Virus TI Delay & Reverb dual per part?

[bachatu]

Im interested in purchasing an access virus TI, though this could be the deciding factor of if and when I purchase the TI. Currently, I own a Virus C, and although I do love the synth, i dislike the fact that reverb/delay is global, so I have a question in reference to the TIs Reverb & Delay.

I saw the TI specs on the access website, it says that it includes independant delay/reverb for all 16 parts. So yes, i understand that reverb/delay can be used with its own setting on each part, but the question is wheather I can also use simultaneously 1 delay & 1 reverb on each part, or is it 1 Reverb or 1 Delay on each part. TO give an example of what Im asking... is it that I can, on lets say part 5, use 2:3 stereo delay, along with a hall reverb on that same part? Or is it that I can only choose either the stereo delay or the hall reverb on it.

Let's assume that its the latter one in a worst case scenario, its only 1 reverb or 1 delay for each part (they cant be used simultaneously)... can we work around this by re-routing one part to another (through the virus internal bus options) and steal another parts reverb or delay ?

I would appreciate any info in regards to this, from anyone who has actually used the synth. Thanks in advanced

Rick

[TommyS]

Good question. I`d like to know this aswell.

[ten]

You can have delay and reverb either/or on independantly on each part....yes to what your saying in effect, its very nice :)

ten

[bachatu]

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D

Awsome!.... i shall be looiking into picking one up soon :) time to sell some useless gear :D

[F5D]

How much polyphony will be left if you use a patch which includes a delay or reverb on every channel (like most of the sound patches do)?

[Midi_Glider]

Its does not effect (pardon the pun! :lol: ) polyphony. use as many as you want...


Best,
midi.

[F5D]

Its does not effect (pardon the pun! :lol: ) polyphony. use as many as you want...


Best,
midi.
In fact the manual says that the delay/reverb affects the polyphony directly. It would be great to know how much? I can see that this is one of the features which Access haven't informed very clearly maybe because they don't want you to think about it. They just say that the TI is a "dual dsp synth", which may give you an imagination that other synths probably use only 1 dsp. My Supernova2 for example has about 10 DSPs inside (probably the same as Virus A has 1 inside, Motorola 56303) and it's several years old now. And all the parts have their own reverbs + delays and other effects and they don't reduce polyphony.

It just feels a little odd that Virus C has 32 (or 26) voices of polyphony and 1 global delay/reverb and the whole synth runs on 1 dsp. Now the TI has about 80 voices of polyphony with 2 DSPs (faster of course) and you can have virtually 16 reverbs running at the same time. But from where did they suddenly grab 10 times faster DSPs for the TI and still try to earn a living with it? So, there must be a catch. The manual says that the TI uses dynamic dsp allocation but it doesn't say how much the reverbs really reduce the polyphony...

I guess it's about 16-32 voices left if you use the reverb for all parts and half of that if you use the "moog-filters". Somebody try it? :)

[marc]

Its does not effect (pardon the pun! :lol: ) polyphony. use as many as you want...


Best,
midi.

the reverb does affect the voice count. but actually saying how many voices would have to be sacrified for one reverb is not that simple since the polyphony also depends on the patch itself.

in general you could say that reverbs are "expensive" - certainly more expensive than a 3rd oscillator or for instance the moog filter. but then, if the patch is really "slim" adding a reverb will probabably hurt so much.

i tend to use hardly any reverb. the main reason is that reverbs do tend to blur the overall sound when overused. when i do a song, i normally switch off the reverbs first and then add one, where i feel that i want to move the sound into the background.

a couple of years back, when synthesizers had no build in effects, reverbs were added to blend the sound into the mix and create the impression of a 3 dimensional space. today, many sounds come with reverb although they don't need one, at least when they are being used with other sounds in an arrangement.

listen for instance to the build in demo song (available on http://www.access-music.de). there is hardly any reverb in it because the style of music doesn't need much reverb. the reverb is only present on the layer sounds which i want to move away from the solo instruments.

hope that helps a bit

marc

[bachatu]

I had no clue that it affects polyphony- that sux :( Not only that, but if your saying that only using Reverb alone, not including reverb+delay-- does that mean that using 1 reverb & 1 delay will reduce it even further? So in F5D's scenario, where using reverb will leave you with 16-32 voices, can we say that using reverb+delay on a part will leave you with 8-16? I know I prob wouldnt be using reverb+delay or even reverb on all parts, but its good to know what kind of horse power the TI is really capable of. It would be really great if someone who owns the synth can put it to the test. And for the style of music that I do (trance), effects is a big factor in giving it the sound im looking for.

I can vouch for what FD5 said about the supernova II.... One thing that i can say about the supernova II- i had a pro x version with 48 voices, is that the in multi-mode that thing did not budge whatsoever... using three oscillators did not hurt polyphony, neither did using reverb or reverb+delay + any of its other effects. THat thing rocked in multi-mode.

I think for what is advertised on the TI, it would be dissapointing that its performance would not be up to par with a synth that is much older and advertised to have less polyphony (e.g Supernova II)

[MADSTATION]

Totally agree with you guys.
This is rather disappointing. At least Marc is giving us an honest answer!

Now the thing is...80 voices under AVERAGE load...Does that means that the voice count could possibly range from 60 to 100(random numbers, I just want to know what's implied by "average load")?

[DIGITAL SCREAMS]

But what did you guys think. Isnt reverb quite a hog for resources anyways....not just on the virus? Perhaps Acces should have marketed it as a 64 note poly....and then you wouldnt fee hard done by....

But why would you want to use onboard reverb anyways to record with? Even if you did want its reverb...I would have thought you'd all lay down the tracks dry then bounce back the ones you wished to treat. I guess everyone works differently...

DS

[MADSTATION]

DIGITAL SCREAMS: I agree with you on there as well...
I personally always start by compressing the signal(before any other effect, otherwise the compressor introduces quite a bit of unwated artefacts) so I will only use the virus effects in the writing process...
For me the TI is mostly going to be a writing too(I will lay down my tracks with TI without worrying about my precious CPU...Then I will pick each synth that I want to use for each sound).

Hopefully it's going to work well :)

[grs]

So how about TI users do some meaty tests!

[WindInHisHair]

Yes, TI users i want some of your meat. Give it to me

WIHH
________
FORD SUNLINER SPECIFICATIONS (http://www.ford-wiki.com/wiki/Ford_Sunliner)

[MADSTATION]

From the tests I've done tonight, 11 channels of TI give me an average of 2-5% usage of CPU. This is actually MUCH better than anything I could ever imagine in my wildest fantasies. Really. That synth is probably the best investment I've done in the past 3 years(and I've done quite a few unfortunately lol). If they can fix some of the issues(well they kinda have to fix them anyways...meaning better arp sync) this synth could really be a revolution...Might even be the last synth I ever purchase. Quite surprising coming from a synth junkie like me.
I've had 0 crash since the beginning, only a few blank screens and arp sync problems...Restarting the TI fixed the issue, I'm just really concerned about live usage. I was planning to do my first live acts around march 2006 but now I'm not so sure about it :-S

Time will tell!
Come on Access, you guys did an awesome job so far(really achieved the unthinkable in my opinion), now you just have to add the extra polish that will make this synth a must-have for all of us ;)

[F5D]

Madstation (or somebody else), I guess you can test how the reverbs/delays affect the polyphony? Make several tracks (about 8 ) playing some sounds which need about 32 voices of polyphony. Then load a big unison lead patch with 6 voices per note and start playing multiple (6) notes at the same time. Then enable the reverbs one channel at a time on the other channels and see if you can still play the big unison sound with the same notes. Or something similar... :)

Or you can just search the polyphony limit first with any sounds when the reverbs are mostly turned off. Then switch the reverbs on and see if the tracks can still play or not.

Btw, Madstation, what is you computer setup and soundcard and which latency and sequencer you use?