Audiotool board archive

FREEZE TRACKS

AT IS A JOKE (KEYCHAIN) · started 2019-10-05 20:10 · updated 2020-06-12 00:57

I need it.

One of the biggest barriers in production, is when your computer is equivalent to your grandma's 50 yr old toaster that is being held together by duct tape, saliva and sheer will. Its absolutely horrible, when its not even you who is the problem, but its your pc that is limiting you. (Yeah I'm a shit producer, but I could have made better things, if my computer didn't die on me after 8 synths). Many daws, allow us to render these tracks to audio to save CPU, and I remember my toaster PC being unable to handle something in fl, so I just rendered it to audio, and sure, my comp still had a hard time, but at least I could actually hear what I was doing. Ableton can freeze tracks as well, and although I don't own Ableton, I've known people who have, and it is absolutely essential when you are working on your potato, with your 50 track draft. Rn, I am working on a draft with 16 synths, and my trash school comp, can't handle it at all. I literally need this feature to continue working on it, but because of this I'm prob going to have to trash it, and start over, or just release and say "hah, XD, I had no CPU to finish this, so its literal trash, (and even if I did have better PC, it would prob still suck cuz im a shit producer, but maybe it would have actually been finished)."

Now, I don't blame the devs for this, as they had a lot on their plate this year and last year, with the release of next, and all these new plugins, as I can't imagine it being easy. Then some entitled egotistical teenager, comes and shits all over it and is like "WhY cAn'T wE fReEzE tRacKs", but a lot of ppl rly need and want this.

Thank you.

Comments (37)

kurp
2019-10-05 21:15 · 2019-10-05

You fail to explain what freezing tracks actually do. Can you elaborate on that?

AT IS A JOKE (KEYCHAIN) · reply
2019-10-05 21:21 · 2019-10-05

lmao, if I remember correctly, and Im not a complete rart, it renders the midi track to audio, and makes it so u can't edit it, hence the word Freeze. when u try to edit it, it will unfreeze it, and you will have to refreeze it to update the proj, and still save CPU. It saves CPU, because the if Im not a complete rart again, instead of it having to render the sound real time, because of midi, it already rendered it as audio, and all it needs to do is just play it back.

Santa Tai · reply
2019-10-05 23:33 · 2019-10-05

from Google-
When you freeze a track, the track is bounced to an audio file. The freeze file includes the output of any plug-ins on the track and any track automation. ... Freezing tracks is recommended when tracks with CPU-intensive software instrument or effects plug-ins are in a finalized state, or require no further changes

Santa Tai · reply
2019-10-05 23:37 · 2019-10-05

freeze tracks is mainly a finalization for a midi, or sample
it saves cpu because when you freeze it, it can no longer be moved or edited
p cool actually, i think this would benefit for audiotool, lowers lag, and allows bigger projects to come from this site

kurp · reply
2019-10-05 23:38 · 2019-10-05

Thanks, I got the definition from the first reply.

Santa Tai · reply
2019-10-05 23:53 · 2019-10-05

your welcome

Known As I
2019-10-07 11:07 · 2019-10-07

Err... what's the difference to "Bounce timeline"?

Jordi Moragues · reply
2019-10-07 13:05 · 2019-10-07

I guess it's about the 30 seconds sample time limit. They'd probably like to bounce or freeze a whole audio chain with a timeline lasting longer than that. One can still bounce a long section to Probe and upload consecutive 30 second selections though.

kurp · reply
2019-10-07 13:18 · 2019-10-07

You can upload more than 30 seconds if it's bouncing a timeline

kurp · reply
2019-10-07 13:28 · 2019-10-07

ermm.. you click bounce timeline in "project", "sample upload"

Known As I · reply
2019-10-07 13:31 · 2019-10-07

I just tried that - bouncing works but uploading will be blocked.
I believe there was a loophole some time ago where this had not been checked. This might explain why that worked for you.

Jordi Moragues · reply
2019-10-07 13:33 · 2019-10-07

Same, I just went through the process before posting my first comment to make sure that it was correct, and Probe won't let you upload samples longer than 30 seconds. That's why I was asking how did you (kurp) do it.

kurp · reply
2019-10-07 13:37 · 2019-10-07

my bad then

relative mAJOR · reply
2019-10-07 20:45 · 2019-10-07
  1. time limit
  2. freeze lets you turn off the track as a whole but easily revert to the unfrozen version, so not deleting it
  3. nobody wants a college textbook of samples in the my section. just keep it in like a temp folder in the track samples section
  4. constantly uploading samples is tedious
Known As I · reply
2019-10-08 02:08 · 2019-10-08

Thanks, that definitely clears things up for me!

relative mAJOR
2019-10-08 02:25 · 2019-10-08

I believe you're saying it can happen sometime. This feature will save the day.

relative mAJOR
2019-10-08 02:29 · 2019-10-08

Also please make it not difficult and let us route fx after the frozen plugins ex. mixer, eq

relative mAJOR
2019-10-08 17:19 · 2019-10-08

shut up and roll with it

Santa Tai
2019-10-08 17:55 · 2019-10-08

lmaoo

Jordi Moragues
2019-10-08 20:29 · 2019-10-08

This could be doable if the freeze function deletes the original audio chain and substitutes it by a single Audiotrack device with a corresponding audio region, freeing the memory needed for the audio chain. Here freezing would mean committing to rendered audio. The only way to recover the original chain would be to undo the history (and getting rid of the freeze). If the browser can handle 1 GB of audio data (1 hour 40 seconds of uncompressed stereo audio), this would be enough to store about 15 bounces 4 minutes long each. Maybe a small meter in the Studio's interface could indicate the remaining time of digital audio available for bounces/freezes and samples. Here's a handy online audio recording calculator: https://www.sounddevices.com/audio-recording-calculator/

Known As I
2019-10-08 21:28 · 2019-10-08

Just a random thought: those freezes don't need to be permanent - they may be re-computed after each load. One could mark a cable as "freeze recorder". Playing the track for the first time records the audio "into the cable" playing it a second time will re-play the recorded audio.
Changing the devices which contribute to the cable's input, invalidates the recording. Alternatively those devices become disabled until someone "resets" the cable.
Cables could be flushed on memory pressure (I'm in doubt if we can detect this).
This method can be integrated into the booster where memory is not an issue. This could be completely transparent to the user. But the complexity is rather high.
(Another more aggressive approach would be into insert an explicit device for this task.)

Santa Tai
2019-10-09 00:55 · 2019-10-09

i really want this to become a thing

relative mAJOR
2019-10-09 12:22 · 2019-10-09

@chordofdestruction when you say "Cables could be flushed on memory pressure" does that mean when i tweak the device chain the freeze resets?

relative mAJOR
2019-10-09 12:23 · 2019-10-09

!!!! Save the audio to the booster! my boy u a genius

virux · reply
2020-06-12 00:54 · 2020-06-12

unfortunately

AT IS A JOKE (KEYCHAIN) · reply
2020-06-12 00:57 · 2020-06-12

There are a ton of stuff that should happen on audiotool, but wont, I believe if audiotool had a bigger team, and also more money they could have. But things like wave table synths, track freezing, and other features that I believe audiotool really needs, just will not happen any time soon