Amsterdam Street (Alternate)

Hi Rick and Dave, Glad you think so. Thanks for taking a listen to this version..

Like I said, I do like this one better too. I spent 15 minutes and wrote down all the levels and gains so *hopefully* it should be repeatable. I'm happy to get rid of the SBLive card because I need the slot for something. I never really had a problem with it (always used it at 48 Khz anyway) and it was remarkably quiet (for a Creative product). There are DirectX drivers for the Mia and the SW1000 so I should still be able to play games

The only problem I have with the Mia is it seems to clip before the 0dB level. But not much before so I guess as long as I keep an ear out for it, it's ok.

Glad you both liked this mix.

Hi dtk

LOL exactly!! I might put it in the linux box and ditch the card that WAS in the linux box (a no-name). Dunno.

Yeah, exactly. I don't know where I've got this aliassing from. I thought it was either in the dithering (32-16bit) or in the anti-aliasing from 48 to 41 khz. But I checked the master 48/32 recording and it's in there too. Which is mightily strange. The Mia is running both input and output at the same rate (48/32) but the samples are only 41/16. It's an enigma I'll solve next time.

Hi Antti!

Yeah, something that SHOULD be there. I love the sound of it, gives a nice 'oooh, it's a 45!' feel.

Glad you like it Antti. Definitely prefer this mix!

I just realized there probably was no dust noise.. My comp seems to be messed up.. Sorry..

hehehe what I'm hearing as dust is probably the spectralizer replacing 2nd and 3rd missing harmonics on the piano part. Gives a bit of an edgy feel you used to get on records...

If you're satisfied with the quality, there's no reason to change. However, the 48Khz recording speed is actually set in the hardware of the SBLive card. If you set the recording for an alternate speed, the card records at 48Khz and then a chip downsamples it in realtime

Hi Lynn! I never really used the card at 44.1 so I can't _really_ say it was bad at that rate. I do need the slot though so it's nice to get rid of it.

Yeah, cubase/steinberg all go for this ASIO driver stuff which is ultra-low latency but a bit picky and difficult to set up.

From work at 32 and 24 bit so far, I'd say I'm getting comparable performance than at 16 bit depth. I don't think it would require an upgrade to go to 24 - although other opinions would be good on this point. I've not used an Aardvark - just me an' my Mia - I would recommend them though.

Hi Aaron,

Thanks for the advice, and for taking a listen to both! I am doing nothing more with this infernal piece for the foreseeable future I know what you mean re: movie genres, though I wasn't thinking about the current stuff, more the animated stuff anyway, which you picked up on with children's TV. No plans for a new demo yet though.

Thanks again!

When I first went to Cubase / Audigy 2 I was quite distressed by all the timing problems - MIDI, Audio and VST tracks all seemed to be on their own timezones. Switching to 48k sample rate fixed all the problems, and I'm pretty happy now, apart from having lost my fond illusion that my poor equipment was 'holding me back' of course

I have Cubase installed but I keep trying to use Sonar keystrokes in it, end up with odd things happening. I will get to grips with it at some point.

But when I installed it I had the same problem with VST - MIDI would be fine, but the VST instruments would trigger in the middle of next week. It was an ASIO/WDM driver problem in the end, took a couple of evenings of fiddling about until I had all the latencies down to the point where stuff played 'immediately'.

Something else I meant to mention about Soundblasters / Sample rates.

I've noticed that when I convert to 128k MP3s, I get better results if I convert the mixdown wav file to 44k sample rate first. I use N-track for producing MP3s, so maybe it's different with different encoding software.

If I use 256k MP3s, I can't tell the difference between the ones made from 48k wavs and the ones made from 44k wavs, but at 128k I reckon there is less 'mush' if I convert to 44k first - although it's possible it's just my imagination (running away with me).

Worth experimenting with if you use Soundblasters though perhaps.