Category: Ticks, Tips, & Tricks

(Partially solved: Clone error still lingers)

While working on a mastering session I noticed I was no longer getting bit for bit transparency. I tracked the problem down to the track mute & clone function. Long story short the mute buttons & cloning tracks can break bit transparency.
To demonstrate the plugin clone issue. Clone a single track with the LP64 multi-band & try to phase cancel with the original.
Clone it twice & the two clones will 100% cancel, but not with the original.

Update:
I’ve figured out the root of the mute issue.
Sonar generates DC or noise bits on silence/lack of content by default. And well mute creates silence.

This INI variable can have the following values:
0 – Fill silent buffers with zeroes, i.e., no denormal prevention.

1 – Fill silent buffers with positive valued low-gain DC

2 – Fill silent buffers with alternating positive and negative valued low-gain DC. The value flips sign on each audio streaming buffer.

3 – Fill silent buffers with alternating positive and negative valued low-gain DC. The value flips sign on each sample.

4 – Fill silent buffers with low-gain noise.

The gain in options 1-4 is determined by ZeroFillDB. We chose 2 as the default because in our testing it reduced denormal problems with the largest number of plugins.

Workaround/Fix
Sending a 64 bit silent dummy clip to all created buses will clear the stuck bit errors. Loop this provided clip across the duration of your project.

silent dummy clip.wav

Creating 5.1 wmv’s from 5.1 quicktime’s can be pure frustration from OS X. With the help of Bootcamp/Expression Encoder & this can all be done on a single finalcut system.

(Tip – Watch fullscreen @ 1080p for clear text)

Not a very exciting video I have to say, but this should give some a better idea of the difference between floating point & integer headroom. Well at least show the advantage not being able to clip the audio while ITB. FYI – yes the video is silent. (For your listening pleasure)

I’m a fan of over the top drum sounds. Sometimes full on distortion is what a track calls for. One of my favorite tools for this is the RAT Deucetone. (as the clueless guitar snob salesman called it “douchetone”). I enjoy the power of analog distortion. It’s a great duel input distortion stompbox that is just begging to be used on a bus insert.

Ratting up that drum bus. (Drum distortion) by Rhythm In Mind

Sonar 32/64 icons

For those that run both the 32 & 64bit versions of Sonar, you might find these helpful.

Having calibrated utility & test files is a must for any audio engineer. The corner stone being pink noise. I have found most DAW to be severely lacking in this area. After much frustration with Protools incorrectly calibrated “Pink” from it’s built in signal generator. I’ve captured 45 sec of full range -20 ref 0vu true random pink noise from a Dolby SDU4.

Let there be noise. by Rhythm In Mind