FM3 Firmware Version 4.00 beta 3

It's insane how happy I am with this firmware. Multiple stock presets are totally awesome with little to no tweaking. And while I initially was happy with UltraRes cabs being supported starting with 3.03 beta, with Cygnus now in place, after testing multiple clean and distorted patches, I no longer care about UltraRes. Seriously. Cygnus sounds - and FEELS - that great to me. I can't justify using an additional 5% CPU per cab for UltraRes, and thankfully, so far at least, it's not a concern for me.

Anyone else having similar experiences? Sitting here this afternoon playing my Charvel Pro-Mod San Dimas with SD Parallel Axis pickups, into my FM3, into my Friedman ASM-12, I've been auditioning Standard vs UltraRes cabs on the Friedman HBE v1/2, v3, CA3+, 5153, and Bogner Shiva and Uber patches, ALL STOCK PRESETS, and it's all been such ear candy to me that Standard vs UltraRes makes no difference to me in sound or feel. I'm not even spending time with the AustinBuddy LiveGold pack today (mad respect for you though, dude). Haven't been this happy with my rig in a VERY long time. THANK YOU FAS for Cygnus!!!
 
Updated to 4.00 beta 3. The fan turns on and stays on (on high speed).
Power cycling FM3 has not effect on the fan. Room temperature 23C, FM3 DSP temp. approx. 50C

Just for test, cooled the unit to 8C. turned it on, the fan turns on and runs on low speed, then as the unit warms up it switches to high speed.


IMG_5791.jpg
 
Chris Naish said:
It's insane how happy I am with this firmware. Multiple stock presets are totally awesome with little to no tweaking. And while I initially was happy with UltraRes cabs being supported starting with 3.03 beta, with Cygnus now in place, after testing multiple clean and distorted patches, I no longer care about UltraRes. Seriously. Cygnus sounds - and FEELS - that great to me. I can't justify using an additional 5% CPU per cab for UltraRes, and thankfully, so far at least, it's not a concern for me.

Anyone else having similar experiences? Sitting here this afternoon playing my Charvel Pro-Mod San Dimas with SD Parallel Axis pickups, into my FM3, into my Friedman ASM-12, I've been auditioning Standard vs UltraRes cabs on the Friedman HBE v1/2, v3, CA3+, 5153, and Bogner Shiva and Uber patches, ALL STOCK PRESETS, and it's all been such ear candy to me that Standard vs UltraRes makes no difference to me in sound or feel. I'm not even spending time with the AustinBuddy LiveGold pack today (mad respect for you though, dude). Haven't been this happy with my rig in a VERY long time. THANK YOU FAS for Cygnus!!!
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I’m having a double whammy of fun. I just got my first Fractal product 2 weeks ago with the FM3 and now also with a whole new (better) modeling system. All I know is I loaded the new firmware and sat and played so long on one preset that I haven’t been able to completely explore. And now I need to get to the latest revision and new Factory presets. All I know is, it’s all good even with some little beta quirks that I have faith will all be solved in time. 👍👍👍

…oh and though I have 3 core PRSi, I recently purchased a really nice Schecter BlackJack SLS Avenger FR-S. Has a Sustainiac and is a blast to play with the FM3! I can relate for sure.
 
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How are people finding CPU usage vs v3.02? Ive got a preset at 82% in v3.02 and dont want to trial the beta if it makes that unplayable. Cheers.
 
Damn, was just going to try it out, but they deleted the link. Oh well, probably for the best since so few didn’t have fan issues.
 
blaggers said:
How are people finding CPU usage vs v3.02? Ive got a preset at 82% in v3.02 and dont want to trial the beta if it makes that unplayable. Cheers.
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There is no general "CPU usage", it's all dependent on the preset. So try it to find out, or don't try it. In any case, you have to do it.
 
blaggers said:
How are people finding CPU usage vs v3.02? Ive got a preset at 82% in v3.02 and dont want to trial the beta if it makes that unplayable. Cheers.
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While I've yet to update to v4.00 beta 3 (I'm on 4.00 beta 1 still but am going to install the latest beta and factory presets tonight) I found my preset CPU loads to be about the same with v3.xx firmware; I didn't find any appreciable change in usage. I thought that was very cool since we got all new amp modeling as well as the newer drive modeling that debuted on the III which did chew up more CPU at time; seems there were some great CPU optimizations in 4.xx.
 
GitGuy513 said:
All I know is I loaded the new firmware and sat and played so long on one preset that I haven’t been able to completely explore.
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I hear you, big time....I keep getting stuck on pretty much every amp I try for a long period of time (including many I would pass over previously) just playing and enjoying what I'm hearing/feeling. Definitely more-so than any firmware on any FAS platform since the Ultra days.

I've been going through all of the amps since I've upgraded to 4.xx but have only gotten thru about 25%...every amp is so rich with texture, nuance, etc. it demands a thorough going over, especially the preamp vs power amp colorations. The depth of different tones/feels that are revealed even with the standard controls is crazy...again, there is a whole lotta magic never like never before.
 
GitGuy513 said:
Yes, let me say that I was replying to the specific sound in video supplied. Others noise issues may be totally unrelated to fans. I must say that I noticed what seemed to be a type of RF/digital hash on some presets with Beta 4 rev.2. I never loaded rev.1. Went from 3.02 Ares. It almost seems like the input was picking up some sort of stray input that was then trying to be processed, but didn’t know what to with it. This was all within the signal internally not an audible noise that could be heard from the unit itself. It was little ticking sounds that disappeared when all input from the guitar was stopped for a period of time. Like 5 –10 seconds.

Troubleshooting electronics must/should be done in a very methodical way. Unfortunately, forums like this can deteriorate into a “throwing darts blindfolded“ type of thing. With all respect to everyone’s efforts.
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I posted that video and to me it sounded more like a hard drive writing a lot of data to me. Maybe it comes across different on YouTube. Dealing with basic tech repairs over the last 20 years I’ve never heard a fan sound like that on any type of electronics. Hopefully I’m wrong though cause I don’t think there are any other moving parts unless there are relays inside.
 
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bo13bo said:
I posted that video and to me it sounded more like a hard drive writing a lot of data in person. Maybe it comes across different on YouTube but I didn’t think it sounded like a fan. I’ve not done tons of repairs but dealing with basic tech repairs over the last 20 years I’ve never heard a fan sound like that on any type of electronics. Hopefully I’m wrong though cause I don’t think there are any other moving parts I guess unless you consider relays a moving part.
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I don't think there are any relays in there...
 
I found an interesting one. I have a free commercial preset for the axe FX 3 that I modified in earlier firmware to run in the FM3.

It's the worshiptutorials.com free ac30 preset. It has heavy CPU usage so I needed to prune it heavily to make it work at all on the FM3.

When I use this preset now there is a heavy latency when hitting a note to the time I actually hear something (like half a second or more) Doesn't happen on other presets.

I don't know the rules for posting a modified free commerical preset. If it is ok to do so I can post it up.
 
rglr said:
FM3 firmware version 4.00 beta 3 is available for download here:
[EDIT] Link deleted due to fan problems [/EDIT]

ATTN: An updated version of this build was posted 6/4/2021 5:30PM. Download and install again if you have installed the prior build.

NOTE: This is a BETA RELEASE which means it may contain bugs. It is recommended that you perform a complete backup of your FM3 using FM3-Edit or Fractal-Bot prior to installing this release.

NOTE #2: Cygnus is a major update. It is recommended that you "soft reset" each channel of the amp block in each of your presets by changing its Type to a different setting and then back (ex: Switch from Brit JM45 to Brit Brown and then back to Brit JM45) . This resets most parameters but doesn't change the basic gain and tone settings. As an alternative, you can "hard reset" an amp channel by using the Reset function (Push Knob A in the Amp Edit menu on the unit itself, or Reset Current Channel in FM3-Edit).

A new version of FM3-Edit is required for this release:
https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/fm3-edit-1-04-01.173322/

Release Notes:
  • Added: “Cygnus” amp modeling from Axe-Fx III firmware 16.x
  • Added: UltraRes IR support and corresponding “IR Length” parameter in the Cab block.
  • Added new Drive block modeling and types. This block is now in sync with Axe-Fx III.
  • Added: “Bank Access” parameter to the Bank Inc/Dec footswitch functions. When set to ALL, the settings for Bank Lower Limit and Bank Upper Limit are IGNORED. ALL is the new default, so if you wish to enable these limits for bank switches, you must set “Bank Access” to “LIMITED”.
  • Added: Adjustable USB buffer sizes.
  • Added: Latest changes to the Reverb block from Axe-Fx III.
  • Added: FM3 + FC-12 (“OMG15”) layouts are now built-in and loadable from the Reset page in FC Controllers/Onboard Switches.
  • Fixed: Power on holding the HOME key will now prevent the startup preset from loading.
  • Fixed: Power on holding the EDIT key will now prevent system parameters from loading.
  • Fixed: Output 2 issues regarding unity gain, Copy Output 1, and Output 2 block low volume.
  • Fixed: Footswitches are now resistant to an issue that was causing freezing.
  • Fixed: Default FC Layouts are now loaded correctly when you use “Reset System Parameters”.
  • Fixed: The PRESETS menu page now correctly displays the active preset.
  • Fixed: Pedal calibration will now work correctly for pedals set as “Tuner on Heel Down.”
  • Fixed: Inserting Pitch block into a high CPU grid will not hang up the GUI.
  • Fixed: Footswitch preset functions will now honor the global “Default Scene” setting.
  • Fixed: Vintage Tape Chorus Delay Time parameter can now exceed 19.85.
  • Fixed: Drive Low Cut parameter is now functional.
  • Fixed: Aligned Pitch block “Type” names with Axe-Fx III.
  • Fixed: Mini-LCDs issues experienced by some customers are much reduced or eliminated.
  • Fixed: Speaker LF response if LF Resonance and Q are set to low values.
  • Fixed: IRs in Cabinet picker page now displayed in correct color.
  • Updated: Power amp excursion and recovery times.
  • USB has been reworked to reduce issues experienced by some customers.
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We’re you able to reproduce the fan thing or is this more precautionary
 
Installed 4.0 Beta 1, then 2, then 3. After the initial version of Beta 3, the fan was spinning up quite often. I've just installed the latest version of Beta 3 (3) and I am no longer hearing the fan spin up every other minute. Everything seems stable. The FM3 performed flawlessly at rehearsal today. Thanks FAS team!
 
bo13bo said:
I posted that video and to me it sounded more like a hard drive writing a lot of data in person. Maybe it comes across different on YouTube but I didn’t think it sounded like a fan. I’ve not done tons of repairs but dealing with basic tech repairs over the last 20 years I’ve never heard a fan sound like that on any type of electronics. Hopefully I’m wrong though cause I don’t think there are any other moving parts I guess unless you consider relays a moving part.
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Exactly, mine sounds like a hard drive reading/writing data or the click of a relay in an amp when you switch channels. Maybe I’m paranoid, but I’m either going to downgrade to 3.02 or just play my Axe until this is fixed.
 
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