WOW

Well, I was able to try out Digital Performer 4.5 (and 4.6) a bit this weekend, en route to our official upgrade (gonna mail that check any day now, just have to figure out how we registered when we did our last update!).

Let's just say, there is no longer anything holding DP back. Motu has really nailed it with this one.

The upgrade is truly remarkable. One of the only flaws with DP was the way the windows worked - lots of windows open, all over the screen, often hidden by other windows which made the system a bit unweildy. Just a bit, because once you were used to it it wasn't so bad, but the new version allows you to consolidate windows, putting them all in one big window where everything can be seen, moved around, resized, etc. In a few minutes I was able to tweak the look of the program and make things MUCH more efficient.

The most significant update, though, is automatic latency compensation. This is nothing short of a revelation, a major shift in the way the program deals with audio, and firmly places DP WAY ahead of the ProTools curve. I know at least one studio that's switching from ProTools to DP based on this alone - a studio which has invested considerable time and money in ProTools but is sick of the limitations Digidesign places on its users (such as limiting track count to 32).

Let me explain this latency compensation thing.

All digital audio is subject to latency, which is simply the time it takes to do math to the audio file before it's sent to the speakers. Different processes take different amounts of time; if you run a simple equalizer across a track, the track's audio is slightly delayed. Different effects have different latencies.

In some cases this doesn't matter - it can be minimal and inaudible. But in some cases it's a major issue, for example if you have 9 tracks of drums (kick, snare, 3 toms, 2 overheads, and two room mics) and you run one EQ here and a compressor there, your tracks are out of synch, and thus out of phase.

This is the biggest issue with digital audio (once a certain level of quality in the initial analog to digital conversion is achieved), although its effects can be so subtle that often they only register as "not sounding quite as good."

The new DP looks at the tracks it's playing, the effects that are on them, and adjusts its playback to keep everything in synch. It's just that simple, and just that revolutionary.

No, the stock ProTools does not do this.

I could detect an immediate difference - take for example one tune I worked on this weekend with a bass track that's actually 2 tracks, a direct signal and one from a mic'ed amp. Running effects on the direct signal puts the tracks slightly out of phase, mushing up the bass sound. DP 4.5 takes care of this with no effort on my part.

The free upgrade to DP4.6 adds another revelation. Built in pitch correction, complete with automation and the ability to take the pitch info from a track and convert it to MIDI.

This is huge! DP will now correct pitch for you without the use of a plug in, allowing you to draw in the correction curves right over the audio in your main windows, as if it's a simple volume or pan adjustment. The pitch info can be copied right into a MIDI track and sent to a synthesizer, so you can have that solo doubled without even knowing how to play it.

There are other improvements too - better management of CPU resources, some new plug ins, a more streamlined "Bounce to Disk" option, and plenty more.

Has DP surpassed ProTools in terms of features? No question (it probably did when DP4.0 was released, but now there's really no comparison). Will tracks recorded at Smoke and Mirrors sound better now? Again, no question.