Topic: The V-Machine

I ran across this ongoing thread at KVR about the V-Machine, which there was some discussion about here not long ago:

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=227030

May be of interest if people are thinking about using one for PianoTeq. Essentially, according to this thread, the verdict still seems to be out. And more to the point for us, I don't think anyone's tested it with PianoTeq yet.

Re: The V-Machine

1 GHz CPU might prove a bit underpowered for PTQ. Then again, there is no clogging coming from Windows and OS generally, so it might be just enough to squeeze out at least 64 poly for Pianoteq. This is my only hope for that machine. For everything else it seems to do the job what I need in live situation.

Hard work and guts!

Re: The V-Machine

In that same thread today, there's a post from someone getting error messages when trying to load PianoTeq into a V-Machine. The V-Machine developers are responding on the thread. With luck, we may see some discussion of whether or not it's possible.

From what I can gather, there are problems with some vsti's: authorizing a vsti on the V-Machine is one of those problems. The developers are having to contact instrument makers individually to see about creating versions meant just for the V-Machine, in some instances. Another problem, not so major, is that it apparently can't load programs built with Synthedit. 

(I don't own one, and can't justify buying one in the near future, so I don't feel as though I should add to the developers worries by asking questions myself in the thread. )

Re: The V-Machine

Pianoteq has a challenge-response registration scheme, so it's a problem to register a plugin on it that's already been registered on a regular PC/Mac. SM Pro Audio should ask Modartt to make some kind of program (or something) that would make it easier to work out the registration for the V-Machine.

The way I see it - if you have Pianoteq on your PC, you should be able to transfer it to V-Machine with a simple copy-paste, and a registry file of some sort that holds registration info. What is Julien's/Guillaume's opinion on this?

Hard work and guts!

Re: The V-Machine

Seems like a big problem for the V-Machine, similar hardware, and software developers. As more of these hardware players get released, the same problem is going to come up again and again--how many hardware machines can the software developers support, given the time it would take to dev a way to port a vsti over and make sure that the software is still protected?

Maybe a good rack computer, with lots of memory and a fast processor, is still the best solution, as Bruce Richardson used to argue on Northern Sounds.

Re: The V-Machine

There are these, for example:

http://www.directresolution.com/

They start at £499. They don't seem to have a soundcard on board, however. I guess you have to add your own.

And I'm sure that there are several other good systems devoted to audio.

Re: The V-Machine

A powerful 4U ATX is what I have used w/ Scope DSP cards for years now. I always am looking for better solutions, but they all seem to be rackmounted also.
I view the V-Rack and Receptor Pro as an upgrade path for me in the future as opposed to going to a 64bit O.S. prematurely.
Using 4GB's of DDR2-800 on an Intel DP35DP w/ 3 x Scope Pro DSP cards hosted by Bidule and the 3GB PAE Switch has been plenty of stable live power for me. Only when I try and use SISS & VSL together did I see any trouble w/ memory addressing.
Using Modartt allowed me to eliminate a few large instruments, which in turned allowed SISS & VSL to loaded together w/ other K2/GVI based instruments.
But I do not use both live but was happy to see that I could use a Physically Modelled instrument that gave me more free RAM while providing similar sounding libraries.
I do have a new option after a decade of Scope/Giga 4U DAW's with the release of a new Scope 1U DSP rack called XITE-1.
It appears as though I can use this to not only replace the 3 x card 4U DAW, but have 350 % more power.
Having a shock-mounted 4U DAW w/ a Soniccore A16U converter, a 3U Analog Synth, SurgeX 1U, XITE-1 1U, and a Lexicon PCM91 AES/EBU connected 1U, a MIDI Solutions F8 pedal controller, all controlled by a 17" laptop w/ external HDD's via PCI-e eSATA 2 x port card looks to be a very powerful mobile recording/live performance DAW.
I recently went from 28U, to 16U and  by summer '09 might be using a 4U and a laptop.
I will be broke but can go anywhere, anytime, no crew, no having some Union stagehands moving my rig around.....
I have upgraded from the 2GB DDR2-800 w/ the E6850, to the E8600 w/ 4GB's of DDR and while being able to load more VST's, I noticed no difference w/ the faster Core 2 Duo.
The laptop I am looking to build will use the T9600 CPU and will be plenty powerful. I still think a fast Core 2 Duo will work fine for along time instead of the Quads.
Since I use DSP based modulation & mastering effects and hardware reverb the need for all of these Octo Quad Xeons, etc. thankfully isn't necessary. I always disable that stuff except for pedal down IR's which sound better mixed w/ hardware reverb anyway.
Next year I look forward to better developed 32bit apps and a smaller rig.
64bit just doesn't seem necessary when there are so many other ways to enhance an already stable set up.
I hope someday to be able to have a Linux based rig and get rid of the silly debacle that M$ & Apple seem to keep playing.
Just imagine how nice life would be w/ a real O.S. made for audio.
Now I am really dreaming.

Happy New Year.

Hardware Analog, DSP, PhysMod. VSTi Romplers....