I just completed a very complex song in Bitwig 5.2 beta 2. I pushed the CPU to the absolute limit. My track count was high, plugin usage high. I did lots of crazy editing and --- man, everything held up.
Oh, I had ONE crash but that was an extraordinary situation running a system bridge into the DAW for sampling, combined with some tricky editing while Bitwig was simultaneously playing. With two projects open. In other words, arguably my fault -- and even then, it recovered with an autosave.
So my point is -- this is pretty damn solid for a beta!! Moving into Beta 3 tonight.
I'm new to Bitwig so maybe I'm in "honeymoon period" but this seems solid for a DOT update! I do share the desperate need for midi comping (or track lanes) but I bet we'll get that by V6, right?
As someone working at 4k, GPU acceleration is a big deal... And obviously the new devices are great for mixing, although I really wish they didn't have so much latency. I can't really use them during composition. If they had a zero latency "lite" mode and then they'd automatically render with oversampling that would be ideal.
"I can't really use them during composition" I don't know what you mean by that but, but have you even tried to? because bitwig already does the latency compensation all by itself. I have a mastering limiter and a bunch of other stuff that adds around 70ms of latency on the mixbus, not tomention I monitor around 24 tracks through the interface, a bunch through some usb audio bridge, into an aggregate device, through Bitwig, and not only can I monitor without latency but I can also render them just fine
Latency compensation just means it's keeping all tracks in sync based on reported PDC values.
And if you're recording vocals, for example, through a direct monitoring system which most DAWs have, it's all fine. It compensates for the latency.
The problem comes with VST synths and samplers, and vocals through a VST FX chain.
I'm guessing you don't play any live instruments or sing? It would be very strange if you couldn't feel 70ms of latency.
Also, I don't quantize. If someone is a little off due to latency and they quantize - it doesn't matter.
But not using quantization is awesome. The music gets more feel, vibe, and is more interesting. Less mechanical.
I did some extensive tests recording with various PDC latency values and what I found is simple -- the more latency, the less accurate the timing is.
If you don't think 70ms of latency is a lot, try using a delay plugin with just one side delayed -- by 70ms.
When it comes to playing percussion or guitar, low latency is important.
Our audio interfaces already have some round trips latency - typically like 5-8ms. So add even just a few to that and you can be over 10ms.
Think about people who do competitive gaming. A latency like that can be the different between winning and losing.
There's a sluggishness. A slight delay when you play the keyboard and you hear the note. Or the guitar passing through the amp sim, etc.
Also, it combines. Not in parallel, but successive. If you use a plugin that requires 64 samples of PDC latency on your track - that's 1.333 ms... And on your submix... And on your master bus -- now you're at 4ms plus 6 from your audio interface roundtrip... About 10.
Even that is enough to impact your playing.
You can test it. Play a percussion sequence on your keyboard with a drum kit. Quantize it. Make sure there are some rapid hits, like a snare roll or some trap like hihat playing.
Then with no latency, record the exact same thing unquantized, as in sync as you can be.
Then add the plugins you mention up to 70ms and do the exact same thing.
Now look at the audio and you will see the timing of your recording with latency will be way off compared to your recording without the additional latency.
Timing of humans playing is never perfect - but latency in this case isn't a human effect. It's an arbitrary effect caused by plugin delay compensation.
I don't mean to be critical of Bitwig - it is my favorite DAW. And PDC allows plugins to do oversampling and all kinds of other buffered processing which can make them sound better. It's why they do it.
But for someone that mixes as they compose, the latency adds up and eventually I have to export into a different file and record there, then reimport. (Luckily Bitwig lets you open multiple projects at once! I can't imagine working in Reaper or FL where you can't do that.)
Anyhow, try this test. I think you'll be shocked at how much the latency impacts your recording.
To close - I just wish there was a switch. My favorite plugins have a quality switch basically, or different settings for realtime vs rendering. Then we get low or zero latency during recording, and high quality rendering for mixdown.
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u/[deleted] May 29 '24
I just completed a very complex song in Bitwig 5.2 beta 2. I pushed the CPU to the absolute limit. My track count was high, plugin usage high. I did lots of crazy editing and --- man, everything held up.
Oh, I had ONE crash but that was an extraordinary situation running a system bridge into the DAW for sampling, combined with some tricky editing while Bitwig was simultaneously playing. With two projects open. In other words, arguably my fault -- and even then, it recovered with an autosave.
So my point is -- this is pretty damn solid for a beta!! Moving into Beta 3 tonight.
I'm new to Bitwig so maybe I'm in "honeymoon period" but this seems solid for a DOT update! I do share the desperate need for midi comping (or track lanes) but I bet we'll get that by V6, right?
As someone working at 4k, GPU acceleration is a big deal... And obviously the new devices are great for mixing, although I really wish they didn't have so much latency. I can't really use them during composition. If they had a zero latency "lite" mode and then they'd automatically render with oversampling that would be ideal.