User 905133

If anyone has Arturia's Buchla Easel, there's also free banks with presets available for the Easel.

This would be handy. I'm wondering what's actually in the buffer/on the clipboard. Is it the actual audio or midi data? Or is the source, the start and end points, and the data type options chosen? I had assumed the latter. If so, changes to a project in time (placement/location within the project) might mean all clipboard items would have to be updated quite often with typical editing. Just wondering about that.

WOW. For the 25th anniversary Group Buy it was $200.

Thanks for asking. The instrument plug-in I have used to route midi data to and from Cakewalk is a virtual modular synth called Voltage Modular (from Cherry Audio). I haven't used it to distribute Midi FX from Cakewalk back to Cakewalk. I have used it with self-designed modular effects using MIDI. To take a couple of simple examples, I have had used LFOs and ADSR envelopes within Voltage Modular to send midi CC data to control multiple software synths hosted in Cakewalk. I will schedule some time to see if this process can be done with CW's Midi FX.

I'm on Win 10 Pro, so maybe that's part of it. Also, I was copying to a clean track but you might be doing a copy and replace. I defer to others for possible explanations.

I just did the following: Created a short recording on an Instrument Track Used my mouse cursor to highlight/select a 2 measure section Used Ctrl+C to copy the highlighted/selected measures into what I assume is a copy bufffer Created a MIDI Track Placed the cursor at a random spot on the new track Used Ctrl+V to paste a copy Moved the cursor to another random spot Used Ctrl+V to paste a second copy I repeated this several times. Next I repeated the cut-and-paste process several times with an audio track. Ctrl+C and Ctrl+ V worked. What steps did you use? If you used the same steps, maybe someone else can offer possible explanations for why it might not work for you. Maybe there's something that I have enabled that you don't? Possibly one of the Menu Bar > Edit > Select options?

I agree with learning the strengths and weaknesses of all music-making tools and how to use them to meet our own individual needs. Oddly enough, over the past three days I have been going through the Pigments Expansion Packs (Half-Price Sale) and there are a lot of mallet/percussive sounds that sound very much like sounds I already have (esp. such as many in Chromaphone). On my PC Pigments (which I like) has a high CPU %, but I have some work-arounds for using Pigments in context. I have not specifically compared the Chromaphone load with the Pigments load, but generally Pigments is rather high when I am testing presets, tweaking them, and developing compositional layers. I haven't extensively compared interactivity of sounds from different soft synth makers either. Thanks for reminding me to put that on my list of things to do. Generally I find that the FX that manufacturer's put on factory presets (presumably so they sound good in isolation) tend to clash with FX on other synths and I end up using dry or nearly dry tweaks. One of my to-do tasks is to further explore using multi-band FX with integrated dry/semi dry sounds from different synths. BTW, I have been exploring soft synths for the past 2-3 years with the intent of moving away from hardware. But yesterday I fired up the audio from one of my vintage D-to-A sound modules. If they all had reliable D-to-D outputs, I am now thinking I'd like that more than fiddling with soft synths and FX to get the sound that I want. Come to think of it, I generally preferred the FX chips of one manufacturer and tended to use dry (or nearly dry) sounds from other sound modules when combining them.

Yup! I did two updates in rapid succession. Simply turning on layer B with no guts (an "init" layer) added 2-4%. Good to know!! Both turning on and adding the guts to layer B (such as by loading a layer as you describe) added approx. 8-10%. I agree with your assessment of Chromaphone 3 (unique, sounds great, etc. Thanks for the insights into the architecture. I have been pleased with the textures I have gotten with single layers, crazy settings, and built-in FX. I had no idea that piling up notes with a single layer was so efficient!! Thanks also to @Jan Schmitz for raising the issue of extreme CPU load under certain conditions. It is good to know the strengths and limitations of each plug-in.

Thanks for this. I will have to check specifically with dual layer sounds. That might account for the 30% CPU. Not sure I have every Chromaphone Expansion Pack, but if you or others can suggest some high CPU dual layer factory presets, I saved my test CbB project and can try to verify that its the dual layer causing CPU being doubled. Update: All of my randomly chosen factory presets are single layer. As a simple test, I just turned on layer B. That generally increased the CPU load by 2-4%. Update: Turning on layer B and randomly loading sounds added approx. 8-10% CPU. So, with 1 instance of Chromaphone 3 playing my midi loop, I was able to get CbB up to 28%. Thanks for helping me to sort out what to avoid!

My PC is a vintage 2011 formerly Win 7 PC with up-to-date Windows 10 Pro. I get 30% CPU usage when only when I boot Chromaphone. After that it drops down considerably. When not making sound, it drops down to less than 1%. Typical sounds run from single digits to maybe as high as 15%. As I assume you know, it can vary quite a bit. For example, I have one woody mallet sound I tweaked to have mondo delay/echo trails. It starts off at 8% CPU and as I swipe my hand across the keyboard up and down, it does up to 10-11% CPU. This is in standalone mode. In Cakewalk with a single instance I get comparable results above Cakewalk's baseline (1.4% to 2.7% at rest). It spikes to above 30% upon insertion, constant runs with my woody mallet mondo delay/echo preset pushes Cakewalk to the 13-16% range. It is roughly the same during live practice, recording, and playback. I have not tried multiple instances. That being said, I have noticed repeatedly, with my vintage PC I sometimes don't have issues which others report with newer PCs. Not saying that newer PCs can't do more tracks and more effects faster than I can. Just saying that I am not getting any where near 30% CPU with Chromaphone. I looped my test recording (15 measures of midi data) and randomly switched presets (several factory banks). The note density starts low and total CbB CPU starts at 8-10% CPU based on the sound and by the end it goes up to 12-20% CPU. With the 15-measure loop going, I used 2 hands to rapidly play dense random cluster chords to increase the note density (approx. 12-14 notes at a time). The sound playing was at 17-18% CPU max without the additional notes. Pounding the keyboard live, the CPU went up to 18-19%. If there's a way to post/share some of your custom Chromaphone, I am curious to see what results I get with them. It would be good to know if there are some Chromaphone settings that I should stay away from based on a higher CPU load.

Thanks for clarifying what you meant. In essence you are asking for MIDI Merge--the ability to send midi data from several MIDI tracks to a single MIDI FX. As I understand it, this can be done with third party plug-ins. I have seen some people get testy when free software doesn't include everything they want all from within the software. As for me, I don't mind using third-party plug-ins to extend what is not built-in.

Thanks for the additional details. Macrium has been giving me pop-ups to get the newest version for a couple of years (since I used it one time). Makes sense that I should update it before it goes away in case I need to use it again.

I used the free version once and found it helpful. Not sure I will use it again, but thanks for the heads-up about the change.

This may or may not be helpful to others, so I am sharing it as a take it or leave idea (i.e., its not intended to spark controversy or debate). It stems from recent visual issues trying to track the Windows crosshair mouse pointer across two monitors with different resolutions. It works for me, but it might not work for others and I am quite comfortable with that. So, I increased the size of the mouse pointer. As anyone who uses Cakewalk for any length of time might have observed, changes in the mouse pointer serve as visual clues for what's going on. I have found (and it could just be me, which is OK) the changes in the now-enlarged mouse pointer are helpful. So, when moving the mouse pointer across the edge/border/boundary/line or whatever it is officially called, the normal pointer arrow that points to the upper left on my PC changes to either a horizontal line or a vertical line with an arrow point on both ends. For me, that's the clue that I can drag & resize or double click. If this helps anyone, great. If not, please ignore.

I never do this, but evidently we can click and drag anywhere along the edge of a collapsed panel. Maybe that would help until double-clickable borders are implemented?

Are you talking about things that are named "Midi Send" and "Midi Aux" or the abilities to send midi data from a track to other places (such as other tracks, plug-ins not on any track, plug-ins on other tracks, etc.)? In asking this, I'm not challenging you. I have been using an instrument plug-in from another software maker to route midi data to and from Cakewalk and want to explore other uses for the methods I use. So, I am looking for any places where you think midi data could be sent to and from to fine tune my work flow. Midi Send and Send Aux imply a desire for methods to route midi data from places to other places (source and destination endpoints) based on having used midi routers (such as my ancient MOTU 8 x 8 parallel port midi express, MTP AV, etc.). Again, I'm not looking to diss this idea (yours and others) or to spark any controversies, just looking for ideas (possible data sources and destinations within CbB) to try to implement/prototype a solution with my current external plug-in workflow. I have used midi with Cakewalk for ages, but it sounds like people want to route (and maybe filter) midi data in ways that I generally haven't done--except recently with my external instrument plug-in as a midi data processor. I have a long personal history with this kind of thing that dates back to processing midi data from a Casio CZ Synth sent through a Commodore 64 to modify the data and then returned to the Casio (among other methods of processing midi data). Yes, I totally get that people want everything within Cakewalk. As for me, I don't mind using plug-ins for tasks that are not built-in yet. Thanks.

"full installer" turns up this reference as part of the discussion, but I couldn't find it in that thread. Not sure if the following is accurate: Possibly check your files for "Cakewalk_by_BandLab_Setup" (without the quotes). Maybe you have a full installer saved somewhere? Can it be downloaded from Bandlab Assistant (Apps)?

Since it looks like its a French horn, I assumed the notes were all pushed forward to compensate for a sluggish attack section on the sample--so the meat of the sound hits the beat. 100% speculation on my part.

Out of curiosity, what should they look like?

I might be missing something but what I see is that your MIDI track [track 1] is routed to the SI-Electric Piano on track 2. The LED meter in the Inspector shows MIDI is playing in the second screen shot. I do not see how the audio from track 2 / SI-Electric Piano is being routed presumably to a bus (though not totally necessary, just good practice) and then to your sound device. That is showing MIDI data, not audio. There's a button on the track header called either MIDI Echo or Input Echo. Was that turned on for Track 2? If not, that could cause the lack of sound as you played. NOTE: There could be other issues, but this is something easy to check and rule out in problem-solving the issue you described.

NEW (2023-02-16 update 1.1.1) Changes from version 1.1.0: Fixed an issue that could cause communication problems between TONEX Pedal and TONEX Librarian General reliability improvements NOTE: This is an update from yesterday's version which was 1.1.0.

For people considering Pigments, there was a live stream earlier today from Plugin Boutique: