Garriton- Revisited

2012-07-26 06:14 pm

Some time ago, I bought the Garriton Personal Orchestra 4.0 to use with NWC. With help I downloaded a virtual MIDI called LoobBe1. I am somewhat satisfied, but there are still some issues. The sounds are better than the MS sounds that come with NWC, but I'm not blown away at all.

I am using this to write an orchestral piece. At the moment I am only scoring it for string orchestra.

1.) On my desktop (Dell Optiplex 745, stock) the sound file seems to have a background static sort of sound that is intermittent in its frequency and intensity. The sound is not clean at all.

2.) Also on my desktop, the bass staff has a severe fuzztone. I just replaced my speakers with a system that includes a subwoofer, so I know it isn't that.

Any thoughts? Is there a setting that I'm missing or do I need a different soundcard or something???

I appreciate any help you can give me. It's getting frustrating, having spent $150 for the Garriton.

Thanks,

John Mahony

Re: Garriton- Revisited

Reply #1 – 2012-07-27 12:16 am

G'day John,
I'm sorry that I can't give you a definitive answer, but I would try a sound card instead of the on board audio. Given the age of the machine I wouldn't rush out to buy a new card, but rather see if you can find a second hand PCI sound blaster (maybe the SB Live or similar) to test with. I bet your local computer shop has a few taking up space on the shelf...

This will at least prove the problem into or out of the on board audio section.

Ahh, just thought of something... Does the problem exist with the Microsoft synth as well or only the Garriton? It's just possible the Garriton is using more CPU time than you can spare. If this is the case, many soft synths have the capacity to limit CPU load - perhaps the Garriton is the same and you can reduce the CPU load (and sound quality) a bit.

Another possibility is other software loaded and taking CPU time, like AV software and anything else that sits there waiting for something to happen.

Or what external connections do you have? Maybe disconnect the LAN cable for a while. This will eliminate interrupts from the network driver. Anything else like this? USB devices? Printer/Scanner/Fax maybe?

Having said all of that, I have a problem with my own set up where I can only turn the volume up to about 30% before some kind of buzz/distortion sets in - as 30% is pretty loud it's not a problem, but this is one I've never gotten to the bottom of - not that I've bothered that much...

I know the above probably won't help that much but it's all I can think of at the moment.

Have you tried checking the Garriton forum(s)? Perhaps someone else has run into this and found the solution.

Re: Garriton- Revisited

Reply #2 – 2012-07-29 04:06 pm

Lawrie,

Thanks for the response. My PC is loaded up pretty good, so CPU capacity is a real possibility. I'll see what I can do about that.
The Garriton help hasn't been any help at all. I'll try the forum, see what I can come up with.

Thanks for the suggestions.

John