Stereo Tool

is it smart to use 128kHz on input...
because it's big difference in cpu usage.. i try it and from ~65% at 176.4kHz (similar is at 192) goes to 45-50%.

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control point
control point2

IF your sound card natively supports it, then it might work fine. Note that all the processing is done at 32 kHz in this case, so frequencies above 16 kHz are unavailable and frequencies nearing 16 kHz may be less reliable.

But you should really check the quality of the sound. And if RDS reception is still working (RDS signal ends at ~ 59.4 kHz, and the sound card should filter out anything above 64 kHz. The two values are relatively close, so if the filter isn't steep enough you might loose some RDS signal).

I think I've catched the newest Beta version (solved AMD problem - "Stereo Tool 4.0" !).

Sound is great.
But the preset selection dialogue is flickering and this way too instable for my eyes (ATI 4850 with Catalyst 8.12, Windows XP Pro SP2).
I have no such flickering with any other application.

If this flickering could not be solved, I would prefer the old version 3.xy preset dialogue window.

I have X1900XT .. and this is not happens for me.

btw. Do you try latest catalysts ? 9.5 i think.
here is the 9.6 http://www.megaupload.com/?d=YCI4WVZ9

And try old catalyst 8.7.
My dead 4870 works best with 8.7 in 2D.

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control point
control point2

Is it flickering while you're moving through it, or always? Flickering while moving through it can indeed occur, but when the mouse isn't moving it shouldn't do that. I might fix this later... The old dialog may not have flickered, but the list of presets was getting way to long...

@ Bojcha

Thanks.
I will try some newer and older Catalysts.
I know that some Catalyst versions works better than others with some graphic cards.
And newer is not always better.
Of course, this is an ATI problem and not a problem of Stereo Tool !

But it seems that all of the preset dialogue windows I know (I started with Stereo Tool 3.30) have more or less flickering problems.
Very small effect with some 3.xy versions (I can live with this).
But with this 4.00 Beta it is really an extraordinary "effect".

I really try hundreds of applications.
But none has any flickering effects.
It is only Stereo Tool.

It seems that in Stereo Tool Beta 4.00 the preset dialogue graphics are constantly rewritten to the screen area.
It makes no difference if I move the mouse or not.
Hans is doing a fantastic work.
The audio quality is really professional
But I think there is room for optimations (the programming) of the preset interface (call it a wider compatibility with different Catalyst versions).
I think we are only a dozen of Beta testers here.
If released without changes, I am sure there will be more (ATI) users with this flickering effect problem.

Tonight while finishing up things I discovered a bug that has some sound quality impact.

Basically, if a loud high frequency (usually an "S" sound) is played on top of loud bass, and Loudness is used, I'm in a lot of trouble... I have to make both the bass and the "S" louder, which isn't really possible. If I lower the loudness, it sounds very unstable and unpleasant, but if I don't the "S" sounds distorted.

I thought I had a fix for this, but in some tracks - especially when using higher Loudness settings - I still heard the bass go down far too much when loud "S" sounds were present.

So I looked into the code, and made some changes... I have found a better formula to estimate the amount of bass loss to loud "S" sounds, which has a number of consequences, some are good and some are bad.
+ Bass is more stable now
+ It turns out that this filter was the main cause of highs distortion - and it caused other forms of distortion as well! Now it's fixed there's far less need for the "clean highs/deep bass" filter, so I've increased the default value of it a bit.
+ The low frequencies are not only more stable, but kick drums which occurred simultaneously with a hi-hat are now better preserved. So they sound more 'punchy'. The low frequency level is also a bit higher now (on average about 0.1-0.2 dB, when loud highs are present up to +1 db compared to the previous version).
- The high frequencies are slightly reduced due to this (about 0.2 dB softer than before). They do seem to sound a bit "softer" (less metallic), which is good.

I did some tests with the FM Europe preset, and I couldn't notice any difference in the highs - I did hear the improved bass response though.

For FM Loud Europe, I do hear that the highs are decreased a bit - but that's probably not an issue because before I actually had a lack of lows. And that has improved - a lot - now.

The good news is that it should now be possible to use slightly higher Loudness values than before to achieve approximately the same quality.


Also, there was a bug in the Low latency setting - it sounded horrible. Now it sounds ok again, and the fix described above seems to have helped a lot for low latency as well.

Winamp DSP plugin: http://www.stereotool.com/download/dsp_ ... _BETA2.exe
Stand alone version: http://www.stereotool.com/download/ster ... _BETA2.exe
Command line: http://www.stereotool.com/download/ster ... _BETA2.exe
VST version: http://www.stereotool.com/download/vst_ ... _BETA2.dll

If nothing else goes wrong, I will FINALLY release this thing tomorrow evening.

It could be that I'm rewriting constantly... I'll check if that's the case, and if so turn it off if there are no changes.

(Damn, that will need to be tested too... So I can't release it tomorrow either.... )

By the way, the old versions just used a Windows pull-down menu... So I really don't understand why THAT would flicker.

Oops, I forgot to upload the BETA2's... But they are online now!

Mitchi: You're right, I am constantly redrawing. Will fix it asap.