Question 1)
I've been testing 2.0.0 Premium for the last couple of days. Compared to the last version I've got a hard time getting even close to as good resolution (time and freq). In the last versions (regardless of version _type_ I was able to follow a singer in a certain piece (my reference the last 10 years) and I could see distinct signature of the voice. In the last version it is all blury even though I have used all known tricks to trim the spectrogram. Is it possible that something good is destroyed from the last versions by the latest new pitch function?
Question 2)
While testing I took the time to look closely at this web site. I don't think I ever noticed before, but under the explaination between the different version types I found some surprising information. It sais I can get a frequency resolution of 10.8Hz @ 22.1kHz with "free" and 5.4Hz @ 44.1kHz with "live". This is odd because from my math class I clearly remember that frequency resolution is only a function of sampling frequency and time: If doubling the sampling frequency, then half the frequency resolution, and doubling the sampling time, then doubling the frequency resolutuon, which is pretty much the direct opposite of what it sais. Can you please explain this misunderstanding?
And while at it, I feel free to go with another odd behavor that for a long time did annoy me...
Question 3)
Is it possible to make the scrolling smoother? My hardware is powerful enough to scroll one pixel colomn at the time and then fill in the new pixel colomn with the new data, and not like it is now, where ten or twenty pixels scroll at each update?
Comments
Re: Something buggy about the last version?
Re Question 1:
The maths of the spectrum and spectrogram have not changed at all over the last few versions. Is it possible that you have changed the analyzer settings? Try the default settings of a sampling rate of 44100, Frequency resolution of 5.4 Hz (or lower), and a Time Resolution of 12 updates per second.
If you open an existing recording, it should look identical in all versions since 1.0 with identical analyzer settings. If in doubt, please send me the file and I'll show you screenshots from different versions.
One thing that has changed recently is the default sampling rate. It used to be 22050, but is now 44100. That is because the pitch recognition works better with the higher sampling rate, while the spectrum works better with the lower sampling rate. In fact, this might be the cause of the changes you saw.
Re Question 2:
Frequency resolution in the way I use that term is a function of sampling rate and of the size of the Fourier Transform. Please look at /en/sampling-rate-and-frequency-resolution for an explanation.
Re Question 3:
You can try to adjust the recording latency under Options / Customize / Advanced Settings / Audio Performance. Try a value of 40 or lower. However, values that are too low might not work well.
In a future version I probably will also enable support for the native audio API of Windows 7, which has very low latencies (like ASIO).
Best regards,
Bodo
Re: Something buggy about the last version?
I just had another thought about the scrolling. With the default values, I get very smooth scrolling on my 4 year old system. If you see updates of 10 or 20 pixels at a time, something is wrong.
It is possible that you have some configuration issue that causes your system to hang like that. Please use this tool: http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml to check if your system is responsive enough for real-time audio processing.
I used to run Windows XP on a Macbook, and the Bootcamp process from Apple caused huge latency problems (you can probably still find relevent threads about it in the Apple support forums). This tool helped to identify these problems.
If you Google for "DPC Latency" you can find more about this (not limited to Macbooks).
Re: Something buggy about the last version?
I just ran some checks to verify the smoothness of the scrolling, and even on a low powered netbook it scrolls in increments of one pixel.
It would be great if you can contact me with your system specs so that I can try to work out where the problem lies.
Re: smoother scrolling?
Hi Soprano,
I just got a new computer that is much faster than my old one, and now I'm seeing the unsmooth scrolling that you reported.
Specifically, it seems to happen when a microphone is connected to the integrated Realtek HD Audio codec. If I unplug the mic from there and just use USB Mics, scrolling is fine and absolutely smooth. But when a mic is connected to the HD Audio Codec, even when I'm using a USB Mic, I sometimes get bad scrolling in increments of ten or twenty pixels.
Hopefully I can fix it somehow.