Win7 x64 and scope luna

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Kullervo
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Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Kullervo »

Hello gentlemen,

this has probably been asked many times already, but I'm not sure if I found the definitive answer by searching :

is there any way to use my scope (3DSP) card in Win 7 x64 without upgrading to 5.1 ?

I'm moving to a new system (64 bit), I only have a 3 DSP card, so I have no intention to buy the 159 eur (!?) upgrade.

My question is : is there a way to use the card with asio4all or some other driver, just using audio in & out, leaving aside the scope platform / mixer ?
I got the impression the answer is no, but before ditching the card, I just wanted to be sure.

Thanks for your input, sorry if this is a topic that's been rehashed too much already (?)
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astroman
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by astroman »

in fact the answer is NO
simple reason: the card has no fixed routing, the DSPs MUST be initialized and loaded with the proper instructions.
(which is what the Scope software does)
if 64bit is a must, sell the card ;)

cheers, Tom
Kullervo
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Kullervo »

astroman wrote:in fact the answer is NO
simple reason: the card has no fixed routing, the DSPs MUST be initialized and loaded with the proper instructions.
(which is what the Scope software does)
if 64bit is a must, sell the card ;)

cheers, Tom
Thx for your answer.

Sell the card ? You mean it's worth something ? :D
I planned to give it away on KvR, taker pays postage, if anyone can be bothered :lol:

64bit is worth it to me for the RAM, even though I still use Cubase32 (with jbridge)
Paying 159 eur to have audio in / out is not worth it otoh (to me, since I can do without the scope mixer, and won't use the plugins)
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astroman
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by astroman »

well, that's the way it goes - everyone's different.
I could do without the the RAM for sure ... ;)
to be honest:
A software which 'needs' more than 1 GB to work properly, is most likely written in some crappy way.
64-bit consumer OS is the biggest hoax in IT ever...
(with few exception like rendering huge graphics or cutting Hollywood movies)
other than that it's just a cash cow (imo) :D

cheers, Tom
Kullervo
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Kullervo »

astroman wrote: A software which 'needs' more than 1 GB to work properly, is most likely written in some crappy way.
64-bit consumer OS is the biggest hoax in IT ever...
(with few exception like rendering huge graphics or cutting Hollywood movies)
add to that large sample libraries in Kontakt & stuff like Omnisphere, and you have the reason why people are migrating to x64
(even though, as I said, I still use cubase32. Before going 64, cubase became instable long before memory usage reached 3 gigs ; with jbridge & x64 OS, those days are over)
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garyb
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by garyb »

i think people have stuff loaded into memory that doesn't need to be, and would work better if not. geez! commit to audio at some point! :lol:
Eanna
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Eanna »

That's a general point - with so much in Scope, I have yet to get near requiring >3GB in a project. Between Scope, outboard, a handful of well-designed VST effects and instruments, quite a modern PC, occasional rendering to audio, and no unnecessary overcomplication of projects, I'm breathing easy in my Win7 32-bit setup.

All migrations to larger address spaces in Operating Systems are met with a "what would you need that for?". I've lived thru a few of them in my programming life. And I agree that when software is well-coded in a lower-level language (closer to the hardware), there is alot you can do with efficient memory management. Some computers and lots of classic and very responsive and bug-free synths ran happily in 4-8k of RAM (12/13-bit address space). And the old adage of "NASA sent folk to the moon on pissy computer power"... Even Hollywood managed to render films like Toy Story, probably on an expensive processor farm at the time.

What these larger address spaces allow is for bloated software. That sounds like a bad thing? It isn't really! It's just a different set of requirements - there's no need to shackle yourself concerning your efforts with the demands for efficiencies that that make an software implementation difficult to program, debug, change, and extend. Instead, programs are easier to implement, the language is higher-level (more readable, closer to the domain - in this case, audio), and you get to write more complex stuff in less time. Modern software houses like Audio Damage and those developers under Brainworx/Plugin Alliance produce lots of software with meagre staffing requirements. Gets us, the end user, a quality product that represents excellent value for money...

Inefficiencies are always a bad thing, but bloat is a function of expressive progress and computing power.

Audio is different. It's a single-user system. It really shouldn't require lots of memory! The kind of memory available in a 64-bit OS.

Re. your 3DSP: I agree with Astroman, I do think you'll find folk who'll snap your hand off at the prospect of getting a Scope card for little-to-nothing. Some folk don't have lots of cash to spend. If nothing else, it brings a bit of life to an old jaded PC.
Last edited by Eanna on Sun Dec 02, 2012 5:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Not because it is easy, but because it is hard...
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garyb
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by garyb »

sure! i'm not against anything! :lol:
Eanna
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Eanna »

Sorry garyb, my post wasn't addressed at your response. I'm not that fast at typing! :-)

It was more about the whole 64-bit business...
Not because it is easy, but because it is hard...
hubird

Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by hubird »

garyb wrote:sure! i'm not against anything! :lol:
don't believe... :D
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garyb
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by garyb »

...referred to in this thread.
Kullervo
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Kullervo »

Hey, don't assume lots of ram is only for bloat and stupid people :lol:

Seriously, can you do decent orchetsral stuff with STS ?
These days, with the big orchestral libraries, it's starting to sound pretty good.
Take this example

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWPqJ89nVfI&t=14s

Having the full template loaded without having to keyswitch all the time is worth something, no ?

(8 Gig of ram being much cheaper than the 5.1 upgrade for a meager 3 DSP card :D )
Eanna
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Re: Win7 x64 and scope luna

Post by Eanna »

Not at all! If what music you're producing means your requirements for large memory capability is important, then go for it, get the most out of your hardware by installing an operating system that supports the capabilities of the hardware. I endorse that! Keeps folk like me in gainful employment after all!

Like I say, bloat isn't a bad thing - as always, it's a signifier of progress, with the aim of getting the computer to produce better results, be that for audio, video, gaming, business, science, ...
And, you know, it's a good thing that others are 'early adopters' that help to iron out the bugs for stubborn old types like myself... ;-)

Me, I don't do the large sampler thing - I'm not nearly good enough at orchestration for it to make any tuneful sense! :-)

You don't have a prayer to get Scope to use a big Sample Library, afaik. It's a different kind of technology - addressing Memory from the PCI Cards is not what you want to be doing with near-real-time subsystems - moving large blocks of memory on the (slow) PCI bus is far too expensive a consideration if you want to maintain Scope's low latencies, and Scope does not in itself host a large addressable memory cache, so the bus would just be too busy too often...
Not because it is easy, but because it is hard...
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