PlanetZ forums - scopeusers.com

i notice that there are a lot of devices such as all of brainworx devices that sell as vst and seem to be exactly the same. my question is there a difference between devices that sell in both formats such as sound quality?

yes, the dsp sound quality tends to be better, but the main reason for that is that dsp resources are dedicated resources. the cpu has a lot of jobs to do, at some point, the programmer has to take that into account if he expects the user to be able to do any other work on the machine besides running his plugin.....

stardust wrote:...The only fact I know of is that the calculation accuracy of native maths is limited by the math library coming with the OS compiler and that a DSP by definition is better in this discipline.

good point, Stardust - and a great opportunity to add some devious thoughts...
maybe it's that 'accuracy thing' which is confusing people, developers and 'consumers'
just think about what is processed... it's not bookeeping or financial balances supposed to be absolutely correct to the cent - which is btw not that simple if you deal with $100 million and above figures...

signal processing is about the modelling of changes-of-an-entity-over-time, an absolute value at any given point may be totally irrelevant, as long as the 'form' matches exactly.
DSP libraries are written by people who are experts on the subject.
They anticipate certain (critical or important) situations in processing, that a general purpose math programmer simply doesn't even know about.

cheers, Tom

so its a small difference?im more conncernd if there will be a big difference tht is noticable.i f not id rather just download the vst s for free instead im sure im getting my moneys worth .

with the BX, the difference might be small, but it'll be real and the vst version will be hungry. you won't be getting away with anything. there's a good reason still for using a scope card even if pcs are powerful these days....

thanks, what a bout would there be a big difference with somethjng like scope modular if ever made as a vst?

it's possible to make native stuff as good as anything, the question is, "what else can you do with the computer if you allocate all those resources to that heavy of a realtime process?".

garyb wrote:it's possible to make native stuff as good as anything, the question is, "what else can you do with the computer if you allocate all those resources to that heavy of a realtime process?".

I agree, dsp card developers can be very ambitious with developing their plugins and know that their users have another power source for other needs (computer). UA is a perfect example, their Neve plugins are very dsp hungry, 33609 compressor eats up almost a whole card, but UA does'nt worry about power consumption to the point it stops them from developing high-quality usually. Their card is dedicated solely for their plugs, their not sharing a power source with every developer out here a user may choose for many needed tasks. Their are several SCOPE Plugins i suspect would consume an incredible amount of cpu if ported to Native. There are some power hungry plugins in Native world but in general it appears to not be a good idea with most developers on that platform. I can only imagine what XITE-1 will bring.

Also i don't believe alot of the 'Experienced coders' are interested in Native platform. Ask TC to port their reverbs to Native or SSL to port duende or UA all their vintage emulations or John Bowen his synths and all will probably give a big NO. I would be surprised if any did so anytime soon ( i don't believe power is the only good reason not to port, tho i could be wrong). From my view it seems that in general 'great developers' are more on dsp platforms or not touching virtual-world at all. Of course this is in general and not all cases and of course this is just my humble opinion.

ironman wrote:so its a small difference?im more conncernd if there will be a big difference tht is noticable.i f not id rather just download the vst s for free instead im sure im getting my moneys worth .

ya you can save $400 or whatever by downloading the vst version from net but you will not save your song there is a huge difference between vst and scope or tdm version.

I'm the first to admit that my ears aren't the best at telling the difference when playing around with my own kit (perhaps I should rephrase that ).
But, when put in the hands of some of the guys here who know what they;re doing and listening for, Scope does come out on top and you save your CPU for other things such as decent synths or say Kontakt samplers etc.

What I would say is that there is so much pleasure in playing around with the Scope effects, modulars et al. I'm currently trying to learn as much about the Scope devices as possible and comparing them to the VST ones where possible.
To me though it's a fun hobby to enjoy so I'm not worried about making money.

garyb wrote:it's possible to make native stuff as good as anything, the question is, "what else can you do with the computer if you allocate all those resources to that heavy of a realtime process?".

the Scope bx runs flawlessly IF you have the DSP, and the VST is indeed hungry, and - at least in my tests - CAN drag down CPU overhead.

It's sortof a trade-off - but IMO the Scope version is superb for dedicated final mixdown purposes.

Greg

The scope version also has pre and post eq insert slots. Native plugin format cannot at this stage offer this feature.