FM3 USB Latency Update

Boy_Narf said:
I've done testing with click tracks and recording both with usb and then XLR out and it's the same. No latency issues, nothing weird (maybe I'm not a consistent or gifted enough player to notice).

Maybe it's "close enough" to the point where it's not worth dedicating development time.
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Hulkko said:
Strangely, I haven't noticed any latency on my FM3T.
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I would highly recommend you read about phase and phasing issues. When we are talking about this latency, yes sure, it's insignificant and unnoticeable to the human ear. However, when you want to reamp and blend tones, this is where the issue starts showing, and phasing starts happening.
A good test you can do so you can hear the problem is by recording both a processed signal without time-based effects and a DI simultaneously. Then reamp the DI you've just recorded through the same exact preset without changing anything. After that, solo both the original processed recorded signal and the reamped one and flip the phase on one of them. What should happen is complete silence (which happens when you apply the sample offset fix) but what happens is that you hear some signal (which shouldn't happen). Why is this a problem you might ask. Because this slight difference in timing ruin the tone when you're trying to blend different ones. So yea here you go now you know.
 
USB audio is not sample locked to a clock like SPDIF, AES, or ADAT. There can be a tiny bit of variation in the timing with USB so you won't always get full silence when null testing between reamps. It's usually pretty close and within a few samples or so. The FM3's USB timing for some reason has a much wider range of variation (in the range of a few hundred samples or more) that can slightly throw things out of alignment at times and lead to some phase issues like YamenFahham said. At 48 kHz, one millisecond is 48 samples. So if the timing is off by say 500 samples, then that's roughly 10 ms out of alignment. Not necessarily enough to notice unless you are trying to align multiple takes. The Axe III and FM9 had very similar issues as well, but since those use a dedicated USB controller chip, those were able to be corrected via firmware and driver updates. The FM3's USB controller is an integrated part of a shared controller for many system functions, so I'm guessing there's some limitation there in the hardware that's preventing the same kind of fix.
 
YamenFahham said:
I would highly recommend you read about phase and phasing issues. When we are talking about this latency, yes sure, it's insignificant and unnoticeable to the human ear. However, when you want to reamp and blend tones, this is where the issue starts showing, and phasing starts happening.
A good test you can do so you can hear the problem is by recording both a processed signal without time-based effects and a DI simultaneously. Then reamp the DI you've just recorded through the same exact preset without changing anything. After that, solo both the original processed recorded signal and the reamped one and flip the phase on one of them. What should happen is complete silence (which happens when you apply the sample offset fix) but what happens is that you hear some signal (which shouldn't happen). Why is this a problem you might ask. Because this slight difference in timing ruin the tone when you're trying to blend different ones. So yea here you go now you know.
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I've now read more about what it's really about. My FM3 is connected to Scarlett via SPDIF. That explains why I haven't noticed that problem. That's a very annoying problem and it's incomprehensible that such an expensive device has a bad latency problem.
 
mr_fender said:
I'm guessing there's some limitation there in the hardware that's preventing the same kind of fix.
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Since I’m kind of an officially certified bad person here by now, guess I can just go ahead and say it.

Calling it a “hardware limitation” is a euphemism of sorts. It’s not like said hardware was imposed on Fractal by some act of god, they chose this design most probably to save costs and get higher margins on the FM3. And then chose to keep it when they did a hardware revision.

So as a result there is misleading marketing messaging and users having problems when trying to use advertised functionality, without a clear indication on how to fix it.

Which is bad for karma.

So in my view, fixing this shouldn’t be somewhere on the back burner (if it is on the back burner), or if a software fix is at all impossible then maybe the claims on the website should change, the product comparison table should reflect this, and at the very least the manual should indicate how to deal with it without users having to go to forums for a solution.
 
vangrieg said:
Since I’m kind of an officially certified bad person here by now, guess I can just go ahead and say it.

Calling it a “hardware limitation” is a euphemism of sorts. It’s not like said hardware was imposed on Fractal by some act of god, they chose this design most probably to save costs and get higher margins on the FM3. And then chose to keep it when they did a hardware revision.

So as a result there is misleading marketing messaging and users having problems when trying to use advertised functionality, without a clear indication on how to fix it.

Which is bad for karma.

So in my view, fixing this shouldn’t be somewhere on the back burner (if it is on the back burner), or if a software fix is at all impossible then maybe the claims on the website should change, the product comparison table should reflect this, and at the very least the manual should indicate how to deal with it without users having to go to forums for a solution.
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+
 
vangrieg said:
Since I’m kind of an officially certified bad person here by now, guess I can just go ahead and say it.

Calling it a “hardware limitation” is a euphemism of sorts. It’s not like said hardware was imposed on Fractal by some act of god, they chose this design most probably to save costs and get higher margins on the FM3. And then chose to keep it when they did a hardware revision.

So as a result there is misleading marketing messaging and users having problems when trying to use advertised functionality, without a clear indication on how to fix it.

Which is bad for karma.

So in my view, fixing this shouldn’t be somewhere on the back burner (if it is on the back burner), or if a software fix is at all impossible then maybe the claims on the website should change, the product comparison table should reflect this, and at the very least the manual should indicate how to deal with it without users having to go to forums for a solution.
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I just use tonex one with captures I made of my fractal tones, or real amps, if I need to be mobile. No problems when usb recording with tonex. It is much smaller anyway, and I still like to use hardware for recording (so no tonex vst). My fm3 gets used at home more where I have audio interface.
 
Just discovered this thread. I normally record with plugins or my Kemper, but recently just tried with an FM3 and instantly found the timing was all over the place. Like I keep having to record new takes and they're a bit unpredictable, like there's a disconnect between the metronome I'm playing to and the recorded audio.

But I'll admit even after reading these comments I don't quite understand what's going on. Very disappointing to know it seems to be a common issue that potentially cannot be resolved.
 
It is a bit cumbersome having to move each recorded track. I'm assuming the latency is hopefully consistent over the take.

I usually have a latency of about 4 to 5 millisecond
 
RifferMcDuck said:
Just discovered this thread. I normally record with plugins or my Kemper, but recently just tried with an FM3 and instantly found the timing was all over the place. Like I keep having to record new takes and they're a bit unpredictable, like there's a disconnect between the metronome I'm playing to and the recorded audio.

But I'll admit even after reading these comments I don't quite understand what's going on. Very disappointing to know it seems to be a common issue that potentially cannot be resolved.
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A useful thing to do is to calculate the sample offset in your system and adjust it in your daw settings. There are many ways on how to calculate this, but what I did is I calculated the value based on the silence in the null test. But yea I've sold my FM3 and upgraded to the Axe-Fx III now. And as @mr_fender mentioned, I didn't get complete silence in the null test but the timing is way better than the FM3.
 
It almost certainly it has a different USB controller than the FM3. The AM4 and the VP4 use the same usb drivers so they probably share the same controller. Maybe scan the VP4 threads to see if anyone has had any USB issues. Good to see the USB-C port trend continuing on it though. It's a far more durable connector than USB-B.
 
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