Hey Cool7s_Dad, Dave_at_Nemesys, Others (Configuration Question for GigaStudio)

[jb3]

Greetings all,

1st of all Cool7s_dad, sounds like you are from Dallas from the sound of some of your messages. If so, we are in the same neck of the woods!!!! Okay, here is my delima. I need to upgrade to GigaStudio. Reluctant to install just yet because of my current system. Could you guys look at my configuration and also read how I plan on doing things, and then tell me if I could get away with the proposed upgrades to keep my single PC system? Thanks in advance. Let\'s begin.

I currently have the following system setup
for my Gigasampler.

Processor: PII 300MHz MMX
RAM: 320MB RAM
Hard Drive: Maxtor 12.0G(10.7 Gig Ultra DMA
(after formatted)
Soundcrd1: Darla24 (8 outputs used only)
Soundcrd2: Soundblaster PCI512

Hard Disk
Recorder: Roland VS-1680 HD

Mixer: Tascam TM-D1000 Digital Mixer
Controller: Yamaha PSR-520(looking at QS7.1)
Midi I/F: Midiman Portman 4x4/S parallel
Drum Machine: Boss DR-5 Dr. Rhythm
FX: Alesis MidiVerb 4
Mic Preamp: ART TUBE MP
Sequencer: PowerTracks Pro Audio

Currently I am having very few problems running the full 64 voices of Gigasampler. Every once in a awhile the notes slow down (This is probably due to the fact that I have one hard drive in which sequencer, Gigasampler, Giga instruments, and Windows 98 1st edition run on). Have to defrag often.

Well anyway, I wanted Gigastudio mainly for the ability to pull in Soundfonts, since I have over 1 Gig worth of these instruments.
As far as real-time effects, my external TM-D1000 has effects inside of it, my VS-1680 has an FX card also, and finally, my MidiVerb 4 FX processor will be in the loop. So I really wouldn\'t be using the GigaStudio FX. I want to have them flat as possible to have more outside control over adding FX

Also, in Gigasampler I only use 16 instruments at most, since my Darla24 only limits me to 8 analog outputs. I generally map channel 1 on Gigasamplet to track 1 of sequencer, to analog input1 of the Tascam TM-D1000 and so on. So I don\'t think I would be going for the 160 voices.

I had planned to do no audio recording on my PC since my VS-1680 HD takes care of this. I would generally, do a composition via sequencer, where Gigasampler instruments route out throught Darla24 into the TM-D1000, and all other external midi instruments send their output to the TM-D1000 or VS-1680 directly. Finally, the TM-D1000 (sub-mixer in this config) digital output is sent to the VS-1680 for mastering and CD-burning demos. Once I have captured my sequenced audio output on the VS-1680, I plan to then overdub voice/vocals directly to the VS-1680 via dedicated Mic inputs and track assignments.

Now for my idea of expansion. Tell me if I am off base considering how I am using the PC. Since I would use the PC to run sequencer and GigaStudio. I figure, I need to add an addition HD to my PC for dedicated GigaStudio instruments only. I figure 20 Gig drive (no partition) would suffice. I assume that by doing this, with the ram that I already have, I probably could get more voices on top of the 64 that I can already achieve. Don\'t really care for getting full 160 voices. I already have a CD-RW for backing up my existing overflowing library of giga instruments. Now I would be able to let GigaStudio access the giga instruments with no memory contention for anything else.

The fact that I have 320MB ram should hold me out. So I wouldn\'t upgrade here.

As far as the processor (PII 300 MMX), it sounds like it passes the minimum requirements for the GigaStudio (PII -266).
I could upgrade, thereotically since my motherboard is the Intel i440LX AGPset chipset that supports Dual Pentium II 233-533 MHz CPUs at Slot1 X 2. I would have to get an upgradable I/O APCI module to operate the Dual Pentiums. The problem here is that I can only add another PII-300 MMX processor.
Can\'t uprgrade processors to PIII\'s due to the limited bus speed architecture of my motherboard.

Well, if you guys don\'t shoot holes through my proposal of just getting an additional HD for dedicated giga instruments, then this would free me up to get the Alesis QS7.1 synth/controller, and additional Tascam TM-D100 accessories. Keep in mind that I plan to record all final audio down to my external VS-1680. Oh yeah, if I needed to do some audio editing after things have been recorded on VS-1680 such that I pull them back into the PC, this would be done when Gigasampler is not running. Is this realistic guys? Thanks in advance.

[Chadwick]

Hey jb3
According to Dave and Jim from Nemesys, the Gigastudio will perform very similarly to the Gigasampler if you make the same demands with the same PC. In other words, if you were getting around 64 voices, you should still get around 64.
Since you don\'t need the built in FX or extra polyphony I can\'t see that you\'ll be making heavier demands on GSt than you did on GS.
Your big improvement will be from the extra drive - I\'m guessing you won\'t experience the sluggishness you currently get as you start to stress GS\' polyphony.
But I\'m not running GSt like Tim or the others (still waiting for UPS)- so I\'m not practically experienced. I\'m just regurgitating what I\'ve read so far.

[Cool7s_Dad]

Hi John:

I\'m sorry I can\'t be of more help, but I only have experience with my configuration. As Chadwick says, though, what you say sounds very reasonable. But for me, polyphony is like a drug... I just can\'t get enough. I have one fairly simple piano sonata that peaks out at 80 voices... that\'s just solo piano, nothing else. It\'s also going to be very tempting for you to use the FX with GSt. It\'s one of the best parts. And the routing is incredibly powerful.

Just remember that no matter what Nemesys, or I, or anyone else says, your experience will be your own. One of the very daunting tasks that the engineers at Nemesys face is producing a piece of software that functions across a practically infinite variety of configurations. I know I\'ve been hard on them, but considering the obstacles, they\'ve done a very nice job. But there remains a tremendous amount of uncertainty.

In my configuration, GSt does quite a bit more than GS did. I always got 64 notes of polyphony. But now, with GSt I\'m getting 140+ (I might get all 160 but I haven\'t tried it yet) with three distinct FX running... so I had some latent power that GS wasn\'t utilizing (I\'m running a PIII 700, 512MB RAM, with Ultra SCSI 160). At times my CPU is running at 34%, so I could probably add yet more voices and FX.

A lot of this depends on the types of instruments you use also. Since I\'m using some large piano samples, the AO library, and some other hefty samples, I\'m doing a heckuva lot of disk I/O. But if you use a lot of SoundFonts, you won\'t have as much of that since they are much smaller and can probably be kept entirely in RAM (although I\'m not sure GSt will do that even with small samples).

Nope... GigaStudio is not for the squeamish. There\'s a lot of (expensive) trial and error involved. But I think you\'re on the right track.

HTH,
Tim
http://www.elithic.com (\"http://www.elithic.com\")