Stereo Tool

I got multiple questions about this, so to clarify:

The whole encryption stuff has nothing to do with normal licensing, there are people who want to be able to sell presets so some encryption is needed for presets. I'm not planning to change my license system! I *hate* subscription abbo's.

Wouldn't the settings still be visible in the ini-file?

The INI file would also need to be encoded if an encoded preset is loaded. Or at least part of it. That's one of the difficult parts of this (I'm not even sure if it's really possible yet).

I know we may use ST for a special purpose which it may not be considered for, but we maintain a big bunch of presets for several years now. Changes are generally made programmatically (by writing to presets or ini-files) because it would be impractical to do them by hand.
So if you *always* encrypt presets and ini-files this would be the end of our work (unless you provide full programmatic access to ST, which would be the best way, anyhow).

Btw, why are presets settings copied over to the ini-file at all? It would be enough to just remember which preset to use and load all settings directly from it into ST (or maybe only doing so if a preset is encrypted?). This should also make things easier for you because one would only need to encrypt the presets one wants to and everything else could stay unencrypted.

Dear hvz,

The SCA2 exists in your software, it is important that it is working well! There are many sound cards already 384kHz, just give a visit on ebay and with good prices.
This is mine and I inserted into the transmitter link: http://www.ebay.com/itm/SA9227-PCM5102A ... SwZ8ZW5hx5

This change is important to me, I'll wait ...
Thank you for your work in this fantastic software.

Regards
Filipe

Don't worry, that will keep working. (As long as you don't load an encrypted preset).

Hey, i m back !
And the reason is ..the encrypted presets ( i am planning to give some presets for FAT and HOT sound for FM and HD radiostations

Hans, the SCA channels work fine for me . ( realtek onboard soundcard on Intel I7 )
Indeed the upper SCA channel is a bit low presence ...but it s ok.

Thank you for your excellent software Hans !!!!

It is true that the subcarrier 92Khz is present, you do not have 6 kHz wide band (you only have 2 or 3 kHz). Audio lower and has more noise. Lack spectrum, as shown in the attached photo. ;(
In subcarrier 67khz no problem.
With 384kHz this problem is solved, and improves other aspects of the sound. because the Sample Rate is double.

7.85 BETA048

Windows 32 bit:
Windows stand alone: http://www.stereotool.com/download/ster ... 85-048.exe
Winamp DSP: http://www.stereotool.com/download/dsp_ ... 85-048.exe
Windows VST 32 bit: http://www.stereotool.com/download/vst_ ... 85-048.dll

CHANGED:
- Added an even more conservative highs reconstruction mode for the Delossifier to avoid flutter effects.
- GUI: Simple mode clicking on bottom graphs takes to you Processing or Repair screen
- GUI: Added separate indicator for things that can be turned on/off (as opposed to switches which affect behavior).

- Added mode where for slowly rising the highs above the current level are not reconstructed. This reduces 'fluttering' highs (not sure how to describe those) that can otherwise be present if small bursts of audio above the current maximum frequency get reconstructed.
- MP3: See discussion with Near05 on the next page. Delossifier highs reconstruction if it's not a gap that needs to be filled sounds much less good than using Absolute Highs there. So stop regenerating top part! (At least add an option for it!)
- Add Polar stereo viewtopic.php?f=16&t=6233&p=33031#p33031 - Feedback so far is that it works fine, I'll just assume that it's ok until I hear otherwise.
- Simple mode: How to handle clicking on things at bottom?
- Delossifier: Add *very* conservative mode (minimum of rolling level and current level)

OLD CHANGES:
- Added several options to change how highs are reconstructed in the Delossifier: Not at all, or a bit after a frequency spike. Finally, there's an option to immediately jump up on a spike or go up more slowly, which might reduce distortion-like effects on sounds like piano's.
- Added option to NOT restore highest part of the spectrum.
- Simple mode: Natural Dynamics button too small?
- Add OIRT/Polar Stereo ("You probably don't want to use this") warning
- Fixed NAN message caused by Delossifier on startup.
- Fixed crash in 040 stand alone version
- Make Simple mode single overview screen?? - Waiting for feedback, is this usable?
- SPA remove monthly popup
- MP3/MPEG2 input: Added Delossifier Spectral Hole Filler!!! http://www.welt.de/wissenschaft/article ... nervt.html
- Fixed crash in Dequantizer caused by the optimizations added in BETA038. So far, didn't see any other issues caused by those optimizations.
- Test "looper" optimization on Raspberry Pi 3 -> No effect
- Command line version doens't like long name (Antenne V. - see mail 2-3-2016 22:24) -> Was already fixed.
- Removed optimization that caused crashes
- Added other optimizations
- Voice protection in classic MB is broken. Check what changed. (Code should not have changed at all). - Hm, more has changed. Check in which version! -> Waiting for reply to question -> Compared again, and the distortion is caused by the singleband compressor that's used afterwards. Which does indeed get a slightly louder input because a (wrong!) filter has been fixed since that version.
- MB: Make Overview window for new Multiband! For main settings. Hide other windows when possible, and also make it for MB1
- Exciter: Improve start of filter (less steep!)
- Fix crash in BETA036.
- Bug in 034 should be fixed again.
- Exciter: Make it possible to choose where in the chain to run it
- Hide Stereo Tool name and THIMEO in help window in specific versions.
- VST plugin level should be ok again
- Did some optimizations for the Raspberry Pi version, not sure yet how much effect they will have (so far only build on Windows).
- Exciter: Make 2 kHz block size configurable, or automatic, or combination. Might work best if it's constant?? --> This should fix the too bright sounds in some cases without introducing distortion in other cases. I hope...
- Exciter: Optimize for LPF setting
- Plugin -> Output level doesn't work in VST version
- MB2: Make Overview window for new Multiband! For main settings.
- Woops, wrong flag set for Exciter, dynamic Squeak mode didn't work. It does now.
- "Input without processing" doesn't work in stand alone version.
- Exciter: Add Volume slider
- Exciter: Add DIFF mode
- Exciter: Try to improve tone behavior (should also reduce whole area around a spike I think - maybe configurable?)
- Add another AM test tone, sawtooth with cut off bottom
- Add 'Forcibly remove' to AM settings? Or is this a problem with the transmitter that the tester on Radioforum uses? -> Regardless, I've added it now.
- Fixed AM sawtooth test tone, adjusted level of other test tones when using AM.
- Fixed bug in HARD LIMIT introduced in BETA027 (caused crashes).
- Added slider to Exciter to choose between a more natural spectrum which however sounds more distorted, vs a very clean sound but with shrill tones in it. Will try to get rid of this slider and automatically choose the correct setting soon!
- Polar stereo: K filter added, but output is not strictly clipped anymore. Waiting for feedback.
- Add AM test tone: Sawtooth with pause at 0, asymmetrical. LPF needed?
- Fixed crackle at startup caused by Ignore high frequencies (even if it was disabled!)
- Loading old preset from before Analog mode was added apparently loads in Analog mode! -> Works now, just no idea why??
- Exciter: Crash should be fixed.
- Exciter: Sometimes you see darker bars in the spectrum, changing the overlap back and forth removes those, so somehow some levels aren't always calculated when a setting is changed.
- Fixed crash when closing
- Exciter: Moved to separate page, for now called Absolute Highs.
- Exciter: Added GUI element to show Absolute Highs effect.
- Exciter: Broken at latency 512
- GUI: Fixed hangups caused by tooltips.
- GUI: Remove dots in changed settings for some buttons on top of the screen.
- Exciter: Made frequency range configurable!!! (Old default numbers were 8000-9000 Hz)
- Blog post pre-processing, MP3 and declipping
- GUI: Added tooltips!
- Added exciter (rest of list removed)
- Added (not yet fully ok) Polar Stereo support for OIRT FM stations.
- Error (crash) on some systems should be solved
- Show something in settings that have been changed (for example a dot next to the name of the setting).
- Add license check function: extern "C" bool stereoTool_IsLicenseValid(gStereoTool* st_instance);
- Make scope skinnable
- Bug: i found one malfunction in the BS412 Section: If your switch off the FM Option and leave the BS412 Limiter in On-Position the Advanced Clipper only works in a reduced way: You can´t change the Clipper drive even if you pull the handle. The BS412 Limiter is greyed out instead so maybe someone doesn´t find the failure. If You switch the BS412 to off everything works fine again! Just a small detail, but maybe someone will have problems… -> I think I have fixed it (but there are a lot of different combinations of settings that can impact the result, I hope I haven't missed any). The next version shouldn't have this problem anymore, also, when BS412 is used I have now disabled the Advanced Clipper Drive slider.
I've been busy hiding a lot more deprecated features (if they are set to their default value). This should make the GUI a bit simpler. Stuff that's now hidden (still there and still functional if you really want to use it):
- "Bass AGC (Old)" panel
- "Classic Multiband Compressor" panel
- "Classic Singleband" panel
- "Pre-limiter" panel (in Advanced Clipper)
- "Leif's clipper efficiency modification" checkbox
- "Composite clipping Strictness (CPU)" checkbox
- Phase rotation: ""At start of processing" checkbox
- AGC "Compatibility & behavior" header
- All Singleband and Multiband "Compressor type" (Analog/Digital) pull-downs
- Multiband and Natural Dynamics "Compatibility mode (bad)" for Flat Frequency Response checkbox
- "Bass protection (Deprecated)" header in Advanced Clipper -> Bass
- "Highs gap protection: *" in Advanced Clipper -> Highs
- "Smooth slope" in Advanced Clipper -> Distortion
- "Upsampled highs clipping (useless)" in Advanced Clipper -> Distortion
- Stokkemask: "Force Stokkemask even if not using Composite Clipping (bad for audio)"
- BS412: ""De-basser non-ITU.1770 compatibility mode (bad)"
- Right clicking now restores default again, mid or double right clicking restores last loaded preset (or startup) value.
Bug: If you use FM and Normal output, with separately processed audio for streaming for Normal output, and for FM output enable pre-emphasis but *not* pre-emphasize output, then Normal output is not processed separately!
- What is the pink line in the BS412 display? Maybe remove it. http://i.imgur.com/70mWvqp.png -> Ah no, it's the adjustment of the compressor thresholds. Needs to be added to Help page.
- BS412 has VERY narrow jump on de-basser from 240 to 250 Hz. (Jump of multiple dB's). -> No, brown line jumps but actual output is smooth, so no problem.
- BS412 bass filter doesn't use ITU1770 as it should but some weird other shape that goes up to about 250 Hz.
- Need to support 2 default values and a RESET TO LAST LOADED VALUE reset option.
- Hide not selected deprecated stuff - partially working!
- Move Copyright stuff etc. also to command line version (maybe just copy it?)

TODO:
- Resampler: Predict effect and compensate for that. Maybe look at RC (besides buffer filling) to see where we're going - would that be sufficient? Or can I do some other measurement? Draw some graphs on whiteboard tomorrow... (RC sounds like a very good idea). Hm, RC might not even be needed - adding current adjustment * buffer size might be sufficient!
- Use 1024 for old Synchronization? Yes, higher works less well, still don't really understand why (or actually, I don't understand why 1024 is still ok). Test if new behavior is also better for FM Sync. -> Yes!
- Add MPX input support for analysis
- Poland 5 second extra delay?? - Probably not ST

7.85 but after NAB:
- MP3 Propaganda - Duel way too much highs generated on default settings! Try Normalizing trick (both for old and new reconstruction algorithm!)
- SPA "This sound is processed by"?
- Exciter: Add auto-adjust HPF frequency
- Put in Ben Liebrand settings for vinyl cleanup? Asked question on vinyl forum.
- License check
- set Encryption : impossible to view or modify all the processing settings
- Preset Demo : an encrypted preset with an audio message and beeps when not registred (same as your plugins)
- Preset Licensing : encrypted preset without beeps unlocked by a license
- Exciter: Try to reduce pre-ringing (maybe by doubling overlap? Or measure on bigger block size, then go back to smaller?) Is this still a problem?

LATER:
- Check Dirty Voices bass IMD problem. Maybe also rename to Phat Bass?
- Try adding phase delay compensation
- Also show tooltips for blocks of parameters.
- RDS encoder: Use Mathijs' method with interpolated 0's. Should give a nicer signal! Also I saw a weird jump bug in the raw (unfiltered) RDS output. Shouldn't matter (it gets filtered out) but still better to fix it.
- MB: Add voice volume protection, don't allow mid bands to drop below surrounding (to some extent), protectes voices and it might help to replicate the sound of certain other processors
- Continue with finding parameters to hide
- O skin

The new version is so great! When you combine the hole filler with the absolute highs filter, it sounds result now total natural. this is in contrast to the last version really a significant difference. what was in the linked article online was actually correct. when all is rippling away, it sounds much more relaxed. good work!