Solution to a GUI problem

Post Reply
slavedave
Posts: 40
Joined: Thu Jan 08, 2015 1:16 pm

Solution to a GUI problem

Post by slavedave » Tue Oct 11, 2016 1:47 pm

For some reason unknown to me, about a month ago I started to observe some graphics issues with my Aerodrums. Occasionally, the main screen would display as a blank white screen, or when I clicked on one of the main menu buttons (e.g. "Midi") it would open up into another blank screen. Ona couple of occasions the "midi" button was "greyed out" and I could not use it at all. A reboot usually sorted it out though. I found this was only reproducible when using Aerodrums to drive Addictive Drums using the "Midi Only" option. After much head scratching, I downloaded the most recent version of Aerodrums and reinstalled it plus I followed the guide in a previous poster to install a new Open GL driver for my graphics driver. The result is that I haven't observed the same issues since then.

However, I have noticed that hit accuracy is a little variable at the moment. Sometimes a hit won't register when it is gestured but pops up a few milliseconds later in the middle of the groove I am playing. I have the graphics mode in its most basic form most of the time now because I still get the error regarding graphics interfering with the smooth running of aerodrums. I also note that a sometimes get strange volume fluctuations in hit volume. My stick tips are the originals and have taken a bit of a beating - do you think it would be time to replace them with my spare set?

For the record, I always disable my wireless and turn off antivirus when I am playing live. My dpc latency is pretty good and I use my laptop just for audio production and for playing vst's live. I use an old Dell XPS m1330 (dual core 2ghz, 8gb ram and an SSD system/sample drive) under Win 7 64bit that I have tried to optimise for audio only apps.

Maybe the above might help someone.

REALLY looking forward to new developments with Aerodrums this year - any teaser hints as to what we can expect?

JesDes
Posts: 9
Joined: Tue Dec 09, 2014 9:28 pm

Re: Solution to a GUI problem

Post by JesDes » Wed Oct 12, 2016 7:38 pm

Not sure if I can help with all of the problems, but I'm pretty sure I can solve the issue with the volume fluctuations. If you're experiencing them while using the MIDI out to trigger Addictive Drums, Addictive Drums randomizes the MIDI velocity coming in by a certain amount, and winds up triggering a velocity switched sample set that sounds really off. You'll want to go to the edit page of every kitpiece and enable "NoAlts" in the response section. XLN Audio has some misleading documentation about what that function does, and leads people to believe that it turns off their round-robin samples for a certain velocity. In my opinion, the default "Alternate Samples" option does more harm than good, since should even if you somehow get lucky enough to track a midi part perfectly, on playback it'll be completely different (which can be a good or bad thing) and some sour notes might pop up because of the dumb velocity randomizing.

You can see the randomization happening in action if you go to the map window, click on any kitpiece, and send a fixed velocity to trigger the kitpiece (via Aerodrums, the built in dynamic velocity pad on the kitpiece selection, and ect.). You'll see the velocity registered to that kitpiece jumping wildly despite it being fed a static one, and the fixed velocity being fed if "NoAlts" is enabled. With "NoAlts" enabled, you won't have to worry about any "machine-gun" effect by playing live MIDI, since I doubt you'll ever consistently hit the same velocity twice. Addictive Drums also gets a lot of milage out of the modest samples it actually has (why the file sizes are so small despite being fully multisampled,) because it does some internal processing on the samples in between velocity switches to make every single velocity value sound completely different from each other.

I was having the same problem you were having, and was at my wit's end trying to figure out why I had to play multiple roulette games to get any proper drum mixdown I wanted without notes that were too loud or too soft, so I wound up spending a very long time running tests and documenting the way Addictive Drums works inside and out hahaha.

slavedave
Posts: 40
Joined: Thu Jan 08, 2015 1:16 pm

Re: Solution to a GUI problem

Post by slavedave » Thu Oct 13, 2016 9:04 am

Wow! Thanks so much for that reply. Really interesting stuff. I will try that next time I fire up my kit. I had played with the velocity curve of each kit piece in the map page but I wasn't aware of the randomisation that you addressed. Thanks again.

Post Reply