MiniFreak V, fantastic, but a few minor issues...

[C_Huelsbeck]

First off, congratulations to the release of the MiniFreak V! In terms of sound authenticity compared to the hardware, no complains so far - I tried a whole bunch of patches and it sounds pretty much identical (of course there may be still subtle differences with some sounds that I haven't noticed yet, but overall a fantastic result!).

Now to the minor issues:

- CPU is high, very high... this may be due to the accuracy of the emulation, but I hope in time the team will be able to do some more optimization. I have a hexacore i7 and the CPU pretty much maxes out at 2-3 instances...
- now even more puzzling: even when I freeze tracks in Cubase, there's still a high CPU load (around 25%) from the plugin in the background... I have to use the "unload plugin" option when freezing to get to 0 CPU load
- MiniFreak V does not seem to use the default midi cc mapping of the hardware... only when the plugin is linked do the knobs (like filter for example) automatically link to the right equivalent in the software. I could try to create my own mapping, but I wonder if this is a genuine bug of this first version....

And finally one big pretty please: consider also doing a "MicroFreak V"!

[C_Huelsbeck]

Also adding to my observation about CPU load - I also had a few cases of it going even higher when the plugin was idle (not producing sound).

[MajorFubar]

I think it's just the case that modern, accurate VSTs just take a lot of processing power.
But yeah you wouldn't think it would take much CPU power when idle.
Maybe that will get fixed by a patch.

Couple of months ago someone joined complaining that three or more instances of Analog Lab instruments in their DAW were wiping out the CPU in their 'extremely powerful quad core i7 PC' (their words), and how could Arturia software be so resource-inefficient. When I asked them what their computer's single-core and multi-core Geekbench scores were, they came back with figures that were absolutely smoked by even a 2020 bottom-of-the-range Apple M1 Mac Mini, let alone anything more powerful. I guess it's a matter of perspective and expectation.

[jkipcount]

Testing in Studio One, Minifreak V CPU usage seems about on par with Pigments depending on the preset loaded.  That said, it's even similar to Analog Lab and the Jun-6V in many cases.  Not seeing any abnormally high cpu usage here.  Mac Mini M1, Studio One 6.

[C_Huelsbeck]

Opening an intance of MiniFreak V (or the standalone app) jumps the CPU immediately to around 25%. All cores show similar activity.

If I open up for example SQ80 V, the average CPU is 1.5%.

Pigments is around 2.2%

So don't tell me it's my CPU... I have a capable machine...

Maybe the M1 version is already better optimized and of course I know that it is an amazing CPU, but the Windows version should not take 10 times the CPU of Pigments on my i7!

[mikejarod]

I cannot reproduce this consistently but I've had multiple times that I started the Minifreak V standalone application on Win10, and that no GUI is shown, while the process is running according to task manager. Ending the process though the task manager does not kill the process. Only a reboot does.

[Newcleus]

THE Chris Huelsbeck?

Love your work!  Tunnel B1 was outstanding. 

[C_Huelsbeck]

THE Chris Huelsbeck?

Love your work!  Tunnel B1 was outstanding. 

Thanks!

[C_Huelsbeck]

I cannot reproduce this consistently but I've had multiple times that I started the Minifreak V standalone application on Win10, and that no GUI is shown, while the process is running according to task manager. Ending the process though the task manager does not kill the process. Only a reboot does.

What's your CPU and did you compare the load to SQ80 V and Pigments?

[PitDellaCasa]

Hello

Just bought the Minifreak, great synth with endless possibilities. NTL the standalone app and also the vst plugin needs a lot of power... ...way too much that I can use it in my DAW along with many other plugins. The separate app was one of the main reasons to buy the minifreak, now I am quite disappointed about the cpu hog...

I have attached two screen shots, one the plugin is linked and the other not linked to the hardware. Newest firmware installed.

Regards
Pit

[PitDellaCasa]

I have to be a bit more precise, only if the VST is linked to the minifreak the CPU impact is quite heavy, I opened 16 MiniFreak V tracks in Cubase and the CPU load was around 18%. 

[Ubrider]

I have to be a bit more precise, only if the VST is linked to the minifreak the CPU impact is quite heavy, I opened 16 MiniFreak V tracks in Cubase and the CPU load was around 18%.

I just got my Minifreak, i can confirm that too, i got a 8700k @5ghz. No issue with my computer, i'm a tech guy for 15 years. it's one of the first time that my computer do this, heavy load on CPU, temps going up. I never had this until i run a stress test like OCCT. Even in the biggest cpu intensive video games it's not that high. So i conclude that it is definitely on the software side. Not a big deal, because i know there are a lot of stuff going on at the same time for this to work. But just wanted to put my observation too. in hope that it will be fixed !

Best regards.

[C_Huelsbeck]

More experience now tracking with the MiniFreak V and the CPU usage is kind of mysterious: my CPU maxes out at 2-3 instances according to the Cubase CPU meter and the Windows Task manager... almost full utilization on all cores... fan is working on full blast too. However and very interestingly, when I add more instances, the audio is not breaking up like it does with other plugins maxing out the CPU... it just stays near full usage and I was able to make a complete track with 14 instances (not all playing at the same time of course). CPU shows maxed, but I could still work on the song until the end with no audio problems... so what is actually going on there? Looks to me the plugin does actually not use the amount of CPU that is shown in the task manager, but why is it always near max?

[dan dan]

I have to say as well that CPU usage makes the V vst almost unusable. My fans are blowing like a hurricane, surely this amount of required power is not necessary?
When will this be fixed in an update?

[C_Huelsbeck]

I have to say as well that CPU usage makes the V vst almost unusable. My fans are blowing like a hurricane, surely this amount of required power is not necessary?
When will this be fixed in an update?

I hope soon too... from my latest (real world) tests we know that the plugin doesn't need as much CPU as it consumes, because I was able to run more than a dozen instances in my project, but the CPU is always maxed out even when the plugins are idle... it must be some weird optimization, maybe even a compiler issue that caused this!