@Kraznet

I would echo John's question about giving a more detailed explanation of the latency with the standard wave driver but I wonder whether you are referring to your comment about VSTs? In which case, I would wholeheartedly agree with the need for an ASIO driver!

I often use VSTs, like iZotope Ozone, when exporting projects and find that audio/video sync can be lost due to the "latency" (I would term it "processing time") of the plugin. When the VST is really needed, the only solution is to export the audio to a separate wave file, process that (with the VST) in my audio editor, export the processed audio and then reinsert it to the VPX timeline, muting the original audio, obviously. To be able to omit those extra steps would be invaluable!

Jeff
Forum Moderator

@johnebaker @Kraznet

This is something I myself have complained about on this forum in the past but have come to realise the cause is down to hardware.

Move a slider and the volume change is not instant. The more buffers used and the more sample blocks used the worse the latency becomes but the lower you go the more problems you get when the amount of parallel audio tracks are being played with cracks and pops and sometimes even brief dropouts occurring.

But as I found out too late it comes down to the speed of your system motherboard ram which in turn is totally dependant on the motherboard and processor combination. I got 3200MHz ram installed but the processor will only allow up to 2133MHz with the amount of ram I have on board. I can increase that speed slightly by removing two 16Gig modules but it is still insufficient to deliver the blocks of audio in time so that the audio is in sync with the visuals displayed in the monitor. Latency is still bad. I don't think in this instance ASIO would be of benefit as the blocks of audio still have to be matched to the frame rate of the video and the frame rate for audio in video files is always different to the frames per second of the video frames.

The only way around this is to have higher clock speeds from the ram. I tried overclocking but that made my system unstable for video editing. While increasing the blocks within the program makes sure pops, crackles and audio dropouts can be overcome, the penalty is higher latency.

As far as I am aware there is no software fix for this. It is purely a hardware related problem.

Ray.

@Kraznet

Hi

@CubeAce commented:- in this instance ASIO would be of benefit as the blocks of audio still have to be matched to the frame rate of the video

I agree with this, the playback buffers hold up to 1 sec of video/audio which has to be cleared and recomputed/resynced every time you make a change to a volume setting or audio effect setting.

With ASIO you would still have the buffer delay.

John EB

Thanks for your replies. I made a video showing fader latency. Unfortunately I am unable to upload it here for some reason. The video compares Sequoia to VPX. Sequoia which uses ASIO. When moving the volume fader the level changes immediately. In VPX which doesn't use ASIO when you move the volume fader there is a considerable delay before the volume changes. Also I was trying to do a fade in on a sound effect and there was delay before the fade in worked. Sorry I can't agree this is a hardware problem it is purely due to the lack of ASIO in VPX. Incidentally also tested this in Vegas using their ASIO driver and the response was immediate.

I uploaded the video unlisted on YouTube

Regarding using VST effects, when switching presets or making tweaks there is always a delay before you can hear the changes. Again due to lack of ASIO.

Regards
Kraznet

@Kraznet

Hi Martin,

Yes, ASIO would be excellent to have in VPX, along with VST3 capability.

I suggest that you raise this with Magix and on the Samplitude/Sequoia forum - with your friends at Magix who could possibly have some influence or help out making this come to fruition. At the same time, add in a better mixer with a better meter or choice of meters like in Sound Forge Audio Cleaning Lab (or from Samplitude):

And, ask them to fix the bug with VPX crashing when trying to open an EDL from Samplitude in VPX - see the message about this on the Samplitude forum. You may want to test this first to see if it still crashes.

VPX uses the Samplitude engine technology somehow, so Magix says in the manual.

Perfect synchronization of image and audio in real time is made possible thanks to technology based on the high-end audio engine in Samplitude.

It would be nice to know more about this.

John CB

I made a video showing the delay in switching presets in VST plug-ins VPX vs Vegas Pro 21. The difference is pretty obvious.

@Kraznet

Hi Martin,

Yes, the problem is quite obvious.

As Ray has pointed out many times on this forum, there is a long delay when using Automation in the Mixer between moving the slider and hearing the result. I presume that using an ASIO driver would solve this.

John CB

Yes, ASIO would be excellent to have in VPX, along with VST3 capability.

I suggest that you raise this with Magix and on the Samplitude/Sequoia forum - with your friends at Magix who could possibly have some influence or help out making this come to fruition.

Hi @browj2 I can mention it to them although there seems to be a restructuring of the company happening due to insolvency so I'm not sure how that will affect things. I do have a contact at MAGIX who works with VPX as well I can try that.

And, ask them to fix the bug with VPX crashing when trying to open an EDL from Samplitude in VPX - see the message about this on the Samplitude forum. You may want to test this first to see if it still crashes.

I will test this for you as I use EDL export quite a lot but usually from VPX to Sequoia.

VPX uses the Samplitude engine technology somehow, so Magix says in the manual.

Perfect synchronization of image and audio in real time is made possible thanks to technology based on the high-end audio engine in Samplitude.

It would be nice to know more about this.

They may use the Samplitude Audio engine for synchronising of the image with audio. But as far as working with audio in VPX it's never been a great experience for me. There is a lot they could do to improve audio in VPX. I've been living in hope for years they would improve things but nothing has really changed.

Cheers,
Martin

@Kraznet, @browj2

Hi Martin, John

I am not seeing delays when using a VST, in my case the MeldaProductions Frequency Shifter as you can see below:

I also tried with Independence and was getting the same response times.

Added: Putting a 4K UHD video on the timeline change the response time to about 1.5 secs which is to be expected as the video cache/buffers are cleared and refreshed.

For completeness, these are my Playback audio settings:

John EB

Hi @johnebaker That is very interesting your response times are considerably better than mine and my playback audio settings are exactly the same as yours. That's quite a disparity between the two systems.

@Kraznet @emmrecs @johnebaker @browj2

Hi.

I still maintain that in MMS and VPX the delay for whatever reason is linked directly to the system ram speed.

Maybe it is because of the way the rendering engine works. Personally I have no idea but you can see and hear the difference that enlarging buffers and sample rates does to the latency. So why no ASIO?

I have Vegas Pro 18 as a curiosity and confess I don't use it much but it has ASIO.

I don't have a dedicated audio interface but rely on my motherboard to provide sound. It can be set to 96000kHz at 32 bit and sounds fine and has a S/N ratio I find hard to believe and well above what should be the threshold of pain (Hence my reluctance to believe it although the measuring devices I have seem to bear that out).

Suffice to say it is under normal circumstances sufficient for my audio needs. So my only option was to download ASIO4ALL. Not an ideal solution for testing as in the past I did have a dedicated audio interface and it was much better at using ASIO than ASIO4ALL. I set up ASIO4ALL in Vegas and no matter how much I increased the buffers and sample rates (Up to their limits) the playback sounded awful to the point of for me at least, un-usability.

However, it did not affect the rendered file which played back just fine. But here is the rub. Vegas Pro 18 also played back the file within the editor using the wav driver and the other option (I forget what that was called Windows driver or something) without any noticeable lag / latency. So for me, trying to use ASIO in Vegas presented no advantage.

Now I need to do further testing as I was only playing one video clip with only its own soundtrack. The clip was four and a half minutes long and I added a visual effect to it so the clip was not just smart rendered.

Then I used the same clip in VPX 14 I matched the sound device settings in Windows to match those Vegas used. IE, with ASIO4ALL in use I was stuck with 16 bit audio at 48kHz. Whereas with VPX the sound settings within Windows no longer seems to matter. Then I set the video encoder settings to produce an mp4 file with as close to the bit rate exported render that I could to the Vegas export.

Why? I was hoping there would be a speed difference in the render in the favour of VPX. At least that may give a reason for the absence of ASIO in MMS and VPX.

So the output from the rendered files were close.

The export times from VPX and Vegas were not.

Vegas export time : eight minutes dead.

VPX 14 export time : sixteen minutes and thirty three seconds.

To say I was shocked and surprised is an understatement.

So, the only reason I can think of for it's omission is the possibility that people who buy VPX and MMS may be less inclined to own a dedicated sound card and more likely to use their inboard sound chips and that if reduced to using ASI4ALL they will have the same bad audio experience I had. But, if they are using a newer machine than mine then they would never notice as the latency should be lower due to the faster components.

In other words the omission could be deliberate for the more consumer side of the product line.

I don't know of course, that is just guess work on my part and I urge anyone else to try the same experiment for a larger sample size bearing in mind the capabilities of the hardware in use.

John EB hasn't said which system he tried his tests out on or if it was the same outcome on both machines.

That is not to say both programs do not have different strengths and weaknesses. Vegas on my setup does not hold Pip sizes well often flashing back and forth between the selected size for the Pip and full screen if a fade is selected. VPX / MMS has never done that. Some of the projects I have done I would hate to have to have done in Vegas due to the amount of tracks in is and Pip movement. Vegas on the other hand has much more control over its cross fade effects and more choice.

Anyway, that is what I found and anyone is welcome to try it for themselves.

I may go back another day and try mixing multiple sound files in Vegas using the wave driver to see if that begins to break up or not or starts to introduce delays.

For now, I'm done.

Interesting results though.

Ray.

@johnebaker

Hi John EB,

My settings were quite different from yours, so I switched to them. I have a song on track 1, that is all. I cannot get anything like what you get, more like 2 seconds when I change the volume in the mixer before it reacts.

What's the secret?

John CB

However, it did not affect the rendered file which played back just fine. But here is the rub. Vegas Pro 18 also played back the file within the editor using the wav driver and the other option (I forget what that was called Windows driver or something) without any noticeable lag / latency. So for me, trying to use ASIO in Vegas presented no advantage.

Yes I tested the windows wave driver in Vegas and it was very responsive on a par with ASIO.

The ASIO4all driver didn't work at all for me in Vegas. My RME Babyface Pro ASIO driver seems to work fine. I get lag in VPX regardless of what driver I choose. Anyway thanks everyone for your hard work in testing I need to get on with the tutorial I was working on this whole thing has been a distraction for me today so I need to get my voice ever finished. Although I will be doing that in Sequoia 17.

Regards,
Kraznet

@browj2, @Kraznet

Hi

. . . . What's the secret? . . . .

Good question, tipping it on its head, what else is running at the same time on your PC's that is not running on mine?

The only programs I had running were VPX 15, Screencast-o-Matic and a background app - Powerchute - plus the Windows features required to run the computer.

John

I meant to answer your comment earlier - got distracted by a delivery of shingle for the garden - however I had a 'light bulb moment' while moving the shingle, followed later by more testing looking for something inducing latency.

All testing has been done on my PC. I did not see anything to be gained testing on my laptop as the only difference is the CPU is newer, software, windows drivers etc are the same.

I personally cannot see why VPX using an ASIO driver would fix this, for the reason that a true ASIO driver gives a program, that is using it, direct access to the sound card/chipset, instead of going through Windows, it also does this exclusively, such that other programs are prevented from accessing the sound card.

I tried this with Music Maker using the Magix 2016 Low Latency driver, a true ASIO driver, and VPX was blocked and put up the message that the sound card could not be accessed.

Switching Music Maker to the Music Maker ASIO driver and testing again, VPX could access the sound card, however I started to get a delay of about 1 to 1.5 secs. Still faster than Martin is experiencing, which appears to 2.5 to 3 secs.

I got the same result using Asio4All driver.

I think that the MM ASIO driver is, or is equivalent to, Asio4All which provides the program with ASIO style inputs, while accessing the sound card through the Windows Driver Model output, ie goes through the standard Windows audio device drivers.

The final test I did was to put a 4K UHD video clip on the timeline along with the audio file I previously used for testing, and while playing this and repeating the actions I took in my previous video clip I posted earlier the delay was about 1.5 secs.

I suspect that the much longer delay, Martin is experiencing, and I believe to be excessive, is something specific to the PC, the question is what?

John EB

OK so all this time I was testing using the VPX Wave driver. So I tried switching to the Direct sound driver and the latency has improved considerably when changing fader levels and also switching VST presets. So it looks like using the Direct sound driver is the solution to the problem. I did a couple of quick searches and it seems that Direct sound is lower latency compared to the Wave driver. Maybe you can test that as well @browj2 ? So today wasn't a complete waste of time after all 😀

The online help actually recommends the wave driver although there is no mention of latency between either of them. Incidentally when I try to download the manual I get a " page not working" message.

@Kraznet @johnebaker

Hi Martin,

Wow! I tried Direct Sound and the result was instantaneous using the faders. I did hear a bit of crackling while doing. I tried the Melda MFreqShifter and it reacted immediately.

I just downloaded the VPX manual with no problem. There may have been a server problem.

@CubeAce, Ray, try Automation using Direct Sound.

John CB

@browj2

Hi John.

Once I'm above four audio tracks the amount of samples I have to increase it to gives me a longer delay than using the wave driver and it also starts to affect the video that becomes stuttery. With one or two tracks it works but beyond that I find it worse than the wave driver. Projects that have more than three audio tracks in them for me is just over the 50% mark. With MMS / VPX I still find drawing volumes in quicker than using the sliders if that's the way I decide to mix.

Most of the time though I still prefer to use a dedicated daw to mix-down with where I can use a physical controller with real knobs and sliders and add any other sound tracks I wish. It really depends on how the project progresses.

Ray.