Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

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tseaver
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Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by tseaver »

I haven't tried it yet (and may not, as I'm pretty used to the built-in Harrison controls), but it looks good, and has a native Linux VST2 and VST3 versions:

https://audioassault.mx/products/aa-551-channel-strip

The introductory price is $7.99 (down from $34.99 list), with a free demo.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by sysrqer »

This looks pretty good. I've already got the overtone ones which cover most of this but $8 is worth a punt.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by funkmuscle »

$10.00 Canadian here and so far loving it.

Bit of a learning curve but it's worth it so far I think.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by tavasti »

artix_linux_user wrote: Thu Sep 29, 2022 5:45 pm In the real analog world, channel stripes are a nice idea:
in the best case, you will get that high end sound of that expensive analog mixing console for a budget price.
In the digital world, I do no see much sense in those:
I want to chose myself, which eq and which dynamics.
There is allways a better sounding eq or compressor plugin...
Probably if I would start using a channel stripe plugin, I would still need additional dynamic plugins then, anyways.
Just like there is plenty of eq, reverb, compressor etc plugins, there seems to be plenty of channel strips. So instead of selecting plugins you want separately, you select one channel strip, and use that.

I guess one advantage of using such is saving compute power. If multiple plugins (comp, saturation, eq, what else) is combined to one, there is less overhead compared to situation where you have all those separately. Another benefit might be more streamlined use, just add that your favorite plugin to everywhere, and you have same controls.

Personally haven't tested any of them, I do my final mixes in Mixbus, which has channel strips built-in :-)

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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by tseaver »

@artix_linux_user
I can not imagine a channel stripe plugin with a native GUI-that would be probably not so streamlinded and comfortable...
Having a fancy GUI wouldn't be that efficient then some nice ladspa or lv2 plugins...
I can't imagine that the GUI has much of an effect on the performance while the track is playing, unless it is doing a huge amount of "show me the wave forms" visualization stuff. The point at which the channel strip has a potential for improved performance is that it doesn't need to marshal / unmarshal the partially-processed sound from each built-in "stage" into / out of the ALSA/JACK intermediate format: instead, the outputs can be handed on from stage to stage in whatever lower-level internal format the designer / developer chooses.

Whether any of the available channel strip plugins actually "win" here is an "exercise left to the student" -- the costs of the plugin-to-plugin handoff could just vanish in the noise compared to the real DSP done by each plugin.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by elcalen »

In theory this plugin looks pretty nice, but based on my brief testing with the demo version it does look pretty CPU hungry, even without oversampling. And considering that a channel strip is typically something that's intended to go on a lot of tracks, that does put me off it. I feel like I can get similar results with a combination of existing plugins for a fraction of the CPU hit... Will it sound exactly the same? Probably not. Does that matter? Probably also not...

Edit: also more generally on the topic of GUIs: one shouldn't underestimate the importance of a really well designed, aesthetically pleasing UI. For creative work, the work environment itself is an important factor in feeling inspired, and that also includes the tools you work with. Obviously that's not the case for everyone, but it's still something to keep in mind when designing plugins. And for a lot of musicians, that nostalgic analogue vibe still has a strange magnetism to it... A well designed plugin also shouldn't use much if any extra CPU when the GUI is closed, so that shouldn't really be a factor for plugin choice, since most people won't have all their plugin windows open constantly...
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by funkmuscle »

Yes and sorry to hijack this but I just wanted to touch on the fact that GUI are quite inspiring. It's the same thing with hardware for me.

Kemper was the big craze for a while and I didn't know what the thing was but I knew every time I walked into a music store and I saw that ugly looking green thing that looked like a toaster in the amplifier section I never went near it. Then my friend who worked in the store told me what it was and I said people are freaking out over this? I said they got to do something about the looks because I would never ever entertain plugging a guitar into that thing just because of the looks. It didn't inspire me at all.

Once again sorry for hijacking but I just wanted to give an example on why I love the looks of plugins or hardware that would give me inspiration.

This plugin here though call me when I record my guitar I would like it EQ a bit kind of what takes place on the mixing board when you play live or before you put any tracks down. I was using parametric EQs and they worked but as soon as I put that in there I was able to dial in the sound I was looking for because I was inspired by what this plugin look like.

My only beef about it is that I followed all their instructions but every time I open it I still got to register it. I've got tons of plugins from them and I never have to go through this and I contacted them and they still say it needs to have read and write but nothing else in my OPT directory has read and write for groups and others. When I give this read and write permission, I can't access it. So in the meantime I just registered when I go to use it because the track is already done because I just use it for recording so I'm fine with that but so far I'm really loving this.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by mike@overtonedsp »

This looks pretty good. I've already got the overtone ones which cover most of this but $8 is worth a punt.
I was particularly interested in demoing this, as I'm very familiar with some of the hardware which I'm guessing inspired it, and we also have some plug-ins with - let's just say 'similar coloured knobs'. They are a bit more expensive, but they do come with some nice features such as the desirable control interaction of the EQ when boosting / cutting multiple bands, which is often overlooked, and smooth control interpolation (so you don't get the 'zipper noise' when adjusting controls, which can be quite noticeable with a 1kHz test tone on some plug-ins).
Last edited by mike@overtonedsp on Sun Oct 02, 2022 11:38 pm, edited 4 times in total.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by mike@overtonedsp »

Interesting analysis from UAD which makes informative reading for anyone interested in classic British recording console hardware

https://www.uaudio.com/blog/uad-4k-chan ... ompressor/
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by mike@overtonedsp »

I guess one advantage of using such is saving compute power. If multiple plugins (comp, saturation, eq, what else) is combined to one, there is less overhead compared to situation where you have all those separately. Another benefit might be more streamlined use, just add that your favorite plugin to everywhere, and you have same controls.
The point at which the channel strip has a potential for improved performance is that it doesn't need to marshal / unmarshal the partially-processed sound from each built-in "stage" into / out of the ALSA/JACK intermediate format: instead, the outputs can be handed on from stage to stage in whatever lower-level internal format the designer / developer chooses.
JACK / ALSA has nothing to do with it unless you are specifically using standalone JACK versions of a plug-in for example. If you are using a plugin chain within a DAW, all that happens is a function call to one plugin to process a buffer of samples, followed by a function call to another plugin to process the resulting buffer. So in that sense the overhead is minimal and not dissimilar to calling two separate functions within the same plug-in. However, the situation might be more complex for hosts which put plugins in a sandbox / separate process from the main DAW, and, if each plugin is doing oversampling then you will get the extra up / down conversion into and out of each plugin with associated CPU usage and extra latency. Oversampling is not automatically 'better' - sometimes its a case of the cure being worse than the disease
I can't imagine that the GUI has much of an effect on the performance while the track is playing, unless it is doing a huge amount of "show me the wave forms" visualization stuff.
If the GUI is not being updated / redrawn then it should have minimal effect on CPU. If it uses e.g. opengl then its possible that the UI is rendered every frame, irrespective of whether it has changed. That's just the way the GPU works. But, in that case normally most of the overhead will be on the GPU, even if there is some CPU involvement in preparing for each frame render.
I want to chose myself, which eq and which dynamics.
There is allways a better sounding eq or compressor plugin...
I've always found that channel strips are a bit cumbersome. If I have separate EQ and Dynamics modules / plug-ins, I lose some of the integration / processing options which I might - occasionally - need, but, if I just want to tweak an EQ setting, I don't have to open a massive plug-in with a GUI that fills the whole screen. That's why I made a variety of EQ / Dynamics 'virtual 500-series' plug-ins so you can mix and match different modules and processing within a channel - that's just my personal preference.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by sysrqer »

mike@overtonedsp wrote: Sun Oct 02, 2022 11:25 pm
This looks pretty good. I've already got the overtone ones which cover most of this but $8 is worth a punt.
I was particularly interested in demoing this, as I'm very familiar with some of the hardware which I'm guessing inspired it
So what do you think of it? I've played with it a little but the filters sounded pretty good to my ears.
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Re: Audio Assault has a new channel strip plugin

Post by mike@overtonedsp »

So what do you think of it? I've played with it a little but the filters sounded pretty good to my ears.
Firstly let me say its great that another manufacturer is supporting Linux, and I think the channel strip is a useful addition to the growing range of native Linux plug-ins. While the appearance of some plug-ins might lead users to certain expectations I would always urge doing your research, especially into original hardware, demoing a plugin (do some tone checks as well) if it has a free trial version and making an informed decision. Personally I felt a few things were slightly off from what I would expect - I mentioned the (lack of) expected EQ control interaction and parameter interpolation, and the compressor threshold / auto-gain makeup and gate behaviour was slightly different, but that might have been a design decision, or an aspect of the particular reference hardware, and may not be an issue for other users. It fulfils a useful role as a channel strip, it looks nice and its affordably priced, and its good that it works on Linux.
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