press a key, a sound comes out.
Of course, 'Your mileage my vary'. Mine certainly did when I used to run Windows: without ASIO4ALL it was unusable. But i'm sure they must've fixed that problem by now, otherwise I wouldn't see so many musicians running Windows computers.