Stereo Tool

I see 0.5 -0.6% cpu load increase according to it`s red bars, compared to beta20 . This is both betas with "Ignore freqs above" enabled!!

May be this is the reason somebody with "some old computers" to see problems in sound due to buffer empty or something like CPU not handle the whole power asked from ST ?
This is only a guess.

Glad that cornyman has experienced a similar issue.
Still been hearing the odd click here and there - I don't think this is a CPU load issue though - usage is reasonable on my test pc (ST reports around 40%).
Still waiting to see if I can reproduce the (repeated) clicking I heard yesterday...

Edit: my test pc is a i3-2130, so not that old!

40% but look at the "per core" load . If you have one of the cores at 100% it`s 100% sure that you will hear sound issues.
I repeat this is a guess and only want to help to ignore "third party" conditions.

Load just ST on test machine and see. No other loaded software.
ALSO and IMPORTANT - if you have any Antivirus software - DISABLE IT when you make tests!
Some optimizations make the antivirus software to "see" it as problem and to try to make it stop or something like that.

I have no idea (yet) what can be causing this, also Bojcha reported an exception that in his case didn't affect the audio but looking at the code what he reported should not be possible at all. Which probably means that something else is going wrong somewhere which might have all kinds of effects... I'm still looking...

By the way, did you also test version 020? Or any older one? It would help to know when it started...

I just received a report from someone else who reported "small jitters" in the audio in 017, after running it for 2 days. So, it might have been there a while already.

Any old betas can make it because of lot of bugs - slope unwanted signal issues, spikes and noise floor jumpings that are now fixed.
So ask him to update to beta21 and then for 2 days to test if he can hear them again! This is the right thing he can do , right ?

Hans, some suggestion : You said someone reported that synchronization not work, right ? Is there any chance this last issue with clicksto be related with this? And is it reported from same person ?
i`m sorry i cant help here because i don`t know what they mean by clicks, or jitters. I can`t hear any problem with sound right now
unless someone with this issue can record it , so i can hear it and know what is it . Then i can say if this is presented on my side.

And just for everybody info . If you use any SDR software like SDR# (or SDR sharp) to view the MPX "picture" , you must know that if you run this software , it causes ST to show increased CPU load ( but this is only showed on "red bars" , NO REAL CPU increase of load), and causes sometimes sound spikes ( or clicks or jitters if you call it that way) on ST sound.

That`s why i tell all person NOT load any other software during tests.In other words - don`t use other software that uses the sound card/cards (if you have more than one).

I`m reporting that i receive this exeption when i try to RESET ST ( factory reset)

Occurs every time when i load my preset and then make a "Factory reset" !

Ok reproduced it here! Thanks.

Edit: This is the exact same bug that Bojcha reported, but with address 0 instead of ffffffffffffffff. I didn't understand 0, but ffffffffffffffff makes perfect sense. Now I'm wondering if some CPU's might report 0 instead of ffffffffffffffff in case of an SSE unaligned read/write.

Btw, this still shouldn't happen, but at least now I know what to look for.

Are you using 'Synchronize to output' in the input sound card settings? Or 'FM Transmitter synchronization'?

WOW, strange !
You know that i was told everyone that "AMD sees them all" , but now it looks that even that "Amd sees them right" (not wrong).
This is in case Bojcha has an Intel too

Stereo Tool 7.71 BETA022

Windows 32 bit:
Windows stand alone: http://www.stereotool.com/download/ster ... 71-022.exe
Winamp DSP: http://www.stereotool.com/download/dsp_ ... 71-022.exe
Windows 32 bit VST: http://www.stereotool.com/download/vst_ ... 71-022.dll

I've fixed the exception reported by DJ_DOGGY. I don't know if this also solves the audio problems that several people have reported now (probably not! But it's not impossible that it did.).

(Repeated) Note: Big memory usage reduction (78 MB!). Might cause problems (although I haven't seen any yet).

CHANGES:
- Exception reported by DJ_DOGGY fixed.

OLD CHANGES:
- Make OldSamples buffers (and potentially others) dynamic to save memory - Currently allocating 85 MB just to display waveforms!!!
- Optimize memory usage: Don't allocate more than MAX_SAMPLES_ST for blocks which only get downsampled audio. So only allocate a few things bigger.
- Change tone generation FM enable/disable and order.
- VST multiple instances fails - Tested and works fine. Ignoring unless I'm receiving a better report. Note: 32 bit too many instances can crash due to the 2 GB limit. Max number is now 3, used to be 6 so some optimization could be useful.
- Make VST window bigger
- Fixed Quality slider bug introduced in previous beta
- Fixed jumping pilot and RDS effect on some 'Ignore frequencies above' frequencies.
- Sometimes the top and bottom waveforms run at different speeds when Ignore Frequencies Above is enabled.
- Make Chain block (small size) based - Partially done
- Declipper display is broken. Even without Ignore Frequencies Above. Ok upto 100 ms. Also broken in 7.70!!! Only if samplerate > 48 kHz, and when switching between sizes, upto 100 ms everything is fine (even if no audio is playing so no refresh of the data occurs), so the bug is in the displaying code. -> Was a shift error, fixed.
- Turning "Bandpass" Highpass filter OFF doesn't really turn it off (!)
- Again, fixed noise level jumps and spike at Ignore Frequencies Above frequency.
- Clipper issues Leif / Wolf Stahl (probably the same thing) - Should be fixed now. - Waiting for reply Wolf- Check new clipper highs
- Remove "Take some shortcuts" under CPU, probably broken! And has not much effect anyway. -> Hm, no, must have been in use for the tests. Ugh... TEST to check what is better: ON (which will probably allow more sounds through) or OFF. -> Actually it does seem to work AND allow more highs through, but I don't know if that's a good thing - more tests needed!
- Added lowpass filter after clipper in non-composite mode.
- Another bug in latest beta - ST doesn't remember FM settings - presets from the fm list start up with stereo and rds encoding off
- Fix MPX display sample rate issue
- Fix Stokkemask in Leif's mode with Quality < 3
- Fixed problem with click sounds (reported by DJ_DOGGY). Reduced output level by 1% - you can safely increase modulation by 1% if you're using an output that's affected by this (should only be FM signal inside a plugin). If you're using the stand alone version, make sure to set the output level to the sound card no higher than 99% (-0.1 dB).
- Fix downsampling and Quality slider problems: Lower Quality setting
- Attempt to reduce effect on volume of using Leif's clipping method.
- Fix DJ Doggy's reported errors (19 kHz, junk around tones).
- Ignore frequencies above a specific frequency -> Should lower TOTAL CPU load by another 10-20% (now fully implemented except at lower Quality settings)
- Fixed the lowpass bug that was introduced in 009. Although it has probably always been there! As a side effect, the output is also slightly louder (about 0.02 dB) with no negative effects.
- Fixed distortion introduced in 009/010. Extra highs are still there though! See new 'Sparkling highs' section under Advanced Clipper -> Sound
- Fix optimizations
- Fix code #warnings
- Improved highs filtering in Clipper (both Composite and Normal); sound has more brilliance and suffers much less from ducking on loud sounds.
- Fix bug: NAN's can occur at certain input sample rates (40960 Hz among others)
- Fixed downsampling/resampling issues.
- Made several changes to the Clipper that affect the sound! Sound should now be more open en brighter (but it might have more distortion in some cases, I hope not though).
- CPU: Added 'Ignore high frequencies above'.
- Big Composite Clipper CPU load improvement: Added a new slider ('Oversampling Quality' or something like that); CPU load reduction is HUGE and effect on peak control (for values above 4) seems very small.
- Solved a number of warnings that I added in the last few days
- Some small optimizations
- New Highs Gap Protection improved, now similar in behavior to the old one. I had to add 1 extra step (slightly higher CPU load).
- Fixed problems in 771-004. Some optimizations are disabled - I need to fix that.
- Fix CPU measurement for high loads (jumps to 95% for unknown reason). -> Showing real average instead of median now. Median in dark red.
- Difference in measured CPU load is bigger than expected after CPU load measurement update - check why - DONE, is indeed big! Separate slider added to show both processing and total CPU usage.
- CPU: Clipper: Reduced default number of Bass Clipper steps from 4 to 1
- CPU: Clipper: Implemented Leif's mirrorring method for Stokkemask and optimized steps using Omnia interface, much fewer steps for same result.
- Added option to add a text in the title bar to easily recognize multiple instances.
- EXCEPTION OCCURRED IN HttpServer: Got unknown widget ID.
- CPU: Clipper: Highs gap protection: Use 1 step for non-FM.
- Check if COMMON_STATIC still improves performance, if not remove it -> Does not, removed.
- Redesigned parameter classes and moved everything around for integration with other products.
- Remove Stokkemask mode for non-composite FM clipper (it's probably not working correctly and more heavy than the composite clipper)
- Fixed small bug in Composite clipper FM overhead level compensation calculation. Might make the same setting very marginally louder (less than 0.05 dB)
- Fix crash reported in previous post
- Improved CPU load measurement (small part of code wasn't included, it is now).
- CPU: Composite clipper: Optimize Stokkemask: Skipping outer parts of window
- CPU: Composite clipper: Optimize Stokkemask: Fixed 'Skip smoothing' mode to be compliant, all other modes removed.
- CPU: Composite clipper: Optimize Highs Gap Protection (trick from Leif Claesson that he uses in the Omnia.9 - nearly no CPU load needed anymore!)
- CPU: Added some #pragma's to make compiler generate more efficient code
- RDS: Added some character conversions (Euro -> E, ` -> '). (not yet tested)
- GUI: Allow drawing scopes in half-height to have more headroom above and below.

TO DO 7.71:
- Synchronization is broken in 008 (was ok in 007) - Don't see it! Is anyone still seeing this?
- Reduce memory usage further (check all MAX_SAMPLES_44K arrays including SS and multi_samples)
- Fix Mac VST version (not recognized apparently)
- Fix Linux version (someone mentioned that it crashes after a few minutes, on Ubuntu 14.04)
- Add delay (in samples) for one of the two MPX channels to send audio to allow synchronization of 2 transmitters which use the same frequency. (John Markis)

TO DO 7.72:
- Add impulse response import function!!!
- GUI integration for Multiband?
- Instability in compressor behavior [WesKeene, Bojcha]

TODO:
- Noise learning Micha
- Change default preset (it still uses Classic compressor etc!)
- EQ with 'standard' sliders.
- Make BS412-like graph for levels
- Add 'warm' noise before clipper (requested by Andrew Palmquist, might help with PPM as well)
- CPU: Clipper: Optimize Advanced Bass Distortion Protection