Non-creamware SHARCS

kensuguro · Post by **kensuguro** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 4:51 am

I was looking around for real-time DSP solutions on the line of csound and I found this:

http://www.analog.com/productSelection/ ... sound.html

It's called extended csound and it's a version of csound rewritten for SHARC DSPs. And why won't they release this for Pulsar... aarrgh!!

Check out what it does:
All standard types of synthesis
(
Additive

Subtractive

Wavetable

Waveguide

Waveshaping

Physical Modeling

Phase vocoder

Granular

FOF

LPC
)

Multi-mode filtering

Special effects: reverbs, choruses, flangers, echo and delay, etc.

Phase vocoder: time-scaling, pitch-shifting, etc.

Linear predictive coding (LPC): re-synthesis and cross synthesis under real-time MIDI control

Unlimited virtual effects buses

Vocal harmonization: 2 - 4 voices, pitch-correction

High-quality pitch-tracking and pitch-to-MIDI conversion

Real-time waveform and spectral displays

Noise Gates

Compressor/limiter and de-esser

EQ

Some we can do with pulsar.. some we don't have the software to do.. I just wonder if the SHARC they're talking about is the same ones we have. But it goes to prove that these things are quite possible.

Only, it seems like the product's out of production.

[ This Message was edited by: kensuguro on 2002-03-11 04:54 ]

marcuspocus · Post by **marcuspocus** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 5:18 am

It's sure very interresting! To bad we don't have this on Pulsar...

dxl · Post by **dxl** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 7:47 am

becasue pulsar is old technologo.........
face it people
4 years is a big gap
and it must be using faster DSPs than UAD-1/TCpowercore because DSPs are cheap....

_________________
I'm still seeing new things in life.
<a href="http://mp3.com/dxl">www.mp3.com/dxl</a>

[ This Message was edited by: dxl on 2002-03-11 07:48 ]

Neutron · Post by **Neutron** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 8:22 am

so what? it is a musical instrument. guitars are pretty old technology as well. so are analog synths.

if you do not like it sell it and buy an rme hammerfall or something and GO TO THEIR FORUM.

kensuguro · Post by **kensuguro** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 8:26 am

I'm just wondering because if all the code was written in SHARC assembly, then it could run on a pulsar, I think. But it's highly possible that they're using a much powerful SHARC chip, as they probably do have a wide range of DSP products.

I wrote the guy who made the extended csound package. Let ya all know if he replies. (he's no longer with the company that's selling the package)

But whatever chip it is, I'd DIE to have csound in hardware. Anyone know what model of SHARC chip Pulsar uses?

kensuguro · Post by **kensuguro** » Mon Mar 11, 2002 8:43 am

Just got reply from the guy. He says it won't run on Pulsar because the board doesn't have enough onboard memory to hold the program. Oh well.

at0m · Post by **at0m** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 1:58 am

A friend of mine has DSP programming courses, he does it at university. They put DSP's on pci boards and write effects for them. Last time I saw him, the I/O was a .wav on disk, so he didn't do real time processing. They are using the same DSP's as Creamware.
Maybe in the meanwhile he's already learned more I/O (analog, ADAT, SPDIF,...), I hope to see him soon...

snoopy4ever · Post by **snoopy4ever** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 8:20 am

The Creamware DSP are the Analog Devices ADSP 21065L, and theres is only another family of DSP's that is better the Tiger Sharc DSP family, which is oriented to the telco market, but also can execute standard DSP applications. It runs at 250Mhz, compare that to the 60MHz of the 21065L. Who knows what's going to come next

marcuspocus · Post by **marcuspocus** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 9:58 am

And i also read that this TigerSharc is backward compatible with ours. Meens DSP code already done for our Sharc is already running AS-IS one those Tiger Sharc!

borg · Post by **borg** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 10:25 am

sorry to but in with you tech guys, but what's the reason creamware still uses them old ones, then? suppose they would make the next generation boards with these sharcs, would that mean more voices/devices, or just faster calculations, maybe more accurate?

Post by **garyb** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 10:37 am

who's gonna do the hot rod upgrades?

snoopy4ever · Post by **snoopy4ever** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 10:41 am

the TigerSHARC family is a recent thing, actually it's available today but the evaluation board will only be available on the second quarter of this year.

http://products.analog.com/products/inf ... SP-TS101-S

[ This Message was edited by: snoopy4ever on 2002-03-12 10:42 ]

subhuman · Post by **subhuman** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 10:56 am

borg, in addition to what snoopy said, I have a feeling that mixing boards with different speed SHARCs in one computer could be an issue - I believe with ProTools systems when a change like that is made, you have to buy all new hardware. Try not to get too caught up in the techspecs here, many high end devices including Sony Oxford's highend (~$20,000) mixing desks, uses SHARCs. http://www.sospubs.co.uk/sos/jul00/articles/sonydmx.htm

If you check the pics, the plugins would sure look REALLY NICE running on a Creamware platform don't you think?

Drum-Maker · Post by **Drum-Maker** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 5:22 pm

Hi all

Anybody knows if Creamware is interested to make a 64 bit PCI audio board??
Because I see this socket in the new motherboard of Asus that will be the standard near in the future ...

And maybe will be possible to fit those new SHARC 250 Mhz... up to 8.!!!

Regards

[ This Message was edited by: Drum-Maker on 2002-03-12 17:24 ]

dblbass · Post by **dblbass** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 6:33 pm

I would think some nextgen CW product will absolutely have to move to Tiger SHARCS sometime in the not-too-distant future (much more likely than switching to another platform). If they don't they will lose too much ground in the price/performance race.

Right now, Pulsar's (and Scope's, though I don't own one) very rich and powerful software bundle and a well-conceived overall concept more than adequately compensate for the fact that CW boards are gradually losing ground in price/competitiveness on a pure MIPS per dollar basis, when compared with either add-on DSP or CPU-host-based approaches.

Like me, although almost everyone here at PlanetZ still sees great value, even brilliance, in the overall Pulsar package(except of course our dear friend dxl

), but remember, the competition never rests. I would think CW will eventually need to upgrade or risk dying.

That said, I suspect we'll not hear anything from CW until a major hardware upgrade is pretty damn close to release. Its almost a cardinal rule in tech businesses, with the rapid advances in product specs, that if your customer base gets wind of a major improvement too early, sales of the old platform fall off sharply. Pretty soon there's not enough cash coming in the door to pay the bills through the last few months before the new stuff is ready to ship, product roll-outs start to slip behind schedule, and a dangerous spiral ensues. So the smart players try to keep quiet about major tech improvements for as long as they can. Of course the corollary is that the poor sods who buy just before the new stuff ships feel they've been screwed. Cruel reality.

But, back to the kickoff topic of this thread.

WOW!!! Csound on Pulsar !!!! To die for!! Though honestly, even if nextgen pulsar has more on-board RAM, I doubt they'd really go for this software, cause I think porting it into the Pulsar GIU environment would still be a massive job, even though its written in SHARC assembly. I just think CW's whole device model is too married to the Scope development toolkit to make such a radical switch. (Though wouldn't it be nice to be proved wrong.)

enjoy

Valium · Post by **Valium** » Tue Mar 12, 2002 6:44 pm

Hi all,

well if that's going to happen (next hardware update) I sure hope that it will be backwards compatibel like first gen en second gen cards are right now. Otherwise I might be forced to sell my Luna II and my Pulsar I to by a brand new model Pulsar III?
But I think that won't be a problem since they kept that in mind during first hardware upgrade too. What do you guys think about that?

Greetz

Post by **garyb** » Wed Mar 13, 2002 12:04 am

you know that we hope you're right,valium.

King of Snake · Post by **King of Snake** » Wed Mar 13, 2002 1:11 am

I'm pretty confident CW realises all this as much as we do and they probably will move up to Tigersharks for the Pulsar 3 (or whatever it's going to be called). Right now they are of course very busey with the new software so I guess that when this is over they can start thinking about upgrading the hardware.