[PD] Pd sounds better than Max?

Batuhan Bozkurt batuhan at batuhanbozkurt.com
Fri Mar 7 23:05:04 CET 2008


But the problem becomes appearent when you actually do some signal 
processing with audio data. Max has a flaw about it's floating point 
precision. At first I was thinking the problem was just about 
visualisating data(like, when you monitor a signal value, it is rounded 
and looks wrong but actaul data passing from cables are correct) but 
later I figured that it was not the issue when I tried to use signal 
values as control data, it was all quirky. I haven't been using max for 
a couple of years so I can't find my patches and demonstrate various 
problems but here is what I remember, might be wrong though someone has 
to try it:
[sig~ 800]
|
[%~ 300]

this should give 200 but it was giving something like 199.9998 (I really 
can't remember).

If I were to test this value with [==~ 200]  I was getting zero. So it 
was the calculation itself that was wrong.

There were many problems like this that I experienced and they were 
really appearent when I tried to use these signals as control sources(by 
not leaving the audio domain) because the logical processes were failing 
and I was having to build structures for exceptional rounding errors.

And when you process audio and give those to speakers, you can hear that 
float precision really matters. Max was always sounding dull to me and I 
always blamed float precision.

To my ears and eyes, PD and Supercollider are VERY transparent in this 
sense.

BB

PS: I'm not very aware of the technical issues resulting this decreased 
float precision. So what I believe might be folklore, and I'd be happy 
to be corrected on this issue. Basically what I think that max/msp has 
serious flaws in its floating point handling and this results to BAD 
sound which has that dull msp'ish character.

Libero Mureddu wrote:
> Hi all,
> I remember some months ago I did the suggested test using oscs from:
> Max/MSP,
> Pd,
> PWGL,
> Csound and maybe (not sure anymore),
> SuperCollider.
>
> Well, they produces the same results.
> Anyway it was interesting to experience it!
>
> Here attached is the audacity project file with only max and pd; max
> cycle~ output is shorter so one can hear pd osc~  output starting to
> play only when the other one is finished.
> I reversed the phase using Audacity, to be honest, but I don't think
> this makes the test irregular :-)
> ciao
>
> libero
>
>
>  
>>  Message: 6
>>  Date: Fri, 07 Mar 2008 10:57:49 +0000
>>  From: Damian Stewart <damian at frey.co.nz>
>>  Subject: Re: [PD] Pd sounds better than Max?
>>  To: reduzierer at yahoo.de
>>  Cc: PD-List <pd-list at iem.at>
>>  Message-ID: <47D11FAD.1020000 at frey.co.nz>
>>  Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>>
>>  Roman Haefeli wrote:
>>
>>  > hey funny... i also heard people saying something similar the 
>> other way
>>  > around.
>>  >
>>  > since the same digital algorithm produces the same results on two
>>  > different machines or in two different softwares, i think there 
>> are only
>>  > very esoteric reasons to believe, that one sounds 'fuller' (what 
>> does it
>>  > mean technically?) or 'richer' (more harmonics?) than the other. 
>> for me
>>  > this goes to a similar direction as the discussion, if oxygen free,
>>  > golden plated 8mm-diammeter speaker cables sound better than 
>> others (i
>>  > would rather suspect a difference there than between max and pd).
>>
>>  well, he also said that it was because the [osc~] had a larger table 
>> size
>>  in Pd than in Max, which would make sense.
>>
>>  my initial assumption was that it was to do bit-depth. i used to 
>> scoff at
>>  people who claimed 24 bit was better; but then i spent some time in a
>>  studio working with 24 bit audio, and, well, you notice. (but both 
>> Pd and
>>  Max are 32 bit float, right?)
>>
>>  i hear you about the speaker cables; there are differences even amongst
>>  digital stuff though. for example when Ableton Live clips, to my 
>> ears it
>>  clips a lot nicer than ProTools does. (actually ProTools in general 
>> sounds
>>  very dead - its precision means that you have to work your ass off 
>> to get
>>  colour into your sound.) and back when i was composing in a multitrack
>>  sequencer environment, i remember choosing to use Cubase SX because its
>>  audio engine just sounded nicer than any of the other apps of the time
>>  (Cakewalk and Logic being the main competitors).
>>
>>  > hm.. thinking more about that, i wonder whether this guy thinks, 
>> that pd
>>  > people do just different, probably subjectively better sounding 
>> stuff.
>>  > or does he really think, that [phasor~] in pd sounds nicer than the
>>  > [phasor~] in max? this would be actually quite easy to test, if 
>> there is
>>  > any difference at all. create a wav with same frequency and phase 
>> of a
>>  > [phasor~], once in pd, once in max, and then subtract the one from 
>> the
>>  > other and if you do not get a completely silent file,
>>  > then...............  *i shut up*      ;-)
>>
>>  nice idea, but i'd try it with an [osc~]. anyone want to volunteer?
>>
>>  --
>>  damian stewart | +351 967 797 263 | damian at frey.co.nz
>>  frey | live art with machines | http://www.frey.co.nz
>>     
>
>
>   
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