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NEW FM PROCESSOR

K

konbaasiang

Hi guys!

I've been developing a brand new FM processor in software. With an advanced distortion cancelling clipper that can handle even xylophone, saxophone, telephone (or any other kind of phone) without objectionable distortion, it may just be the cleanest FM processor in the world to date.

Would you guys care to beta test? :)

I've recorded a few demo clips of difficult songs (Debbie Gibson - Lost in your eyes, Evanescence - My Immortal, Kelly Clarkson - Because of you, Kenny G / Aaron Neville - Even if me heart would break, Madonna - Power of Goodbye, Toni Braxton - Unbreak my heart, U2 - Electrical Storm, U2 - With or without you).

File are 75us pre-emph -- play with mpxtool or feed into the nearest exciter (or de-emph yourself).

http://mpxtool.com/bafm/

And here's the first beta of the program, and a screenshot:

http://bredband.leif.cx/browse/bafm/

Can't wait to hear what you guys think! Eagerly awaiting comments.

///Leif
 
WOW! Great work Leif!

Big thumbs up on the cool interface and waveform display.. let alone the sweet audio..

It's definately very clean and a nice range of presets... seems a bit lacking in Bass energy on some of the presets (except the Dance one!) but perhaps that's just my taste..

Would be good to race this against some of the hardware boxen.

Matt
 
Thank you :).

I'm totally addicted to that scope myself.

I agree the Bass is conservative in most presets -- it's by design, since the Bass Boost and Bass Shape controls are right there if you want that über-bass.

Racing is fun! If you don't mind some huge downloads, you can download clips of the following processors:

Optimod 8500 (Impact Less-More 4.0, 75us, composite out)
Omnia 6exi (Rock-n-Roll, 75us, composite out)
Optimod 8200 (Rock-Dense Less-More 9.0, 75us, L/R pre-emph out)
BW Broadcast DSPXtreme FMHD (CHR-HOT 75us, composite out)
BW Broadcast DSPXmini SE (CHR, 75us, composite out)
Breakaway FM (Plutonium, 75us, L/R pre-emph out)

Along with the original, here: http://mpxtool.com/site/torture-test.html

I've greatly improved the way DMPX files are handled -- you can now reassign the processors by editing a single file (00index), and add your own clip just by creating a descriptor file and referencing it from the 00index, so computer-aided racing is easier than ever.

///Leif
 
Leif, I will check it out on Hot96.net (I have it running your older Otiv software right now..

also, I am the engineer who handles all the processing setups for CBS's stations in Portland, so I will try to get you back some feedback, if you keep me up to date on updates..


hit me back on the Hot96 email..
 
Hot96, awesome!

For webcasting, set it to 15 or 25us pre-emphasis, and make sure de-emphasis is on.

The very slight pre-emphasis has virtually no impact on the high-end -- but it keeps the high-end away from the top and bottom of the waveform, which helps MP3 encoders greatly, since they will otherwise overshoot and cause clipping the decoder side.

In short, I believe Breakaway FM can actually help reach unprecedented loudness for webcasts, while keeping it relatively clean. Now, whether loudness wars are a good thing, that's a different story altogether :).

Hey, I couldn't find an email address on your site, other than [email protected]... Can you give me a hint? :)

///Leif
 
Actually it seems like you can configure the output soundcard to bypass pre-emphasis right?

Great program and even includes virtual audio cable it appears!

The big question now is, how much :) ?
 
Gunterm, what do you mean by bypass pre-emphasis?

You can choose whether to de-emphasize the soundcard output -- and you can choose 15, 25, 50 or 75us pre-emphasis -- but you can't run the clipper completely flat.

The reason for this, is that the clipper works *too well* run on flat audio. When a signal that tightly packed is sent through an MP3 encoder / decoder, overshoots appear. 128 kbps MP3 can have 3dB of overshoot on treble peaks! Those overshoots would then be clipped in the decoder, and no matter how well Breakaway FM masks the distortion, it can't do a thing about clipping that happens downstream, and it's painfully audible.

To counteract this, I added the 15 and 25us pre-emphasis curves. With those, you basically still have full high-end, but thanks to the de-emphasis, the signal will not be right at the edge, and thus the overshoots the MP3 encoder makes will not cause problems. :)

///Leif
 
I use the consumer version like, when my computer is running. It uses almost no CPU and there's next to zero latency. YouTube (with the fmt=18 trick) is actually bearable now. ;D
 
not sure if there is supposed to be any form of 64bit support but I attempted to install in Vista 64 (quad core processor).

I got this error. The program was able to install and open.

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: breakawayfm.exe
Application Version: 0.9.0.10
Application Timestamp: 48ec9f70
Fault Module Name: ntdll.dll
Fault Module Version: 6.0.6001.18000
Fault Module Timestamp: 4791a783
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: 0002f217
OS Version: 6.0.6001.2.1.0.256.1
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: a205
Additional Information 2: 020534af3b403d9658a98b169ec4df02
Additional Information 3: 6386
Additional Information 4: 48778e5f62a054b914e1a72e1424345c



I will also test from a 32bit OS later today. I can't wait Leif your program looks very promising.
 
Thank you, oldiesstation! :)

Michael, it is supposed to work in Vista 64. Tested it myself!

You mentioned the program was able to install and open. Then, what happened? When did the error come up -- was it in response to a button you clicked?
Please describe as closely as you can -- it will really help me to be able to reproduce it and track it down.

Venturing into the world of guessing, if it happened when you tried to actually start Breakaway (that is, pressed Finish) in the I/O Configuration, it could possibly have to do with sound card drivers. There's three different audio interfaces supported (DirectSound, Wave, Kernel Streaming). Try one of the ones you weren't using -- it may work better.

///Leif
 
np: Christina Aguilera - Hurt [Back To Basics] [04:03][5.30MB][1411kbps CBR WAV][44kHz Stereo]

Indeed. Nice test track.
 
konbaasiang said:
Thank you, oldiesstation! :)

Michael, it is supposed to work in Vista 64. Tested it myself!

You mentioned the program was able to install and open. Then, what happened? When did the error come up -- was it in response to a button you clicked?
Please describe as closely as you can -- it will really help me to be able to reproduce it and track it down.

Venturing into the world of guessing, if it happened when you tried to actually start Breakaway (that is, pressed Finish) in the I/O Configuration, it could possibly have to do with sound card drivers. There's three different audio interfaces supported (DirectSound, Wave, Kernel Streaming). Try one of the ones you weren't using -- it may work better.

///Leif
Click to expand...

It installed fine after the error and then opens and works perfectly.

Indeed nice work! I have to agree with everyone. I can't wait to try this on my personal pc at home.

What will be different in the consumer version?
 
The consumer "desktop" version doesn't have the FM back-end, doesn't currently have as many presets (both will gain more over time I'm sure), doesn't have linear-phase filters in many places (mainly so the latency is next to zero), and a few other minor changes that have been made/tweaked for the $199 FM version... any of which may end up finding their way back to the consumer "desktop" version, as it makes sense for Leif to do.

Also, the FM back-end is a HUGE part of the CPU use on the FM version, especially on the AMD platform. Therefore the consumer "desktop" version uses a lot less CPU. But is also not made for FM broadcasting at all.
 
Jammyjii: Excellent pick! I can only imagine what that voice does to conventional clippers :). You might be interested to know that there's actually no pre-emphasis related HF limiter in Breakaway FM. All the work is done by the final clipper -- this is why the high-end sound so unrestrained.

The Output meters are not simply a gradient from green to yellow to red, although they look that way:
They're actually two independent layers.
The rear layer is red, and shows the peak level before clipping.
The front layer is green to yellow, and shows the peak level *after* clipping.

So, when you see the red going up above 12dB, that means there's literally more than 12dB of clipping going on.

So, how does the clipper sound so clean when clipping that deeply into the waveform?
Well.. I could tell ya, but I'd have to kill ya ;).


Michael, thank you! I'm glad it worked out. Those intermittent problems are the hardest to reproduce and solve, but once running it is proving to be very stable.

The consumer version has actually been out for months. It's the same front-end (agc, multiband) but uses look-ahead limiting exclusively - no clipping. It also has no low-pass filter or oversampling (no need!), and it's not phase linear (no time! latency is critical when watching video) but instead uses all-pass minimum-phase crossovers. It does no pre-emphasis, so it's no more suitable for FM broadcasting than an 1100 -- it's just not what it was designed for. :)

You could run the consumer version into an external pre-emphasis and clipper, but the audio would fall apart long before it gets anywhere near competitive loudness.

If comparing a preset that is common between the two, they sound remarkably similar -- despite BaFM doing an order of magnitude more work to squeeze the signal into FM with acceptable loudness, punch, clarity and cleanliness.

The consumer version cannot directly receive audio from sound cards, and cannot transmit audio to virtual cables. It's what I had to do, to be able to sell it at a price where it's worth it for anyone who ever listens to music on a computer.

Once the FM version is out, I'll start work on a webcaster / dj version. Same front end and look-ahead limiting, but selectable minimum delay / phase linear, no i/o restrictions, broadcast-oriented presets, and probably with ASIO support for realtime monitoring capable latency.

Did I ever mention I love audio processing? :)

///Leif
 
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