[PD] Pd sounds better than Max?

Hans-Christoph Steiner hans at eds.org
Sat Mar 8 01:02:29 CET 2008


On Mar 7, 2008, at 5:23 AM, Roman Haefeli wrote:

> On Fri, 2008-03-07 at 01:28 +0000, Damian Stewart wrote:
>> hey,
>>
>> i was talking to a Portuguese musician tonight (Miguel Cardoso is  
>> his name)
>> and he was saying that he thought that Pd sounded much better than  
>> Max - a
>> fuller sound with the oscillators, he said.
>>
>> i hadn't really thought about this before, but i do know that to  
>> my ears my
>> Pd patches sound a lot richer than most Max/MSP stuff that I've  
>> heard - not
>> sure whether that's my source material or patches or whether it's  
>> at a
>> deeper architectural level than that.
>>
>> anyone have any evidence, anecdotal or otherwise, to confirm this?  
>> reasons
>> why this might be the case?
>
>
> 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).
>
> 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*      ;-)
>

I think it is unlikely that there is a noticeable difference in  
double-blind testing.  I am sure that people hear differences between  
them, but I am guessing that those differences are inside the brain,  
rather than outside :).

Also, consider that MSP started from Pd code.

.hc

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Using ReBirth is like trying to play an 808 with a long stick.    - 
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