Audiobus: Use your music apps together.

What is Audiobus?Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.

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Audiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.

Most CPU/RAM efficient synths/effects

I've noticed a lot of recent posts of people commenting on synths that are having a hard time running without breakups on the iPad 2.....most recently TC11, iTuttle and Virtual ANS. This got me curious... What are the most CPU efficient synths available? In other words, which synths would likely run fine with an iPad 1. I mention an iPad 1 as a benchmark, because if it runs fine there, it will run fine anywhere. :-) I have an iPad 2 right now, and so this information would be good for me (and anyone else who uses an iPad 2) to know. :-)

How about effects too? What are the most efficient ones? I suspect AUFX fits in this category, but don't know for sure...

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Comments

  • I would think Sunrizer.

  • Probably best to get one of those system monitor apps mentioned on another thread and compare for yourself. I imagine some of those utilities would break it down to the resources used by active apps.

  • Sunrizer runs great on my iPad 2. AND it's by far still the best VA on the AppStore. The guy behind it is just a genius. The performance he managed to get with Impaktor is also quite amazing, considering everything it does from the moment you clap/snap your hand til you hear the sound. It analyzes not only the volume on the incoming sound but also the timbre of the sound, and then proceed to synthesize the sound with physical modelings etc, add effects and so on top, all with absolutely no latency. Unless you use it in Audiobus which will use it's own buffer size.

    NLog is another synth that plays well with both older and newer hardware since it detects what hardware your on and adjusts the buffer size accordingly (512 on iPad 2).

    AUFX seems really really efficient as mentioned.

    Actually, iPad 2 and newer are really capable when it comes to audio effects etc. Running a couple of FabFilter and PSPaudioware effects on my old dual core windows DAW would probably give it trouble. But iPad 2 can handle surprisingly much here, unless you start to use over-sampling etc, that'll bring any iPad to its knees.

  • Bismark BS 16i. Bonus is it is 16 timbre GM player.

  • How does Magellan stand up to things?

  • Magellan does very well on my Ipad 2.

  • edited October 2013

    I would imagine that TC-11 > Turnado > Auria wouldn't do too well. ;-)

    ...even on an iPad 5 with some patch setups. ;-)

  • @funjunkie27 I've thought of that and have even downloaded so apps to try to measure things, but there is a lot of work involved in creating an equal test bed, finding the most cpu intensive patches for each synth and other things, so that I can determine what runs best. I can tell you this....from my initial testing, the iMini uses a LOT of CPU, even when it is just sitting there and doing absolutely nothing. I LOVE the sound from the iMini, but it is not one that I would put on the list of most CPU efficient. :-)

  • Cassini runs great on my iPad Mini (same as iPad 2).

    Most apps do pretty well unless you get a lot of polyphony + effects.

  • ...yeah, but the polyphony and effects are a big part of the fun! :-) Noted about Cassini. Anyone know about any of the Korg apps and how hungry they are?

  • Crystal Synth, a synth that doesn't get much love here, has a built in CPU meter but I have yet to figure out what is going on with it. Playing the same patch, with the same polyphony, the meter will seemingly jump randomly from low usage to spiked. Come to think of it, Crystal Synth was always a bit wonky on my computer too.

  • edited October 2013

    Crystal synth is heavy on cpu i think i always get clicks/cracks when i try to use it with audiobus and extra effects. I just can record it "dry" on my iPhone 5.
    NanoStudio is nice and cpu friendly. Sunrizer is great too! (but since there is no more iPhone support i doesn't use it anymore).

  • DXi had an update today (added 4" support and master tune), so I started messing around with it a bit. It was one of those synths I bought way back but somehow it ended up buried in some folder, unused. And 1. I'm gonna start using this one more, it sounds great, dunno why it got left gathering dust in the first place. 2. It runs really really smooth on the iPad 2, tried it with various effects inside Audiobus at the lower buffer setting and ran great.

  • I was disappointed with the sound of DXi. I tried to like, I really did, but couldn't. :-(

  • Yea it doesn't exactly replace Native Instruments amazing FM7/8 synth. It does have that metallic/static timbre to it, and certainly is one of those synths you either like or don't since it is quite limited when compared to monster FM synths like NIs. I got stuck on the bass sounds, really liked those.

    Speaking of, I don't know if NI still have FM7 in their product library and if they're still updating it etc, but I wouldn't exactly mind an iPad port. :)

  • edited October 2013

    I found that some of the effects breathed new life into apps that I was ignoring.

    Turnado/aufx dub work well with DXi.
    May have something to do with the sounds being 'thin',....'delicate'

    if I use these effects on a richer sounding synths(nave for instance)there aren't as many nuances in the sound.

  • @Audiojunkie - I hear ya. There are a lot of variables involved. Still, it might be useful to know how each does with a default patch and same note played...maybe via midi, so velocity, volume, etc. are kept constant.

  • Dear all,

    This is an "analysis" of RAM usage I did one year ago, where I used the "Sys Status" app to check the memory usage of the apps I had at that time. Note that probably is a bit inaccurate and also outdated... But might be useful ;-).

    Synth

    • Magellan 150 (jr) 100
    • Animoog 120 (Jr) 100
    • Sunrizer 100 (Jr) 80
    • NlogPro 140 (Jr) 130
    • Cassini 110 (Jr) 60
    • Artic keys 100
    • ipolysix 120
    • wave mapper 120
    • Dxi 70
    • ipulsaret 100

    Drums

    • DM1 160
    • Molten 120
    • Modrum 100
    • Drum jam 100

    Instruments

    • Sampletank 150
    • BS16i 200 (depends on the sound fonts)
    • Thumb jam 60

    EFX

    • jam up pro 100
    • livefx 100
  • Sean......hmmmmm?

  • You can easily have an app that uses very little RAM and yet hammers the CPU... or equally well the opposite. Either can cause problems.

  • Nanostudio's Eden synth is quite efficient and nice to learn the principles of synthesis with.

  • edited October 2013

    Yeah, Eden is crazy efficient. Running 12 instances with effects on my 4s doesn't even hiccup. It's no sunrizer but it's an awful lot of synth for very very little overhead.

  • @rrc2soft Great! That's really helpful! :-)

  • I am Glad I found this thread. I also have an Ipad2 and after installing "Harmony Voice" was challenged for the first time so far in using apps that made it impossible to enjoy my music experience. I can run several synth apps like sunrizer and Modular and Alchemy. I am using Music Studio and just got Audiobus. It took all night but I did not give up. I wanted to use that vocal app and at least one synth and have a nice trouble free session. I will tell you right now that Sunrizer was making it impossible to use the "Harmony Voice" but I did find a common ground in using Modular and Harmony Voice together and then adding "Music Studio" as the destination. I am using a Alesis io dock 1 and of course was able to run the instruments in Music Studio as well. I have not tried this with Garage Band but will do that in the future. I was so frustrated that I ended up putting the head phones on so no one might hear how bad the stuttering was while sunrizer and even alchemy pushed the vocal app to far. Don't get me wrong, I bought all these because I like the sounds. I just need to have the ability to sing as well and as inexpensive as these products are they still add up. If I could I would get a new Ipad and go crazy with new apps but I also know from many years of investing thousands of dollars on synth platforms....one (pc based) was absolutely great till they went insolvent. (bankrupt), I still have that whole system in my other studio and I can stack synths and effects like crazy! <<< ((point being that new only lasts for a short time and that is why I think this is great to list what does work with what we have.)) LOL... but I really like the size and portability of the Ipad and I also like the low latency and am not afraid to say that is very cool. Well. for anyone wanting to run that Harmony Voice on a Ipad 2 just beware of the limits. It is pretty cool though and if you don't mind running some of the ones I mentioned along with it than I believe it is worth it. And that is realtime. Still can come in and lay tracks with Sunrizer or other synths. If anyone knows any cool tricks or configurations than I sure would love to hear. I will add other apps to the list or workarounds as I find them. Cheers. - Bettis

  • This is a good topic to ask, as you can get burned as an older device user trying to run some of the more complicated synths, effects apps, etc. on an under-powered device. The information posted by @rrc2soft is interesting, but memory usage can fluctuate dramatically depending on what you are trying to do within a program.

    I have an iPad2. Of the programs mentioned above, Sunrizer and Magellan are full-featured synths and seem to run pretty efficiently. There are some (like Thor, or several of the modular ones) that look great but I don't even bother trying b/c I've heard enough about performance issues.

    Of the apps I own that are probably "above" the capability line of my device: Arturia iSEM; Auria (DAW); Turnado & WOW FilterBox. Most of those I purchased on some type of extreme sale, and knowing full well that they may not work well on my device. They also happen to be excellent apps that were as good as advertised, so I don't regret any of the purchases. iSEM takes literally 30 seconds to load and just tends to be prone to audio clicks and glitches - but man are there some nice sounds in there.

    HOT TIP: Many have noted that Inter-App Audio (IAA) runs without latency (or less latency), and this is cited as an advantage. But, actually, the ability to setup AudioBus at 512 or even 1024 frames is a major advantage if you have a CPU-hungry app. A lot of guitar players know that those apps can get tough to run through AB into a DAW, but virtually any of them can be made to work if you increase latency. Unfortunately, playing a guitar accurately gets noticeably harder from 512 frames and up.

  • I use iSEM all the time with no issues on my ipad2, I honestly don't think I have ever noticed any types of glitching.
    Thor is completely usable as well. There are a few patches that are too taxing, but tons that an ipad2 can easily handle. Turnado runs well too. I sometimes have issues with Wow, but am able to frequently use it, and am not sure if the problems are due to underpowered hardware.

    I always close all apps, reboot, and clear RAM before trying anything too intensive.

  • @Zymos said:

    I use iSEM all the time with no issues on my ipad2, I honestly don't think I have ever noticed any types of glitching.
    Thor is completely usable as well. There are a few patches that are too taxing, but tons that an ipad2 can easily handle. Turnado runs well too. I sometimes have issues with Wow, but am able to frequently use it, and am not sure if the problems are due to underpowered hardware.

    I always close all apps, reboot, and clear RAM before trying anything too intensive.

    Several things...One, my iPad2 rarely has more than 1.0-1.5GB of free space...if that. I've heard that can cause issues, but I share the device with my wife, and some of the music apps I "have to have" are pretty big!

    Two, I've gotten better at memory management recently. cMemory (the Chinese version with refresh) probably is just voodoo or snake oil, except that since I got Auria, I swear the available RAM in that program does go up after you do a refresh in cMemory!

    Three, iSEM is usable, but it just seems to have a lot going on there. Loading it and playing it is one thing - it always works like that. Connecting it to Auria while playing back a rhythm track is more taxing. Also, it has IAA generator compatibility, so I was running it without latency (as discussed above). It probably would work fine on AudioBus at 512 frames.

    Four, any effects app used in conjunction with an instrument app or just playing back a track, is going to stress an iPad2. Turnado and WOW are resource-hungry, and I'm not the only person to notice that. I like the way they function in Auria as plug-ins, however. Rather than glitching, Auria tends to pop up an error message if you're trying to do too much.

    One thing I forget to do often is switch to Airplane mode. Turning off the WiFi/Bluetooth radios may or may not help, but certainly won't hurt.

  • With iSynPoly you can play 3 synth plus 1 drum machine on 4 different midi channels, as well as Magellan 2 synths....for me this is the trick...

  • Sunrizer is still the king.

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