Finale 2009, VSL & Virtual Drumline

[melortz]

Hello My VSL is playing back distorted when using Finale 2009 and Tapspace's Virtual Drumline. I am using a 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4GB of Ram iMac with Finale 2009. I have restarted the computer, reloaded the sounds and still having the distortion. I've owned VSL for about a month and never had this problem. All volumes on the mixer are at 0. I am using Virtual Drumline with VSL and have not had any issues until now. Virtual Drumline is playing back fine but VSL is distorted. Any ideas? Thanks. Mark Lortz

[andi]

Hello Mark!

This very much sounds like a performance problem. Can you please describe, if you have changed anything on your system. Maybe your hard drive has not enough free space anymore or is fragemented, so that the streaming doesn't work as it should.

Andi

[melortz]

Hello: Nothing has changed with my system. I have 360GB hard drive and 160GB free. I am a Finale Beta tester and spoke to Coda. This is what they told me: >> Any other thoughts? Do you know of customers that are using VSL with Finale 2009 successfully to write orchestral scores? Thanks.

[andi]

Hello Mark!

Sorry for your ongoing problem.
With 160 GB free diskspace your problem must have a different reason.
It's really strange that you haven't changed anything on your system and from one day to the other playback doesn't work anymore.
Can you please take a look at the CPU meter of Vienna Ensemble during playback. To which percentage does it go?

If nothing else helps I would uninstall Vienna Ensemble and reinstall it.

Best,
Andi

[melortz]

Andi: Today everything seems to be working better. The CPU meter peaks @ about 25% , which should mean there are no problems? Correct? Thanks Mark

[andi]

Hello Mark!

I'm glad it's working better now. 25% is a high CPU value. It is most probably a performance problem you had.

Best,
Andi

[melortz]

HI: Is there a way to lower the value? Is this something I can adjust? Thanks!

[andi]

Yes and no.
You could do the following things:
Quit other programs which are running at the same time.
Use less AU instruments or FX plugins.
Normally I would recommend using a higher buffer size for the audio driver, but unfortunately this doesn't seem to be possible with Finale for Mac. I'm already in contact with MakeMusic about this matter.

Best,
Andi

[A.S.]

@Mark Lortz said:

Do you know of customers that are using VSL with Finale 2009 successfully to write orchestral scores?

I use Finale for composing orchestral and chamber music and I also own Vienna SE. I bought Vienna a year ago but haven't been able to use it until very recently when I upgraded to a 2x2.8ghz Mac Pro 8-core (6 GB RAM).

Not many people are aware that the latest versions of Finale have become extremely CPU intensive. (Playing back a blank score can use as much as 50% of CPU on a G5) My previous computer was a PowerMac G5 2x2 ghz dualcore with 4.5 GB RAM and though this machine could play 25-30 GPO instruments without any problems it could only playback 4-5 Vienna instruments without pops and clicks.

[melortz]

Hi Albert: Thanks for the information. I am using a 2.4 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 4GB of RAM and that should be enough. The most I max out on the CPU is 40%. Recently, I seem to be having better luck. Could I ask you a few questions?? 1. I use Tapspace's Virtual Drumline (for concert and marching percussion) and its pretty much a "plug and play" piece of software. There is very little mixing or adjusting that needs to happen. Are you able to have the VSL sounds be that way or do you have to do a good bit of tweaking? I was really hoping that I would be able to have great sounds without much tweaking. Thanks.

[A.S.]

@Mark Lortz said:

Are you able to have the VSL sounds be that way or do you have to do a good bit of tweaking?

Hi Mark,

as I mentioned in my earlier post I have just started to use VSL again with Finale (I did some simulations with VSL in Logic last year but that's pretty much what I have used VSL for so far).

Regarding "plug and play": I'm afraid we will never see a software library that won't need tweaking in Finale. There are two many ways to notate similar things. The more sophisticated libraries such as VSL are not designed to to work with notation to start with. Another thing to consider is that though VSL does supply HP prefs for Finale (thanks a lot Andie!) most VSL/notation users are using Sibelus (including Andie from VSL). Wether we like it or not we Finale-users are more or less Beta-testers for VSL. Hopefully we can combine our efforts during time to come but at the moment we are "pioneers" is this area of Finale...

To be more precise: At the moment I seem to get a decent result with Finale and VSL using the VSL HP prefs (you can download them from the VSL site). It's not fantastic but it's ok. The overal impression is better than GPO (for instance) but there are moments when I get strange playback results with VSL. I just discovered some oddities with playback of timpani (I will get back to you Andie about this!) but I think I know how to solve this particular problem. It's most likely I will encounter more things like this during the coming months. I will try to post my results here and contact Andie as often as I have time.

Hope this helps

Albert

[melortz]

Hi Albert: Sorry for the delay-I've been under a few writing deadlines. What does Sibelius offer that Finale does not when it comes to VSL? I am currently a Finale 201 Beta Tester, and you are right there are very few people using VSL and Finale. I may be the only one of the Beta testers! I am working with Robin Hodson with Sibelius and my school system. Are you working with Finale for the final product or exporting to a sequencing type program and tweaking the sounds from there? I'd be curious to hear how you are doing it. Thanks. Mark

[A.S.]

@Another User said:

Are you working with Finale for the final product or exporting to a sequencing type program and tweaking the sounds from there?

My "final product" is always a score and I always write for living musicians or orchestras. When I have finished a work I just send it as a pdf-file to my publisher and then my work is done. Playback is a nice feature but not essential for me. From time to time I have been asked by conductors or soloists if I could supply a computer simulation of my work (usually if it's a premiere performance and I don't have a "real" recording of the piece). What I do is this:

- I disable HP and then apply the HP plugin on the whole piece (be sure to choose the VSL HP prefs when doing this).

- I save this as a midi file.

- Open the midi file in Logic and then start tweaking...

If it's just a fragment of the piece and Finale is playing it ok I just save it as an audio file directly from Finale.

/Albert

[melortz]

Albert- Thanks for the information, I will try your suggestions. Have you ever considered switching to Sibelius. I haven't but Sibelius really seems to be set up better to work with VST than Finale. I just want it to be a bit easier and it seems as if Finale is NOT the easy way to go. Thanks. Mark

[A.S.]

@Mark Lortz said:

Have you ever considered switching to Sibelius.

Not since Finale 2007... 😊 (that must have been the buggiest version of Finale, ever! It was driving me nuts with crashes three times a day etc..) On the serious side, no, I haven't considered switching. The main reason is that I have been using with Finale since 1994 (I've been working full time as a composer since 2000) so I know this program well. The other reason is that I still believe that Finale is somewhat more adjustable when it comes to notation and layout. Finale is maybe harder to learn but Sibelius is known to "think" for you and I don't want that. The quality of my "notated" end product will always be more important for me than playback. That's why I'm sticking with Finale.

Albert

[melortz]

I agree about Finale 2007 - way too many bugs! There are a few things in the new Sibelius that seem to integrate better with VST and VSL. I have had better luck with the Finale 2010 Beta version and VSL. I just feel as if Finale could make things easier with the software synths and it seems as if Sibelius is doing a better job. I am not sure if I want to take the time to learn a new piece of software with Sibelius. I have a long time Finale friend that recently bought it and is using VSL and EastWest sounds. He's going to let me know which works better with the software synths. I'll keep you posted if you like. Thanks mark