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Cubase vs logic... is hans zimmer right?

You cannot hear the difference between 32bit and 64bit summing
Well, technically... 64bit has less rounding errors (the whole point of it), which means less noise (right?)... which means, someone with golden ears and great system/room COULD hear it.

In my book, examples for golden ears are Hans Zimmer and Eric Persing of which both are claiming PT sounds the best, Logic the worst. I tried comparing Cubase and PT HD Native on my Win machine, couldn't hear any difference... maybe PT on Mac sounds better? :D ... maybe PT with 32bit floating point math sounds the same as Cubase and the old PT with fixed point actually sounded better.. i dunno and I certainly haven't done any meaningful testing, but how I look at this is - I believe HZ, Eric and others until I prove myself they are wrong.
 
The audio engin that Hans speaks of is just addition. If there are compressors in the chain that he's "hitting hard" that's a different story, and doesn't have anything to do with the daw.

Sure, the emulation of a compressor is just an example, to say that ... the code is not the same, it is not identical, for a Plugin, for a Daw, so it can produce different results. Is not so strange if some audio engines work better then others. Logic has a different Audio Engine from Cubase, ProTools is different from Nuendo... etc etc..

And the question is not if sounds Better ... but that an audio engine can sound different in some conditions.

I recreated the SAME mix, with the SAME plugins ( waves ) in Logic, Cubase & ProTools. With 10 audio Tracks, with 4 STEMs.

In this condition, the Null Test failed...

so there are some differences...maybe little, and are not so important for me......maybe is also the pan law, the delay compensation and how it works......etc but this is all.

Cheers

Ste
 
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I don't think so. Cubase has the same Audio engin as Logic. It's simple addition. No-one has any special vodoo, even though some marketing will say otherwise.
 
Well, technically... 64bit has less rounding errors (the whole point of it), which means less noise (right?)... which means, someone with golden ears and great system/room COULD hear it.

No they cannot hear it. And furthermore you need to watch that one hour video I posted earlier.

In my book, examples for golden ears are Hans Zimmer and Eric Persing of which both are claiming PT sounds the best,

Its doubtful to me that either one of those two people, while absolutely brilliant at composing and sound design, are not GEB. Even if they are, they cannot hear the difference between 32bit and 64bit summing. Do more research on this to understand why, I am not going to try to explain it here, which I would not be able to do the subject justice.

Logic the worst. I tried comparing Cubase and PT HD Native on my Win machine, couldn't hear any difference... maybe PT on Mac sounds better? :D ... maybe PT with 32bit floating point math sounds the same as Cubase and the old PT with fixed point actually sounded better.. i dunno and I certainly haven't done any meaningful testing, but how I look at this is - I believe HZ, Eric and others until I prove myself they are wrong.

Please watch the long one hour video about Audio Myths.
 
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Sure, the emulation of a compressor is just an example, to say that ... the code is not the same, it is not identical, for a Plugin, for a Daw, so it can produce different results. Is not so strange if some audio engines work better then others. Logic has a different Audio Engine from Cubase, ProTools is different from Nuendo... etc etc..

And the question is not if sounds Better ... but that an audio engine can sound different in some conditions.

I recreated the SAME mix, with the SAME plugins ( waves ) in Logic, Cubase & ProTools. With 10 audio Tracks, with 4 STEMs.

In this condition, the Null Test failed...

so there are some differences...maybe little, and are not so important for me......maybe is also the pan law, the delay compensation and how it works......etc but this is all.

Cheers

Ste

if you use ANY plugins you are not testing the DAW any longer you are testing the plugins. How you use each DAW and plugin can obviously make huge differences to the sound. that does not prove anything about one daw being more or less transparent then another..especially if its your ears that are doing the judging.

Now all that being said, the discussion from Admiralbumblebee is a worthy discussion and I would like to see a discussion focused specifically on his findings from a few months ago. In those findings he found certain DAW's introducing measurable intermodulation distortion while performing automated fades. Logic was one of the offenders, along with StudioOne. whether or not that intermodulation distortion is actually hearable or not I do not know. He did say that the distortion created by Cubase during those fades was actually hearable, though more subtle on the visual measurement. I would like to look more deeply at how at when LogicPro and cubase are distorting the signal during automated fades. Is it only when automated? His test involved automation, but what if you just set the fader and leave it, does the distortion continue, etc. Is it only during bounce? What about real time vs non-real time bounce? Etc.. He left a lot of open questions, but it is definitely a scientifically measurable distortion that is happening differently in different DAW's while doing a particular operation with it. So how you use the DAW can matter a lot. We should investigate his report more, IMHO. But most of the claims being made on this thread are fallacious.
 
if you use ANY plugins you are not testing the DAW any longer you are testing the plugins. How you use each DAW and plugin can obviously make huge differences to the sound. that does not prove anything about one daw being more or less transparent then another..especially if its your ears that are doing the judging.

Now all that being said, the discussion from Admiralbumblebee is a worthy discussion and I would like to see a discussion focused specifically on his findings from a few months ago. In those findings he found certain DAW's introducing measurable intermodulation distortion while performing automated fades. Logic was one of the offenders, along with StudioOne. whether or not that intermodulation distortion is actually hearable or not I do not know. He did say that the distortion created by Cubase during those fades was actually hearable, though more subtle on the visual measurement. I would like to look more deeply at how at when LogicPro and cubase are distorting the signal during automated fades. Is it only when automated? His test involved automation, but what if you just set the fader and leave it, does the distortion continue, etc. Is it only during bounce? What about real time vs non-real time bounce? Etc.. He left a lot of open questions, but it is definitely a scientifically measurable distortion that is happening differently in different DAW's while doing a particular operation with it. So how you use the DAW can matter a lot. We should investigate his report more, IMHO. But most of the claims being made on this thread are fallacious.



If I use THE SAME plug-in, this should sound identical. If I use Waves L2 on Cubase, On Logic, On ProTools, the result will be the same. So in my test , I used THE SAME plugins , with the same settings wich I've exported. So the difference on the sounds is Why the Audio Engine is different, little different, as I said before.

In a DAW we use also the plugins. So for a right test , its important the simulation of a normal workflow.

Cheers
 
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If you use exactly the same plugins with exactly the same settings, then even still it will depend on whether the plugin has anything in it that is programmed to introduce any variations over time as to whether it will also produce exactly the same result at any moment in time. to be clear..

And it still comes back to your ears, they are not reliable measuring device. So in order to prove your point you will need to produce some kind of scientific measurement showing the output of one DAW with that plugin vs another daw with the same plugin using the same settings and all other factors of usage being equal. If you say you hear it, I don't believe you, and nor should you.
 
If you use exactly the same plugins with exactly the same settings, then even still it will depend on whether the plugin has anything in it that is programmed to introduce any variations over time as to whether it will also produce exactly the same result at any moment in time. to be clear..

And it still comes back to your ears, they are not reliable measuring device. So in order to prove your point you will need to produce some kind of scientific measurement showing the output of one DAW with that plugin vs another daw with the same plugin using the same settings and all other factors of usage being equal. If you say you hear it, I don't believe you, and nor should you.


I'm not saying which I can hear the differences. I'm saying which the Null Test, a scientific test and not a subjective sensation , failed in the complex condition with identical plugins. So, some differences are present.

We are talking about a technical aspect, not of a quality sensation. The best DAW is the one that makes you work well.
 
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If you have ANYTHING in the plugin that is changing over time, then that is to be expected. A simple modulation would do it.

Describe your test more completely and it will probably be shown that your null test is user error in that regard.
 
If you have ANYTHING in the plugin that is changing over time, then that is to be expected. A simple modulation would do it.

Describe your test more completely and it will probably be shown that your null test is user error in that regard.


10 Tracks - Each track with 3 Plugins- Eq - Compressor -Eq same plugins, same value, same settings. 2 Tracks are in a Stem, other 2 Tracks in other Stem, etc. In each stems there are 3 plugins, Eq, Compressor, Eq, same values, same settings. On the Master, there are 3 plugins, a Multiband, a compressor, a limiter, always the same settings.

Do you think that the Delay Compensation of Cubase works like the delay compensation of ProTools HDX? For example.. this is one little difference.
 
Just because they are the same settings does not guarantee that their algorithms are deriving the same exact results on every pass through the same music. These plugins are capable of complex calculations and very well could intentionally be bringing in subtle or not-so-subtle variations...and would thus fail a null test. Sorry but you can't use that test to validate the DAW's mixing engine, you have distorted the test with plugins that are doing unknown changes to the DSP over time.
 
Just because they are the same settings does not guarantee that their algorithms are deriving the same exact results on every pass through the same music. These plugins are capable of complex calculations and very well could intentionally be bringing in subtle or not-so-subtle variations...and would thus fail a null test. Sorry but you can't use that test to validate the DAW's mixing engine, you have distorted the test with plugins that are doing unknown changes to the DSP over time.

This Mean that a Song mixed in Cubase.. or in ProTools HDX or In Logic, with the SAME plugins... will not have the SAME sounds. But there are some little differences. And I say exactly this.

because it's a complex workflow. But the normal workflow is complex. A simple Null Test is a nonsense test.
 
I recreated the SAME mix, with the SAME plugins ( waves ) in Logic, Cubase & ProTools. With 10 audio Tracks, with 4 STEMs.

In this condition, the Null Test failed...

If I use THE SAME plug-in, this should sound identical.

No.
It has been shown in the past, that plugins can some times have variable logarithms, meaning that if the pugin is in the chain, you won't get a null with multiple passes.


The audio engines for all DAWs is the same, in terms of rendering - as said earlier in this thread, a null test confirms that.
 
No.
It has been shown in the past, that plugins can some times have variable logarithms, meaning that if the pugin is in the chain, you won't get a null with multiple passes.


The audio engines for all DAWs is the same, in terms of rendering - as said earlier in this thread, a null test confirms that.

True.. but a song is made in a complex workflow with, many plugins.

Guys, I'm not saying that logic is better than Cubase.. o ProTools is better than logic.

I'm saying that in a complex workflow with the same settings, the null test FAILED for many reasons...so the result is different. It's Simple
 
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a null test doesn't make any sense if you're using plugins..that is true. If you're doing anything to the sound, including built in tools of the DAW, that might produce a slightly different sound between two different takes...then a null test is meaningless.

The null test is only to look for differences between the basic mixing engine without these other complex variations being introduced. A null test should give you confidence that the mixing engine is "transparent" and not introducing any color on its own.
 
a null test doesn't make any sense if you're using plugins..that is true. If you're doing anything to the sound, including built in tools of the DAW, that might produce a slightly different sound between two different takes...then a null test is meaningless.

The null test is only to look for differences between the basic mixing engine without these other complex variations being introduced. A null test should give you confidence that the mixing engine is "transparent" and not introducing any color on its own.

This is True...But my question is: Is the mix the same ? No. So yes there are some differences.

So maybe some people would prefer the result on Logic, or Cubase, or ProTools HDX.
 
please provide accurate measurements of the difference. Your null test is not an accurate measurement.

Ehehe Ok. I see that we don't understand. I know very well a null test. But I'm saying something different. I'm not interested to show that the Audio Engines "unloaded" are all identical. I know this.

BUT:

If a mix created, How I explained before, have some differences, because if I put the 3 files, with phase inverted the result is not a complete cancellation, this means that there are some differences. The "reason" is not important. I've used same plugins, same settings.

And the differences are for the reason that we have talked.

I repeat ... For example, do You think that the Delay Compensation of ProTools HDX works exactly in the same way of Cubase?

Do You Have ProTools HDX ? The Delay compensation of ProTools is different from Cubase.

So the Delay Compensation can be a reason for some differences in the mix.

Bye
 
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I'm saying that in a complex workflow with the same settings, the null test FAILED for many reasons...so the result is different. It's Simple

I think what everyone is trying to say here, is that the result was different because of the plugins, not because of the DAW
 
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