FM9 Latency - Around 5ms?

Back in the day before monitors I wonder what players thought about latency being on a huge stage standing 20' from there speakers?

That's a good question, but there was an interesting paper presented at AES a while back that showed that if you have a visual cue like, for example, seeing your amp across a large stage, your mind is capable of using that to adjust and you don't perceive the latency. Running your signal through a digital device lacks any such visual cue, so you'll perceive digital device latency more than a distant amp with equivalent latency.
 
Last edited:
That's a good question, but there was an interesting paper presented at AES a while back that showed that if you have a visual cue like, for example, seeing your amp across a large stage, your mind is capable of using that to adjust and you don't perceive the latency. Running your signal through a digital device lacks any such visual cue, so you'll perceive digital device latency more than if you have an amp an equivalent distance across a stage.
How would looking at one physical object (amp) differ from looking at another physical object (modeler)? Would it be your brain saying "Ok, sound is hitting me now, the amp is way over there, which is verifiable at a glance, we're hearing the sound when we should"?
 
How would looking at one physical object (amp) differ from looking at another physical object (modeler)? Would it be your brain saying "Ok, sound is hitting me now, the amp is way over there, which is verifiable at a glance, we're hearing the sound when we should"?
You would be looking at the distance to the sound source - the speakers.
 
That's a good question, but there was an interesting paper presented at AES a while back that showed that if you have a visual cue like, for example, seeing your amp across a large stage, your mind is capable of using that to adjust and you don't perceive the latency. Running your signal through a digital device lacks any such visual cue, so you'll perceive digital device latency more than a distant amp with equivalent latency.
Do you happen to remember the name of the paper? I did some searching but couldn't find it. Curious to learn more about this study.
 
https://toonz.ca/bose/wiki/images/7/7b/AES_Latency.pdf

Of relevance to this thread:

There are numerous differences in the perception of
latency between Wedge Monitors and IEM monitors.
The most notable difference is the decreased amount of
latency necessary to incite the same quality rating in the
IEM

In other words (my paraphrase), not all latency is equal. The subjects were more tolerant of latency due to distance to a speaker than they were of latency due to digital processing.
 
Same boat. No longer in a band and my FM3 handled all my needs with elegance. I sold my beloved FM3 and got a FM9T. The unit is a BEAST and I can’t imagine life without it.
I just sold my QC and the FM3 is still within the return period... Tough choice. 🤔
 
Ok, so this should be fixed in FW 6.00?
Release notes say the amp block has 32 samples less latency now, but iirc it was said there were 64 samples too much, so still 32 samples off?
(Not that this really makes a difference to me, just curiosity)
 
The theoretical latency of the FM3/9 is:
In -> Out - 96 samples = 2ms
In -> Amp -> Out -160 samples = 3.33ms
In -> Amp -> Cab -> Out - 160 samples = 3.33ms (Cab block doesn't add any latency unless IR has leading silence)
in -> Drive -> Amp -> Cab -> Out - 192 samples = 4ms
None of the other blocks add latency.

It appears that perhaps there's a bug in the FM9 and it's adding an extra 64 samples of latency. I will discuss this with the head engineer on that project tomorrow.
Hello
And what about ControlSwitches or ExternalSwitches? They add latency to preset or no (especially at firmware 6.00 beta).

In time of AX8 CS and ES added CPU usage, what its now?
 
Hello
And what about ControlSwitches or ExternalSwitches? They add latency to preset or no (especially at firmware 6.00 beta).

In time of AX8 CS and ES added CPU usage, what its now?
Controllers don't directly process audio so I don't think they can introduce latency
 
Controllers don't directly process audio so I don't think they can introduce latency
I think I saw it mentioned that controllers such as pitch follower take a lot of CPU power when assigned to certain things in AMP, for example, They might require some extensive network (?) calculations sometimes, which - when multiplied by complexity of certain amps - might introduce unwanted effects.
Not sure if latency is one of them, but if AMP needs more cycles or something to calculate the changes, it might be measureable somehow.
 
I think I saw it mentioned that controllers such as pitch follower take a lot of CPU power when assigned to certain things in AMP, for example, They might require some extensive network (?) calculations sometimes, which - when multiplied by complexity of certain amps - might introduce unwanted effects.
Not sure if latency is one of them, but if AMP needs more cycles or something to calculate the changes, it might be measureable somehow.
As far as I've understood from this thread, there's a general buffer for all the stuff that's running plus a dedicated buffer for those blocks that need to introduce latency for some reason (amps, drives, etc.), and from what Cliff has said, it seems those all those buffers have a fixed lenght.
So I doubt something like controllers can increase latency.
 
Back
Top Bottom