[Osw-users] Re: Trying OSW

[<wl...@wl...>]

> Wil: I downloaded OSW this PM and although it installed and ran, I'm
> having a bit of trouble getting decent sound out of it. The Shepard
> tone demo runs, but the sound quality is very poor, I suspect because
> my DAC can't keep up or vice-versa, the computation is too slow.
>
> I couldn't get any sound out of the OSW demo at all. Perhaps it's very
> slow to compute, but I had no indication of this.

If the OSW demo you're talking about is the can_you_say.osw patch, I don't
think it is supposed to make sound- yet. How is the sound quality poor?
Does the audio start "crackling"? Have you tried any of the simpler audio
patches in the tutorial/audio folder?
>
> The midi demo's worked, but sounded terrible and I don't think the 19
> tone demo was actually in 19-tone ET, but the sound was so poor nothing
> sounded right.
>
> I'm using a Sony Vaio tower computer, 550 Mhz Pentium III, Windows
> 98SE, 256 Megs of RAm, a 10 gig hard drive. Csound in various versions
> runs fine and gives me good sound in write to file, then play mode.
> Realtime Csound sounds about like OSW, so I suspect it's my computer.

You're using the windows binary? I have no information on OSW running
under windows 98- that might be an issue. I'll cc this message to the OSW
users' list- maybe Amar can shed some light on this. He is the
creator/initial developer of OSW, as well as the Windows maintainer.
>
> The sound card is an Aureal Vortex AU8830. I have a midi interfact for
> the USB port, but haven't had time to try it.
>
> I'm somewhat familiar with MAX, having gotten an alpha version from
> CNMAT in the late 80's and have used other sound generating programs
> such as HSML with Wires, Jsyn (the latter on my old MAC). I've even run
> MusicIVBF on a mainframe back in the Pleistocene at UCSD.

Cool. It sounds like you have a history of early adoption.

>
> Anyway, I think the OSW has a lot of potential and I like the look of
> the GUI. Hopefully, my problems won't prove fatal. I would be willing
> to run OSW in non-real time mode if that is possible.

OSW was designed from the ground up as a realtime language. As far as I
know, there is no way to run it in non-realtime. But, then again, realtime
is so much more fun. : )
>
> --John

,Wil