FM9 Scene switching lag time

[Greg Ferguson]

I want to repeat one thing, I have not even updated firmware and using everything stock

If you're running an older version of the firmware, that may be part of the problem. The firmware controls the speed of the switching, and major improvements were ported to the FM9 in v3.0, which came out 8/15…

• New “Block Mixer” algorithm results in faster/quieter scene and channel changes. This new algorithm allows placing Amp blocks in series without the concomitant sound bursts that would normally occur when switching scenes.

In general, it's good to stay current with the full releases of the firmware. (If you're worried about bugs or living on the edge then definitely stay away from the beta releases.)

You can check the firmware version you're running from the front panel by going to Setup > Utilities > Version, or, in FM9-Edit, it's listed in the top-left of the main window.

 

[unix-guy]

Ok, I got off on wrong foot, frankly your comment to my numb brain sounded like it was a critcism on using products that dont compete with Fractal, I bought fractal because I was not getting what I wanted out of my current setp and believe that Fractal can avoid me buying and carrying two tube amps around for every gig/practice
I will definitely following your advice on "hold" feature of switches, dont know where to start unless I dive into manual, which will probably happen over the weekend

That's a great place to start!

Here's a post I made a could years back on that topic:

https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/rtfm-read-the-fine-manual.159203/

 

[rijiboy]

I will definitely look at suggestions from Brucegregori and GlennO , looks like I will be busy learning this over the weekend.
for now back to office work
Oh and one more thing, my FM9 came with FW 3.0, I just wanted to make sure if its not old firmware thats causing this issue

 

[unix-guy]

I will definitely look at suggestions from Brucegregori and GlennO , looks like I will be busy learning this over the weekend.
for now back to office work
Oh and one more thing, my FM9 came with FW 3.0, I just wanted to make sure if its not old firmware thats causing this issue

That's currently the latest version.

 

[rijiboy]

For reference, I created a quick video
in 3 minutes I will be in back to back meetings for couple of hours, so probably wont get time to reply here, there is definitely some seemless switching available as I showed in video example, and pretty sure after reading blogs and watching help video I will be able to understand and fix the issues I am facing

 

[Brucegregori]

With 2 Amp blocks and a Multiplexer there shouldn't really be a gap...

There still is....it is smaller but there still.

 

[chris]

For reference, I created a quick video
in 3 minutes I will be in back to back meetings for couple of hours, so probably wont get time to reply here, there is definitely some seemless switching available as I showed in video example, and pretty sure after reading blogs and watching help video I will be able to understand and fix the issues I am facing

Just FYI you are calling presets Scenes and scene Presets.

At the end you say changing amps, but that is changing presets.

Preset changes have an audio gap. No way around that.

Scenes within a preset can have a gap if the Amp channel is changing.

I think first get familiar with the words Scene and Preset, or else explaining and understanding is going to be tough. The 8 selections on the screen are Scenes. Scenes change channels and turn blocks on and off.

When the big number changes, that’s changing Presets.

 

[chris]

There still is....it is smaller but they’re still.

There is no gap if amp blocks are ONLY turning on and off.

There is a gap if they are changing channels.

 

[unix-guy]

For reference, I created a quick video
in 3 minutes I will be in back to back meetings for couple of hours, so probably wont get time to reply here, there is definitely some seemless switching available as I showed in video example, and pretty sure after reading blogs and watching help video I will be able to understand and fix the issues I am facing

In the first case I think the Amp block channel is not changing.

In the 2nd, the channel is changing. To me, the gap you are hearing is "normal". Using 2 amp blocks can eliminate that.

In the 3rd, you are changing presets. That's always going to have a gap as it's reloading all the blocks.

 

[Greg Ferguson]

my FM9 came with FW 3.0,

That's currently the latest version.

That version was chock-full of goodness and it resulted in extremely fast changes, so something else is wrong.

Many times people try to gauge the speed of changes by looking at the Edit screen on their computer, rather than watching the front panel of the modeler. That doesn't work, because the editor is polling the modeler for information about the preset/scene/channel. The front panel of the modeler is the authoritative source and should be what is used when checking switching speed.

 

[Brucegregori]

There is no gap if amp blocks are ONLY turning on and off.

There is a gap if they are changing channels.

Somewhat, but next 0 with controllers... I find controllers more useful and less prone to gaps...coming from the Helix world this might be more useful..

 

[GlennO]

Somewhat, but next 0 with controllers... I find controllers more useful and less prone to gaps...coming from the Helix world this might be more useful..

The Helix is a bit different. It has an optional mode to eliminate switching gaps, even when changing presets...but at the expense of reducing available cpu by 50%. Basically, one processor is always standing by, dedicated just for the purpose of loading a new preset. Headrush has this feature too. But that's a pretty heavy price to pay for gapless switching.

Even without that option, the conundrum is that the more sophisticated the amp modeling is, the more of a gap you'll incur when switching the amp, even when you factor in the processor speed of a high end modeler like the Axe-FX. This leads to the paradox that a low end Pod can switch with less of a gap than an Axe-FX. It's often hard for newcomers to the Axe-FX to grasp this. Cliff has done tricks like applying an envelope to the amp output to make the gap less noticeable, but it's always there when changing amp block channels. Even on the Axe-FX III it's in the neighborhood of 40ms.

 

[Brucegregori]

The Helix is a bit different. It has an optional mode to eliminate switching gaps, even when changing presets...but at the expense of reducing available cpu by 50%. Basically, one processor is always standing by, dedicated just for the purpose of loading a new preset. Headrush has this feature too. But that's a pretty heavy price to pay for gapless switching.

Even without that option, the conundrum is that the more sophisticated the amp modeling is, the more of a gap you'll incur when switching the amp, even when you factor in the processor speed of a high end modeler like the Axe-FX. This leads to the paradox that a low end Pod can switch with less of a gap than an Axe-FX. It's often hard for newcomers to the Axe-FX to grasp this. Cliff has done tricks like applying an envelope to the amp output to make the gap less noticeable, but it's always there when changing amp block channels. Even on the Axe-FX III it's in the neighborhood of 40ms.

Correct....as to why I recommend using controllers. It can make more sense based on where the user is coming from.

 

[Greg Ferguson]

"Preset switching can cause an audio gap" is useful reading and is a jumping-off place to additional information. This affects all modelers, not just FAS.

 

[unix-guy]

There still is....it is smaller but there still.

I had not messed with this on the FM9, only the Axe Fx, so I wanted to test it.

I created a preset from scratch:

Input -> Amp1 -> MUX-> Cab -> Output
\-> Amp ->/

I set a per preset switch that toggled channels on the Multiplexer to change between the 2 amps, which were set identically (59 Bassman Bright default settings).

There's NO audible gap at all.

Then I changed 1 amp to 5150 Blue and did rudimentary leveling.

Again, there's no gap. There's obviously a break in the tone but that is what it is.

You can use Scene Controllers as you said, but that's not always going to get the 2 sounds you want.

You can use a Mixer block and "crossfade".

You can use a clean amp with drive pedals.

You can also make "timed" changes so the gap from channel changing isn't audible, although in some cases that can be really hard to do.

Lots of ways to address this...

 

[Greg Ferguson]

Start at 36:02 in the following video for another example of how the FM9 responds normally.

 

[sick pickle]

Can anyone else confirm they notice scene switching lag in FW 2.0? I’m talking about a simple setup of scene 1 - overdrive, amp, cab, reverb, scene 2 - overdrive, amp, cab, DELAY, reverb. When toggling between the scenes that turns the delay on and off (no other changes) I notice a lag, or signal cutting out. I can post a preset in a bit. CPU is well under 70%. It’s a pretty obvious pause in signal. I have spillover set to ALL in global settings, and each preset is set for Mute FX In within the bypass section of the preset. I’m assuming this is FW issue that will be corrected but just wanted to see if anyone else noticed this. I A/B’d this with a Helix and it was very noticeable. Also when switching presets to another patch that has a delay in it, I’m hearing the delay time ramp back as if you were manually adjusting the delay time on a pedal.

Hey man,

I am coming from Helix as well. There is no doubt that Fractal has gaps when switching–it is just how it is. Coming from snapshots...it's just not the same. It's something I am learning to deal with, given all the other benefits of the FM9 amps, editor, etc.

As you know, it's all about channel switching. I had a hard time grasping that, I cannot just change the values of on a amp block (bass/treble/mids/gain/etc) between different SCENES–to me that makes so much more sense than having to copy the same amp to the the next channel, and adjust there...I mean, the SCENE is the differentiator, why not just change the values between scenes? I digress.

 

[rijiboy]

Hey man,

I am coming from Helix as well. There is no doubt that Fractal has gaps when switching–it is just how it is. Coming from snapshots...it's just not the same. It's something I am learning to deal with, given all the other benefits of the FM9 amps, editor, etc.

As you know, it's all about channel switching. I had a hard time grasping that, I cannot just change the values of on a amp block (bass/treble/mids/gain/etc) between different SCENES–to me that makes so much more sense than having to copy the same amp to the the next channel, and adjust there...I mean, the SCENE is the differentiator, why not just change the values between scenes? I digress.

I think I also suffered that "workflow shock", it was bothering me so much that yesterday I didnt really enjoy playing Fractal at all,
In Helix I can seamlessly jump from a patch with couple of amps and multiple signal paths to another heavy amp/fx patch without even going through snapshots, I dont perform live a lot, but when I do I have 4 patches, from clean to lead, and switching between them without lag is normal, the only thing that bothered me compared to my headrush, was the reverb and delay trails, and Helix fixed even that with firmware update couple of years ago., so for now I think I will keep Helix for live and keep Fractal for studio use till I learn all great suggestions here

And all is not bad, finally last night I sat down and explored some more of Fractal, Soldano SL100 model is exactly what I remembered it should've been from 2 decades ago, and I really like Ruby Rocket Bright amp model, this is exactly what I was looking for, I could get half way to this with tweaking Sag/Bias on Helix, and Ruby Rocket perfectly mimics a tube amp thats dying under the load recently I almost bought Marshall SV20h because that was the only amp coming close to the sound I needed, so thank you Fractal for bringing this great model into FM9

 

[GlennO]

Hey man,

I am coming from Helix as well. There is no doubt that Fractal has gaps when switching–it is just how it is. Coming from snapshots...it's just not the same.

As you know, it's all about channel switching. I had a hard time grasping that, I cannot just change the values of on a amp block (bass/treble/mids/gain/etc) between different SCENES

Yes, you can do that with the FM9/Axe-FX. The analogous feature to Helix Snapshots you're looking for is called Scene Controllers. The user interface is not as simple/intuitive as Helix snapshots, but it accomplishes the same thing.

 

[sick pickle]

Yes, you can do that with the FM9/Axe-FX. The analogous feature to Helix Snapshots you're looking for is called Scene Controllers. The user interface is not as simple/intuitive as Helix snapshots, but it accomplishes the same thing.

Yeah. I find it hard working out min maxes and percentages compared to the knobs I want to change. Like you said- just not user friendly. I’ll have to dig deeper to try to understand it more.