Is XITE applicable for me ?

[EdivanSneberg]

Hoi soniccore experts

please help me to take a decision to go for XITE and scope or not.
I saw once and again the XITE demos at Messe, the soniccore webpages and cannot get some things clarified.
I was told that this forum is the best place to get advice on practical stuff.
So, please excuse my ignorance and help me to get it clear.
Here we go.

I understand that XITE is the successor of the creamware DSP cards. I once owned a Luna some 10 years ago.
XITE is much more DSP powered than Luna was.
Does it mean that XITE has no limits in number of synth voices as I had it with my Luna card ?
I never came to more than 5 or 6 voices before a DSP limit was reached.

Especially with Modular I had great results to build freeform envelopes with the Modular sequencers.
Albeit I read here that the current scope version does not allow to use any sequencer module in Modular.
Is that true ? Is there any correction planned ? Is that valid for XITE as well or only for cards ?

There was a VST hosting with scope effect plugins some years ago called XTC. I remember that this was kind of unofficial during the demos of XITE, but I cannot find this VST I/O on the webpages of soniccore.
Also here in the forum I cannot get a clear picture whether it runs or not.
Is such a VST feature available with XITE plugins ?

Please accept my apologies when I miss anything obvious reading all the forum entries.

regards and bedankt Edi

[nitri]

Hello, sincerely I would hope by scope 6. At the moment Xite1 is ferrari without wheels. Very complicated to optimize a system with Xite1. Your you must have computer science knowledge to obtain an optimal advantage of Xite1. Some people will say the opposite here. I am musical nonengineer in computer science. You waste long time finding out as this or that one problem is solved. A time that you could be using to create music. And to discover after some of the problems do not have solution. There is no a good technical support aside from this forum. I want to think that Scope 6 will solve the great problems that they prevent to Xite1 to be the best system to create music.

At the moment Xite1 this sleeping hoping to be waked up

[HUROLURA]

Regarding voices count on synth plugins.
The Xite-1 also has limited power but much more than what was available on the PCI cards.
Usually Xite-1 provide 5 to 10 time more power than the former 14/15 DSP Scope Pro card.
It is particulary true on Xite optimized devices (i.e. SonicCore plugins).
As I also started with a 3 DSP I understand what you mean with limited polyphony.
The Xite offers MUCH more room.
For example I succeeded to get 10 6-notes polyphony instance on that example with the Xite-1:
https://soundcloud.com/hurolura/minigang-x

I know about issues using the sequencer of the SB404. I would have to check about the modular specifically but the range of sequencer module available also include third party modules that shouldn't suffer from the same issue if there is any).

I cannot provide you any feedback about VST mode as I just never tried this (neither on old scope PCI cards nor on the Xite-1).

Hope this helps

[EdivanSneberg]

Hoi Nitri and Hurolura

that was quick ! I understand why they pointed me to this forum now.
Thank you for your replies.

Argh this loks to me there is some truth in the forum discussions about the responsiveness and agility of XITE as a product and a box in my studio.

Good to hear (thanks Hurolura for the sample) that the new DSPs at least open single instrument 6 voices to several instruments in parallel with 6 voices.
So it is not possible to go to 8-10 voices with the instruments. What a pitty.

Thank you nitri for the openness. I take what you say as a warning that it is better to wait for a scope 6 version.

It looks like the discussion about the bugs in scope 5 bear more truth than it is appreciated.
I could never figure whether these issues are generic defects or only wrong configuration of the single owner of scope and XITE.
I guess it would be good to have an unambiguous support information that scope 6 will correct all bugs and gives a date for scope 6 rollout. Some years ago at Messe I saw only a poster with wonderful things to come with version 6.
Do you as insiders have such an availibility date for scope 6 ?
Will scope 6 be free for all who have issues with scope 5 ?

Noone uses VST ? So Scope and XITE remain a universe on their own, like an effect box or a submixer ?
Interesting approach by Soniccore. Do you think this reflects the smaller studio's DAW software reality ?

regards Edi

[dawman]

OMG, It's another "here's why I can't but an XITE-1 thread."
I tire from the same messages meant to be read by Soniccore, which they never will as their time is spent making Solaris right now since it too is another product that sits above the rest, yet there are a few owners who just can't seem to make music with it.

If you do buy one, please don't use it anywhere on the West Coast or Vegas where I work, I have enjoyed punishing the laptop/VST crowd for 4 1/2 years now and would hate to think someone has finally decided that the extra quality of sound achieved is worth the extra presses one must suffer on a QWERTY.

And the end of the day, you either have the money and need realtime parameter modulation, or you need to save money since parameter modulation is just 2 big words that matter not in the world of satisfying multitudes of clients in the quest for a hit record for 99 cents per download.

Wait until 2018 when they drop to 2000 bucks, or you see one on ebay finally. I never have seen one, so I guess the owners of this worthless non musical instrument, that will never be optimized just sits on a shelf for bragging rights...

First time I see one for 2 large used, it's mine.
It's nice to run across so many FOH and performers who want to know why Solaris and the XITE-1 sound so good, then I tell them you get what you pay for.

Some have decided the quality is worth the price, some decide they'll stick to the laptops and Receptors. I like those guys as I never have to worry about them ever turning any heads.

I would buy a big bulky MacPro with 50 Synths and 40 Compressors and Limiters, 38 Delays, dozens of reverbs and of course these all sound different.
It's fun demoing sounds all of the time, keeps guys from actually having to finish ideas they hear in their heads.

[Roland Kuit]

As you are a modular builder I think it will be enormous fun to work with the IV and other modules.
It is a bit slow process, in comparison with other virtual modulars, but the sound is awful good!

[EdivanSneberg]

Thanks dawman and Roland for your replies.

dawman i am actually not fully grabbing what you try to tell me.
Probably you are making fun of me.
Alright, that's fine, fast comprehension is not given to everyone.
Taking your answer serious means that in your eyes the quirks are more than compensated by the sound.
I would not play off usability and interfaces against sound quality. I guess you don't want to tell me I am dumb because i can't see the bragging important.
Excuse my dumbness, yes, I have bought a Macpro and use VST/AU like many others do and do successfully. I left scope when soniccore left Mac, though that does not mean I am not clear what scope can do very well when it is unleashed from bugs.
I am not aware that there is anything in scope and xite that can compete with a DAW App when it comes to arrangement versatility.
But hey don't pull me into this ideologic talk in a post-ideologic audioworld. I can see from what you say you like your XITE and that is at least good for you.
Please allow me just that I don't want to bragg and stick with native arrangement software for the decent things I do.

Roland indeed Modular is still the most striking argument for scope. I just wonder if the Modular 4 modules that I just see on Ben's pages will tempt me into another round of subtractive with new mods while I have read here that my beloved modular sequencers wont run.
Is it really true that this sequencer bug all across the sequencers is not fixed in scope 5 ?
The invest into XITE for the Modular is somehow choked off by the sequencer bug in my view.

regards Edi

[jksuperstar]

Hoi Nitri and Hurolura
Good to hear (thanks Hurolura for the sample) that the new DSPs at least open single instrument 6 voices to several instruments in parallel with 6 voices.
So it is not possible to go to 8-10 voices with the instruments. What a pitty.
Noone uses VST ? So Scope and XITE remain a universe on their own, like an effect box or a submixer ?
Interesting approach by Soniccore. Do you think this reflects the smaller studio's DAW software reality ?
regards Edi

Polyphony can go above 10...it depends on the device/instrument. Hurolura's example wasn't a statement of the limit...just an example of loading 10 separate instruments, EACH with 6 polyphony set. That's 60 voices..on par with most ROMpler type synths, but WAY BEYOND most other Hardware Virtual Analog modelling synths. The XITE continues under development, especially with 3rd party developers now...and new techniques are being developed to make the full use of the XITE.

[HUROLURA]

Do not undertsand me wrong about the "test/demo" made with the Minimax.

My intention was to compare it with my NOAH ex in term of DSP power.
So I set polyphony to 6 notes as it is what you can get on 2 "instances" with the NOAH Ex (which integrate 11 DSP of the same kind as the one you had on your 3DSP board - actually the NOAH Ex use 8 of them for the synths, 2 others for FX, I/O and so on and the last one is here to "emulate" the host PC on scope systems). On the Xite-1 I stacked 6-notes polyphony Minimax instances for comparison purpose but you can also get it to work up to 16 notes without any problem (the thing is I only have 10 fingers and often just play multiple monophonic synth parts). To be quite fair, there was also a couple of FX loaded on each part and a set of reverbs to get as close as possible to my NOAH Ex reference.

Vignette Xite Noah.jpg (5.06 KiB) Viewed 3449 times

Hence though providing 6 notes on each part, most of the instruments were just played mono in the example.
And this is also one of the good point on such a DSP solution: it is much more predictable than any DSP and I prefer the fixed polyphony solution rather than the dynamic allocation found on other synths (or the numeric noise or crash without any warning you get when getting to far on CPU consumtion with VSTi).

There are still a few things to be fixed on the Xite (this non working sequencer module but you have other solution available, the non optimised old devices from 3rd parties, the sampler which seems to have some issues but I do not use them) but with what is provided as for now you already have endless possibilities.

I am currently at home (only old good scope PCI cards here), so I cannot reload the project on the Xite to provide you more details ...

[dawman]

I apologise, no excuse for my frustration.
I am used to Stardust purposely coming here and pretending to have owned an XITE-1, or borrowed/rented one, I can't remember as he erased all of his posts. Must have took hours since having 12,000 posts means lots of time.
I assumed incorrectly he came back with a new ISP.

My apologies.

[dante]

Check here, under the XITE/Events/Guitaris tab - theres 9 articles about XITE
Under the Instruments/Modular tab - 9 articles about MODULAR - which barely scratch the surface (eg beginners stuff)
And one article on MATTOMATT - the excellant sequencer working on latest Scope and XITE:


http://www.hitfoundry.com/scope/

[hubird]

...I can't remember as he erased all of his posts. Must have took hours since having 12,000 posts means lots of time.

huh?

[EdivanSneberg]

Thank you guys.
Jksuperstar and Hurolura, yes I have got it wrong a bit and it is good to see that less complex synths have higher number of voices.

Dante that is a truely awesome link. Great resource to get the bright side of XITE and scope. I like the fresh style of presenting scope.
So the only working sequencer in scope is Mattomat from GHOST.
Phew, I did not expect Modular to be so neglected.
Anyway thanks for the clarity.
The only way I see is to wait for scope 6.
Do you have any insider information when it will surface ?
Maybe there will be some bug fixes for scope 5 in the meantime to shorten the waiting.

I see from the other forum entries that scope 6 is in what i would call an alpha state for a closed developer use.
Is there a public beta phase anounced already with a date ?
Do you know what will be in the scope 6 package and what not ?

Dawman I can see that you are very enthusiastic about your XITE.
Again I do not fully understand what you are talking.
I dont know what you mean with stardusts and ISPs.
Has it any relation to XITE Modular and instrument voices?
Would you mind to open up for me what it means for XITE and scope?

Thanks to all of you.
Your answers already gave me more decision support than any marketing blah.
It appears to me that there are high hopes that scope gets a revival though from what I hear it is limited to a niche I cant take advantage of.
It is a pitty that the target of scope 6 is not clear beyond what I saw at Messe poster.

regards Edi

[Roland Kuit]

Thanks dawman and Roland for your replies.

Roland indeed Modular is still the most striking argument for scope. I just wonder if the Modular 4 modules that I just see on Ben's pages will tempt me into another round of subtractive with new mods while I have read here that my beloved modular sequencers wont run.
Is it really true that this sequencer bug all across the sequencers is not fixed in scope 5 ?
The invest into XITE for the Modular is somehow choked off by the sequencer bug in my view.

regards Edi

The sequencer is my opinion the last interesting module. You can sequence from DAW's or build your own sequencer.
Far more interesting than the existing ones. Not one, but 10.000 ways to sequence.
In my books there are chapters about building these things.

The Modular is about creating interesting sonic palettes where pre-routed synths fail.
Not only subtractive synthesis but much more ways of synthesis are possible.

[EdivanSneberg]

Hi Roland,

graet approach to Modular 4 on your pages.
I 100% agree that the soundscapes of Modular go beyond any fixed signal path in existing synths.
No doubt, that is why I think neglecting Modular is a sin.
In my use the modular sequencers, that do not run in scope 5, allowed me control envelopes and triggers for subsequent modulations. Also the sync to midi clock and note length values gave me the freedom to adapt to changes in song contexts.
For me this is very important to go beyond ADSR/LFO type of movements.

But of course I might be the only one to miss the sequencers and the one shot soundscape is most important in Modular.

Maybe you have the time to talk about sequencing with scope modular in your book next year.

regards Edi

[djmicron]

each XITE newer dsp is equal to 6 of the older dsp's provided with the Luna(or any of the pci cards), so on a XITE-1, there are 12 of the new dsp's equal of having 72 of the older dsp's equal of having 24 Luna cards and also on the XITE-1 there are 6 of the older dsp's equal to another 2 Luna cards.
All standard synths(minimax, prodyssey, protone and all minor synths) can run without troubles, Modular IV also runs flawlessly.
The bugs on the XITE are about the sequencer modules based on SSQGate10DLL which needs a fix and vdat and samplers(on 64 bits OS), but there are other ready to use sequencing modules from flexor package and some free device too, or you can also develop your own.
Also there is huge power for effects and mixing, plus realtime sound processing of hardware and software I/O, all with different sound character and clarity than the native synths and effects.
All you have to do with scope is to use what you need and don't waste unneeded resources, but what you'll get will be quality.

[nitri]

Hello again! I think that they are sufficient posts in this thread to make a decision. There is too much division of opinions as far as if it is a good system or no.

For my there are some clear subjects:

Bad:

1-) The price? Not 100% optimized platform. May be 60%...

2-) Very complex configuration. You lose long time configuring your system.

3-) Obsolete and limited automatization and control system.

4-) Uncertainty about the future. No news, no support...

Good:

1-) Possibly the best sound.


You would pay all that money by a product that you cannot be useful to the 100% ?

Modular IV is sufficient justification for the investment?

It would be of aid to know that Sonic Core continues developing Scope 6 and that it does not lack long time for its completion.

Screen captures, photos...

Official announcement, not by means of its friendly in this forum.

Its webpage for very many time it has not been updated

[dante]

Nitri, clearly the XITE is not for you if you see a Ferrari without wheels, no support or counting the number of times a website is updated.

This is a musical device, and clearly therefore sound is a number one overruling aspect. Coupled with versatility it speaks for itself and it's usefulness could potentially outlive Sonic Core or a dozen other manufacturers of music gear and their support by at least a decade.

Probably even 2 decades, which even the old PCI cards approach.

The notion that Scope 6 will make or break the usefulness of this card is a nonsense, albeit I'm sure it will be a useful bonus when it comes.

[djmicron]

You would pay all that money by a product that you cannot be useful to the 100% ?

i use it at 100%, scope allow us freedom and sometimes that freedom can cause problems, but if we avoid certain buggy situations, all is fine and the card is usable at its 100% as i'm doing for my job.

don't know what do you mean by bad obsolete automation, with scope you can use audio rates for automation, there is nothing better than this.

I also agree with dante, scope is not a fashion thing, it's a tool and it can be used for years without the need of updates or spam by sonic core, as it happens with other audio software and hardware forcing people for periodical updates and hardware changes.

[sunmachine]

I also agree with dante, scope is not a fashion thing, it's a tool and it can be used for years without the need of updates or spam by sonic core, as it happens with other audio software and hardware forcing people for periodical updates and hardware changes.

I totally agree with this! Actually I really like the fact that there's not an update every few months.
I'm still using my ten+ years old PCI cards but I'm saving up for an XITE now.