VirtualMIDISynth 2.x alpha available for testing

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Pagine

Posts: 1972
Joined: 25 Mar 2012 - 01:19
CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released

Alpha 8 is finally out; here's a list of changes:

v.2.0.0-alpha8 - 2015-03-01
- NEW: Added multi-device support (2 devices are active)
- NEW: Live apply of most of settings, including soundfonts.
- NEW: Redesigned configurator dialog, now is bigger, resizable and scrollable.
- NEW: Updated BASS to 2.4.10 and BASSMIDI to 2.4.9
- FIX: Added check to avoid adding an already existing soundfont to the list.

Please test it and report bugs here.

Posts: 59
Joined: 19 Apr 2014 - 06:23
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released
coolsoft wrote:

Alpha 8 is finally out

Welcome back and thanks for the update.  A couple of things:

- Is there a changelog page I can go to for Bass/BassMIDI so I can track changes done to the libraries?

- I feel a disconnect in consistency when it comes to the two VMS ports and the mixers.  Perhaps a mixer window could integrate a button to switch between the two and/or open up the other mixer window.

- None of the settings under Advanced seems to apply live

- While the settings panel is currently a little unorganized now, its also a little glitchy too now, I.E. the "shortcuts" tab under settings is flashy

- I'm still seeing no benefit of the "additional output buffer" in my testing.  If anything, its starting to cause more/worse audio glitches in Alpha 7 and 8, the higher it is; it is least glitchy at "0", where I tend to keep that setting at anyway.

- When adding soundfont(s) to the chain, I'd like to see the file dialog box allow the user to select more than one soundfont at a time.  (and maybe increase the soundfont limit in the chain a little?)

 

That's all for now, I shall continue reporting if I find more things

- Main laptop: Sager NP4658, Intel i7-4810MQ, 2*8GB DDR3 (PC3-10700), 512GB+512GB SSDs, Intel HD4600/NVidia GT840M

Posts: 26
Joined: 12 Mar 2013 - 16:35
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released

Thanks for alpha8

Well, that awful delay intruduced in alpha7 is still there.

I'm going back to alpha6 that is working very good, even with some glithes it just beat the competition.

Keep in mind that we (by we, I mean 3 persons testing individually) are using a RAM disk so there is absolutely no bottleneck anywhere.

I'll be honest with you, I'm a bit dissapointed to see this issue after I made a detailed bug report, yet I understand that programing is not a one day task and bugs will always happens.

So don't take this personally, but Im a kind of person that like to say what is thinking.

I hope you will take this as only a part of constructive criticism.

The shortcuts TAB is flickering like MAD under windows 8.1 O.O

Nice to see that program is evolving in a good direction, but I'll skip this alpha8, for me it's not usable in that state until that delay is completely resolved, fast midi switching is a priority.

Posts: 1972
Joined: 25 Mar 2012 - 01:19
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released
Ray890 wrote:
Is there a changelog page I can go to for Bass/BassMIDI so I can track changes done to the libraries?

BASS changelog is not available on un4seen website (at least I can't find it), but it's included with BASS sources. I don't know if BASS includers (like me) can copy/paste that changelog into theirs... will ask to Ian Luck.

Ray890 wrote:
I feel a disconnect in consistency when it comes to the two VMS ports and the mixers.
My first idea was to keep a single mixer and add a switch at the top of window, allowing user to switch between mixer 1, 2 (and in the near future 3, 4, ...).
But this way it was impossible to control more than one device at a time; so I came up with a "cascading menu".
I'm open to suggestion on this...

Ray890 wrote:
None of the settings under Advanced seems to apply live
In fact I wrote "NEW: Live apply of most of settings, including soundfonts." ;)
I'm still working on settings that require a VMS restart.

Ray890 wrote:
I'm still seeing no benefit of the "additional output buffer" in my testing.  If anything, its starting to cause more/worse audio glitches in Alpha 7 and 8, the higher it is; it is least glitchy at "0", where I tend to keep that setting at anyway.
Still investigating on it.

Ray890 wrote:
When adding soundfont(s) to the chain, I'd like to see the file dialog box allow the user to select more than one soundfont at a time. (and maybe increase the soundfont limit in the chain a little?)
I agree, it's a thing I haven't thought at all.
About the SF limit: the limit is actually 30 but it could be increased easily (no architectural limit).
What's a reasonable one for you?

supergod wrote:
Well, that awful delay intruduced in alpha7 is still there. [...]
I'll be honest with you, I'm a bit dissapointed to see this issue after I made a detailed bug report, yet I understand that programing is not a one day task and bugs will always happens.
Your detailed bug report was not ignored but... I have a lot of people asking for updates from time to time.
Alpha7 was released on Nov2014 so many of them wondered if the project was dead.
And I agree with them: waiting 4 months for an Alpha update is too much.

Since I had a lot of features almost ready, I worked on completing and release them with highest priority.

Now that there something new to test for users I'll work on fixing open bugs... ;)

supergod wrote:
So don't take this personally, but Im a kind of person that like to say what is thinking.
I hope you will take this as only a part of constructive criticism.
No problem, that's all right.
Words like "Good work, nice job, well done" are really welcome, but developers also need "this should be fixed like this" or "doing this throw this error on this system".

Ray890 wrote:
the "shortcuts" tab under settings is flashy
supergod wrote:
The shortcuts TAB is flickering like MAD under windows 8.1
It doesn't on Win7-x64 (my development machine) nor on my Win8 testing machine. Is it only the shortcuts one or the others too?
PS: double buffering in plain C++/Win32 is a nightmare...

 

@both: thanks for your testing and patience.

Posts: 26
Joined: 12 Mar 2013 - 16:35
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released
coolsoft wrote:

Is it only the shortcuts one or the others too?

Only the shortcuts TAB

Posts: 16
Joined: 4 Set 2014 - 17:34
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released
supergod wrote:

Only the shortcuts TAB

The Options tab will also flicker if you use the scroll bar.  "Shortcuts" flickers the entire time.

 

Unfortuantely, the weird silence I mentioned earlier still seems to be present.  I had worked on a theory as to what was causing it involving changing the instruments in use but, well... I'll explain my tests and you can see why it doesn't add up:

  • Loading a file and playing immediately causes a very brief stutter.  This I attribute to the renderer starting/initializing and don't consider an issue.
  • Loading a file, keeping the player open and loading the same file causes a few seconds of silence at the beginning.  The system believes it to still be playing and will be part-way in when audio resumes.
  • Loading a file, stopping playback and resuming it has no issue at all.
  • Loading a file, closing the player and then loading the same file will cause only the breif stutter.
  • Loading a file, closing the player and then loading another file will cause only the brief stutter.
  • Loading a file, keeping the player open and loading a different file will exhibit the few seconds of silence.
  • Loading a file, stopping playback and loading another file in new player cause only the brief stutter.
  • Loading a file, stopping playback, loading another file in a new player, stopping playback again and returning to the original player to resume playback has no issue at all.
  • Lastly, loading a file and letting it play to the end before moving on to a new file will only cause silence in the event you're using a playlist, thus technically not stopping playback in between.  If you let playback end and then open a new file it again only causes the brief stutter.

(NB: Pausing playback is no different to doing nothing - the silence is still introduced.  It's only outright stopping playback which negates it; though pausing and resuming demonstrates no issue to speak of)

So it would seem that the only time the silence occurs is when the playback software is left playing (or paused) when attempting to load a new file for immediate playback.  The only thing I can suspect from this is that the renderer (either the driver itself or BASSMIDI) doesn't gracefully restart itself, despite separately shuting down and starting up seeming to be quite efficient.

Posts: 59
Joined: 19 Apr 2014 - 06:23
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released

Upon further testing, I found that I start to get sometimes random errors and VMS crashing when using Alpha8 with MIDITrail.  This seems to be reproducable if you experiment with stopping and playing midi playback, along with the VMS load/unload states.

AND, I have also encountered an odd note playback delay (perhaps the same one Thalyn is having?).
When I let MIDITrail request the driver by pressing space to play, stop the driver request (and midi) with esc, then press space to play again (re-request driver) without closing VMS beforehand, MIDITrail is responsive but I get about 0.5 to 2 seconds of silence, then notes start becoming audible followed by a whole bunch of notes bunched up at once.

- Main laptop: Sager NP4658, Intel i7-4810MQ, 2*8GB DDR3 (PC3-10700), 512GB+512GB SSDs, Intel HD4600/NVidia GT840M

Posts: 1972
Joined: 25 Mar 2012 - 01:19
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released

Alpha 9 is out, here's a list of changes:

v.2.0.0-alpha9 - 2015-03-07
- NEW: Soundfont add dialog can now add more than one SF at a time (limit increased to 50).
- NEW: Soundfont list management buttons now are enabled/disabled based on list state.
- NEW: Soundfonts can now be enabled/disabled with numeric keyboard keys.
- FIX: Removed lag introduced in alpha7 to MIDI clients that open/close the device quickly (like GZDoom).
- FIX: Configurator tab pages controls can now be focused using TAB key.
- FIX: Fixed flickering with Aero in Win 8.1 and Win 7.

Please test it and report bugs here.

Posts: 16
Joined: 4 Set 2014 - 17:34
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released

Spectacular!  The delay in audible playback when not stopping the player is, for all intents and purposes, gone.  It's possible some kind of software might be able to detect it but I sure as heck can't hear it; and that's what counts in the end.

The flickering is also gone from both locations it was previously visible.  Nice one!

Time to see if I can "break" something else, though hopefully I won't be able to.

Posts: 26
Joined: 12 Mar 2013 - 16:35
Re: CoolSoft VirtualMIDISynth 2.0.0-alpha8 released

Hello.

Thanks for alpha9.

1. The delay bug is propably fixed, hovewer it realy *needs more testing* - I'll let you know.

2. Flickering is fixed. (hopefully)

However I have found and introduced in this version a new bug that will force to stuck your program in crash .dll nightmarre. :(

The only way to get out of this nightmarre is using some tricks.

There is also another bug in configuration.

I was able to reproduce both.

Soon I'll create a detailed bug report - when I found some free time.

Pagine