# Legato Latency with Spitfire & 8Dio. Advice most welcome!



## timestudios (Aug 21, 2018)

Hi, Apologies if this is posted in the wrong area. I'm not a scripter but I'm hoping the experts here could shed light on my latency issues with certain libraries.

I'm running a macbook 2.5ghz dual core. Internal SSD & 16Gb Ram. DAW Logic Pro X.

I am experiencing midi latency during live and playback mode with legato patches. Some libraries more than others. I can reduce latency in Kontakt stand alone mode by adjusting buffer sizes but my Macbook struggles at very low rates. As a plugin in logic i still experience latency even at 32 samples. Changing the sample rate doesn't help much either. 

I have to shift the midi data forwards in the track regions to make the notes play in time with the rest of the project. 

Will a faster CPU help? I'm considering upgrading to a quad core iMac. I understand moving the libraries to an external drive will help. My midi keyboard is old and uses a traditional midi pin cable direct into my Steinberg sound card. I could upgrade that also however it works fine and without latency for piano patches and orchestral staccatos. My Chris Hein legatos don't seem to suffer but my other libraries legatos are very laggy. Any advice will be hugely welcome! Many thanks!


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## EvilDragon (Aug 21, 2018)

Absolutely shift the notes where they need to be. Don't expect everything will align to the grid always.


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## timestudios (Aug 21, 2018)

EvilDragon said:


> Absolutely shift the notes where they need to be. Don't expect everything will align to the grid always.



Hi. Thanks for getting back to me. I feel a lot better knowing it's normal behaviour. I've worked with audio quite extensively but very new to midi. Just to be clear, even if i quantise the notes to snap to the grid, certain legato samples will still sound out of time? That's what's currently happening. I'm moving the midi data as needed to play in time with the pulse of the project. Thanks again. This website seems like a great place for discourse with other V.I users! Thanks for having me! Rolz.


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## EvilDragon (Aug 21, 2018)

Don't quantize to grid, period. Use your ears


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## timestudios (Aug 21, 2018)

Can I ask you how to set the instrument preload buffer please for Kontakt please? It's at the current default setting of 60.00kb. All my libraries are on my internal SSD. Can I also ask you what's the best setting for sending midi to the outside world. It's also at the default setting of GUI. Your advice is much appreciated!


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## EvilDragon (Aug 21, 2018)

There have been threads about those questions you could search, but...

If you're full-on SSD feel free to drop DFD buffer size to the lowest value globally (in Options->Memory). You don't need to worry about sending MIDI to outside world unless you want to use Kontakt's arpeggiators, sequencers etc. to drive other plugins. Some DAWs don't even support this feature. Just disable all that, I'd say.


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## timestudios (Aug 21, 2018)

Evil Dragon. You're a legend. Thanks for helping a newbie. I'll familiarise myself with the Kontakt user guide and keep experimenting so eventually I might be able to help others on this site instead of asking for info 'cap in hand!' All good wishes! Rolz.


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## brek (Aug 21, 2018)

It sounds like your talking about the latency that's "baked" into the samples themselves, and not computer latency. So changing the pre-load buffer in Kontakt or your audio card buffer settings won't do anything about that. Pretty much all sample libraries have it to some degree or another. Some are relatively short, some are quite longer. Here's the developer of Cinematic Studio Strings talking more about it:





I generally set a MIDI pre-delay on all of my orchestral tracks. For example, when I'm using LASS I put a pre-delay of about 20-30ms on my short articulations track and 40-50ms on legato patches. Of course, I tweak with my ear if something isn't sitting right. Having this pre-delay allows me to quantize to the grid - which I consider necessary at times for speeding up the workflow when conforming cues to new edits or quickly sending out charts for musicians. But, I still have to manually shift portamento transitions to fall in time. A user here created a pretty ingenious solution to this:
https://vi-control.net/community/threads/free-permanent-fix-for-css-legato.71972/ 

That thing alone is almost enough to get me to switch to Logic.


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## timestudios (Aug 22, 2018)

Hi Brek. Thanks so much for such a detailed reply. That’s a big help mate! 

I’ll take a good look at the attachments you sent and take it from there. 

All good wishes. 

Rolz.


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## lingtalfi (Jun 28, 2020)

Well, that sucks. Working with midi we shouldn't have to do this manually, I hope libraries will improve with time, so that when we align things on a grid, they sound aligned on a grid.


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## polypx (Jun 28, 2020)

It'd be awesome if Kontakt could predict the future, so that when I play a new note it starts the legato 80 ms earlier.


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## lingtalfi (Jun 28, 2020)

polypx said:


> It'd be awesome if Kontakt could predict the future, so that when I play a new note it starts the legato 80 ms earlier.



Yes exactly, just ask the daw (or however you do it, but just do it).


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## Jay Panikkar (Jun 28, 2020)

lingtalfi said:


> Well, that sucks. Working with midi we shouldn't have to do this manually, I hope libraries will improve with time, so that when we align things on a grid, they sound aligned on a grid.



It's not a problem that requires fixing. It's the cost of realism; acoustic instruments don't hit their peak at the exact moment you play a note. Add negative delay to the MIDI tracks to bring the instruments closer to the grid.

What developers can do is to make sure the delay is consistent across the library so there's no need for guessing. This is what Alex Wallbank has done with his Cinematic Studio series libraries. If other developers followed suit, it would make programming MIDI a lot easier and less frustrating.


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## mybadmemory (Jun 28, 2020)

What you're experiencing isn't really latency but the baked in pre-roll to allow the legato transitions to be played. Latency is noticeable on short patches that don't have much or any pre-roll baked in, but for sampled legato transitions to work they need some time to play the actual transition.

Every sample library treats this a little differently. Some make their entire library use the same amount of pre-roll to keep all patches in sync, and offer a setting for it. Some add the pre-roll only on the legato-patches in which case you have to manually compensate either with per track pre-delay or by moving the midi data in the piano roll just for those patches. Some even have different pre-roll values on different types of legato transitions within the same patch, which makes manual editing even more time consuming since you can't compensate on track level but have to do it on note level.

I also wish library-developers and DAW-makes worked together to make a standard that everyone could follow, where they agreed to treat the issue in the same way, and offer automatic solutions in the same way. One way could be to always disable the pre-roll while playing in the data (would sound worse but be playable), and then automatically turn it back on and automatically compensate for it while playing back the track. If just a few of the major library developers and let's say one of the biggest DAW's were up for this, I think most others would follow suit. Hey @Spitfire Team @OrchestralTools @CineSamples @audioimperia and the rest, would you be up for this? :D


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## audioimperia (Jun 28, 2020)

mybadmemory said:


> I also wish library-developers and DAW-makes worked together to make a standard that everyone could follow, where they agreed to treat the issue in the same way, and offer automatic solutions in the same way. One way could be to always disable the pre-roll while playing in the data (would sound worse but be playable), and then automatically turn it back on and automatically compensate for it while playing back the track.



Hey mybadmemory!

This is indeed something that we are putting a strong emphasis on in our development process. Every sample in our orchestral catalog is manually synced and features a maximum of 250 ms of pre-pad, which is also adjustable in the interface. And we are currently working on solutions to make this an automated feature, yes!


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