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Just starting out

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timhowarduk

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Just starting out

PostMon Jan 11, 2010 6:26 pm

Hello all, first post.

I have two possible long term Hauptwerk projects, the first is as a simple practise organ for home. The 2nd is using a Johannus Opus 5 console at one of my churches to drive Hauptwerk as myself and the other organist are not too wild about it's two sample sets.

At the moment I'm messing around with the free edition on a macbook (2.1Ghz dual core, 2Gb ram) using a cheap midi interface and the inbuilt audio, and trying out the free sample sets. I'm prepared to buy the Advanced edition as soon as I am happy (or happier) with the sound. The two things I'm keen to improve are latency and broadness of sound (in terms of frequency spectrum)

At home I've tried connected into the audio input on my Kawai digital piano, and the sound is pretty good down to 8ft, the 16ft aren't too great and only prominent 16ft stops (e.g. trombone on St Annes) are really audible. For practise purposes I could live with this.

At church I've tried connected into the audio inputs on the Johannus (it has no external speakers just console speakers) but this seems to have no top end to the sound, I suspect the input only goes to one speaker internally. I've also tried the PA system and a fairly nice DIY amp with varying results, but so far nothing I'd be happy to play in front of others. So clearly I need to get in some higher quality hardware.

I'm trying to work out the order to spend money. After reading the forums, my thinking is the following:

1) ECHO Audiofire to improve midi latency and allow multiple outputs
2) Set of Mackie MR5's for church
3) Sub woofer, not considered which yet.

Does anyone have an opinion as to whether latency issues are most likely down to the cheap midi usb interface I'm using or the spec of the mac, or both!? The St Annes Moseley organ seems much snappier than the Prudhoe Methodist Organ and I wouldn't have thought the latter is using more ram. I've got no other evidence that the macbook isn't coping, no sound break-up or distortion.

I also wondered what the least complicated speaker setup anyway has happily used in a small church? Is adding a subwoofer pretty much mandatory to achieve reasonable 16ft results? Am I mad to hope that a pair of monitors would be good enough for the moment?!

It seems quite a big brave step to starting putting money behind this dream so any positive experiences welcomed! I'm particularly interested if anyone is using Hauptwerk in a small church with a fairly minimal setup.

I'll stop waffling now, thanks for any comments.

Tim

PS the demos of the St Georges Casavant organ have just blown me away while typing this, WOW.
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polikimre

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Re: Just starting out

PostMon Jan 11, 2010 6:38 pm

The latency is most probably due to the onboard audio interface, upgrading to the ECHO should cure that. You test whether MIDI latency is a problem using a MIDI monitor software. You can also try to reduce the buffer size under General settings/Audio, but this may introduce cracks if you go too far.
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timhowarduk

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Re: Just starting out

PostMon Jan 11, 2010 6:44 pm

Thanks for the reply, I'll get the Echo and keep experimenting.
Tim
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howeks

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Re: Just starting out

PostWed Jan 13, 2010 10:50 am

I agree that your latency is most likely caused by the soundcard. Changing to the Echo should eliminate that. I've used several different midi adapters including one very cheap one and have never had latency problems caused by them.

I recommend looking at the St. George's Casavant sample set for church use. It has a sufficiently complete registration for any service playing. At home, I practice on it more than any other set I have.

The Mackie MR5 is probably too small to use without a subwoofer. For 16' stops you need a speaker that goes down to about 30Hz. In addition, as good as Mackies are, the small speakers will probably have trouble filling a sanctuary without distorting. Some people have had good luck with the Behringer 2031a which is a larger and more powerful. I use those on my home setup (without a subwoofer), but have no experience using them in a sanctuary yet. Regardless, for church use on a small budget, I'd still recommend adding a subwoofer to 2 monitor speakers as a bare minimum setup.
Regards,
Kirk
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timhowarduk

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Re: Just starting out

PostWed Jan 13, 2010 11:49 am

Thank you for the very useful information. I certainly don't want to spend money on gear that is inadequate, though I guess I could always find a use for two MR 5's at home.

It may help other potential posters to know that the church I am talking about has a very small nave which seats about 80 and an extension to one side which seats an extra 70. Compared to most UK churches it is tiny!

I should probably ask this in the amplification section (are free edition users allowed to post there!?) but any recommendations for sub woofers?

thanks
Tim
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organtechnology

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Re: Just starting out

PostSat Jan 16, 2010 2:08 pm

Let me preface this by saying theat I am not a Mac user but if I remember correctly the Mac onboard audio is pretty good and should not be causing latency issues. The MIDI unit latency should be minimal on slowly played notes. The jam up will come as you play rapidly and the MIDI buffer can not get the data through fast enough.

The latency from key press to sound (is this the issue you describe?) is pretty much controlled in Hauptwerk.
Try this experiment. Go to the General Settings tab | Audio outputs : Buffer size (sample frames) and reduce it to 1024 then to 512 and then to 256 until youstart getting break up. This improves the latency from key press to audio out but it reduces the available poliphony as it does. Also if you are using the free edition your poliphony is only 256 pipes and reverb time wil drastically affect this number.

As for the speakers and room size.

First to get to 8-channel audio without the 'ping', you need the Hauptwerk Advanced Edition key.

Second: Concentrate on a room in your home and fill it with sound first. I think 4 BX5a speakers and a 10 inch powered subwoofer should work for practice cubby to large living room. For a smallish church, I believe something like 8 BX8a or 8 Behringer Truth 2031a will suffice. Use a dry sample set for the church, wetter for the small rooms. Read Chris's description of how he gets the Anloo to sound as he likes and how many sound sources he uses (a lot!). A pipe organ moves a lot of air to make the sounds and to properly reproduce it from samples requires a lot of speaker cones.

The above is of course free advice and your milage may vary.

Pax,

Thomas
Complete Hauptwerk™ systems using real wood consoles, PC Sound Engines, Dante Audio for Home or Church. info (at) organtechnology.com http://www.organtechnology.com
Authorized Hauptwerk; Milan Digital Audio and Lavender Audio reseller.
USA and Canada shipments only.
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timhowarduk

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Re: Just starting out

PostMon Jan 18, 2010 12:19 pm

Thanks for the advice. To update:

1) I installed a midi monitor and found my Kawaii piano is sending thousands of system exclusive messages perpetually. I discovered that turning "local control" off on a menu stopped this happening, and midi throughput improved considerably. I now also realise that my original post was rather early when I was doing all my experiments with one particular sample set with seems to have inherent latency problems (for me anyway). So that issue is resolved now.

2) As I live in a small-ish semi detached house I can't go too mad with speakers at home, so have decided that for now headphones are the cheapest way to a fuller sound. I'm saving for some K701's, in meantime am using cheap K99's which I have to say are not too bad at all for the money.

3) I've ordered the Echo Audiofire 4 anyway, as it has lot's of attractive features which are useful to me (even irrespective of hauptwerk). It will be interesting to compare the onboard audio and the Echo audio. As I can later daisy chain a 2nd unit it will never be a wasted purchase (should I upgrade and want 8 channel audio out)

4) I'm awaiting delivery of a 2nd midi keyboard controller for home, and very excited about being able to practise 2 manual stuff at home!

5) (for techies) I'm doing some experiments with the Arduino Mega micro-controller board http://arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardMega, as it has four serial (so midi) ports and 54 digital IO pins which I'm intending to hook up to pistons, stop switches, and LED's for my home setup. I know I could just buy a touch-screen, but where's the fun in that?! This will probably turn into a separate post once I have it slightly more "presentable"

Finally I can see it makes more sense to build up experience with my home rig before attempting doing anything at church.

Thanks for all the help.
Tim
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jkinkennon

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Re: Just starting out

PostMon Feb 22, 2010 10:17 pm

I just lost a reply I'd written! Yikes, this will teach me not to be fumble fingers on the laptop.

Keep us informed about your progress with the microcontroller, Tim. I've always used someone else's encoder boards, but last week I ordered a PIC18 kit from Microchip plus a couple of modules from MidiBox for the hardware only. In two fun days I've turned out a skeleton application with interrupt driven MIDI ports that are well buffered. At the moment it's just a transparent interface between my console and HW, but it has the hooks to write quick C applications so it should be all downhill from here.

For those with soldering skills but no programming experience the existing MIDIBOX kits are simple to build and quite affordable.

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