Mono vs Poly (real technical limits)?
Posted: Tue Apr 28, 2020 6:31 am
It is a simple concept, right?
Polyphonic, monophonic, done.
But then you dive deeper into the topic, and suddenly it is more complex than this. No Polystream will ever leave your plugin, they all need to be converted to a Monostream. But, if polyphonic content is leaving your plugin in a monostream, they question arises, what exactly the monostream really is? Obviously it has little to do with polyphonic vs monophonic, as the manual implies. So what is the difference, aside from the obvious, which is monostream being a steady stream, while polystream is an event based system?
The more I think about the topic, the more it confuses me.
- If a user hits 3 notes on their midi controller, the plugin receives 3 midi events. We could route each event to a dedicated monostream and at the end mix them together, before leaving the plugin. Polyphony.
- If a user hits 3 notes on their midi controller, we can tell the polystream that it only handles one voice. Monophony.
At which point is there a clear difference? At which point is it, that one has an advantage over the other? Of course, it is much easier to construct your plugin flow with polystreams, while you have to do all the hard work in monostreams yourself, but that's just cosmetics. It results in the same output. Where do the paths split? The point at which you can clearly say "in such situation, this is much better than that, because..."?
Sometimes, if you think too hard about a topic, you might lose overview, and you can't see the wood for the trees. Is that happening to me?
If I had a synth with exactly defined keyboard ranges, just an octave for example (think keyboard split or drum machine or sample player, etc.), why should I use polystream over monostream, or vice-versa? Handling 12 blue lines, that are mixed together in the end, isn't too difficult. Getting specific information about one specific voice in a polystream however can become difficult (in 3.0.6 at least).
I get even more confused, the longer I think about it, in order to make a decision. Can somebody help me out?
Polyphonic, monophonic, done.
But then you dive deeper into the topic, and suddenly it is more complex than this. No Polystream will ever leave your plugin, they all need to be converted to a Monostream. But, if polyphonic content is leaving your plugin in a monostream, they question arises, what exactly the monostream really is? Obviously it has little to do with polyphonic vs monophonic, as the manual implies. So what is the difference, aside from the obvious, which is monostream being a steady stream, while polystream is an event based system?
The more I think about the topic, the more it confuses me.
- If a user hits 3 notes on their midi controller, the plugin receives 3 midi events. We could route each event to a dedicated monostream and at the end mix them together, before leaving the plugin. Polyphony.
- If a user hits 3 notes on their midi controller, we can tell the polystream that it only handles one voice. Monophony.
At which point is there a clear difference? At which point is it, that one has an advantage over the other? Of course, it is much easier to construct your plugin flow with polystreams, while you have to do all the hard work in monostreams yourself, but that's just cosmetics. It results in the same output. Where do the paths split? The point at which you can clearly say "in such situation, this is much better than that, because..."?
Sometimes, if you think too hard about a topic, you might lose overview, and you can't see the wood for the trees. Is that happening to me?
If I had a synth with exactly defined keyboard ranges, just an octave for example (think keyboard split or drum machine or sample player, etc.), why should I use polystream over monostream, or vice-versa? Handling 12 blue lines, that are mixed together in the end, isn't too difficult. Getting specific information about one specific voice in a polystream however can become difficult (in 3.0.6 at least).
I get even more confused, the longer I think about it, in order to make a decision. Can somebody help me out?