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Loading sample sets The organ menu is used to load and unload sample sets:
In order to be able to play Hauptwerk, a sample set must be installed and loaded. The St. Anne's, Moseley organ sample set is installed automatically with Hauptwerk, but you can purchase many other superb additional sample sets from third-parties (see the Crumhorn Labs website for a list). Before you can load any such additional sample sets, you must install them using Hauptwerk's component installer via the File | Install organ, sample set, temperament or impulse response menu option. The component installer is covered in a later section. [Hauptwerk version 1 sample sets must instead be imported, which is covered in the importing version 1 organs section.] The main option used to load a sample set is the Load organ menu option. When selected, you are presented with a list of all sample sets which have been installed, so that you can choose which to load. The first time that you load any given sample set, you will be presented with the Rank Audio Output Routing screen:
By default, the screen will not appear again. However, if you wish to change any of the settings subsequently, simply use the Organ | Load organ, adjusting rank audio output routing option instead, and the screen will be appear prior to loading, as it did the first time. This screen can be used to tell Hauptwerk how, and if, each given rank should be stored in memory, and through which of the computer's physical audio outputs it should sound. By setting Audio enabled? to 'No', the rank will not be loaded into memory. It is thus possible to load only part of a sample set when you do not have sufficient available computer memory to load all of it. If a sample set uses stereo samples, changing the Maximum memory channel format to 'Mono', will cause the sample to be converted to mono prior to loading, and they will then automatically be panned back into stereo in real-time if the rank's selected Destination output group is stereo (see the audio routing section). If it is mono, then the samples will always be loaded in mono regardless of the setting. Thus the setting provides a further means to reduce memory requirements drastically, although often at the expense of realism. [Note that panning mono samples into stereo in real-time is less processor-intensive than playing true stereo samples in the current version of Hauptwerk, unlike Hauptwerk version 1. Note also that the St. Anne's, Moseley organ sample set uses mono, 16-bit samples.] The Maximum memory sample resolution setting works similarly for sample resolution. Regardless of the setting, a 16-bit sample will never be loaded into memory as a 24-bit sample, but any higher resolution samples will be loaded in 24-bit (32-bit aligned), consuming twice as much memory as 16-bit samples, if the 24-bit option is selected. Note that Hauptwerk's internal audio signal processing and mixing resolution is always 32-bit, and audio output always happens in the highest resolution supported by the computer's audio interface, so even if all ranks are loaded in 16-bit, the effective resolution is usually still much higher. 14 and 20-bit resolutions only offer any advantages if memory compression is enabled, since they compress much more than 16 and 24-bit respectively, thus saving a large amount of memory. The 20-bit option is especially useful since it gives most of the audible benefits of a 24-bit resolution, but without using much more memory than loading in 16-bit without compression. Note that you might notice more hiss with the 14-bit option, due to the limitations of the lower resolution. However, it might, for example, be a useful choice for some ranks for which only a few pipes will sound at once, such as softer Pedal ranks. Memory compression mode allows you to disable loss-less memory compression for some or all ranks, typically increasing the memory required for a given rank by between 40 and 70 percent. Memory compression is enabled by default for all ranks when you load an organ for the first time. Disabling memory compression has no effect at all on audio quality but reduces the load on the computer's processor slightly, increasing the polyphony that can be achieved by between 10 and 15 percent. Hauptwerk's polyphony management system automatically takes this into account. For most fairly recent computers the slight reduction in polyphony resulting from memory compression would not be a problem. If a sample set easily fits into memory and your processor is struggling to provide the polyphony you want, try disabling compression. If you need to increase polyphony but there is insufficient free memory to disable memory compression for all ranks, try disabling it only for ranks that place the highest demand on polyphony but leaving it enabled for those that place the least demand on polyphony, such as Pedal division ranks where typically only one pipe would sound at a time, or leaving it enabled for those ranks that are used least frequently. Hauptwerk supports samples containing multiple loops, which it plays in a complex sequence to reduce perceived repetition. For the most realistic results, always leave Multiple sample loop handling mode set to 'Load all available loops (max realism, most memory)' if you have enough memory to load the whole sample set, so that all loops available in the rank's samples are used. The setting has no effect on samples with only one loop. If you select 'Load only loop which ends first (less realism, less memory)' then usually considerably less memory is required if the samples contain several loops. If a sample set is only slightly too large to fit into memory, try loading only the first loop for the least frequently-used or least prominent ranks. Note the multiple sample loop playback can also be disabled globally using the General settings | General options screen. Hauptwerk also allows a sample set to include multiple real release samples for each pipe, which gives extremely realistic handling of releases, especially when playing fast passages. For the most realistic results, always leave Multiple release sample handling mode set to 'Load all available samples (max realism, most memory)' if you have enough memory to load the whole sample set, so that all release samples included in the sample set are used. The setting has no effect on pipes with only one release sample. If you select 'Load only default sample (less realism, less memory)' then usually considerably less memory is required if the sample set contains multiple release samples, but the virtual acoustic of the organ will sound much less convincing when playing short notes. The Multiple attack/sustain sample handling mode setting works similarly for sample sets with several attack/sustain samples per pipe. Multiple attack/sustain samples are used in some sample sets to model a pipe organ tracker-action response, to select samples randomly to reduce repetition, to give more realistic attacks to a pipe that sounds immediately after it has stopped speaking, and to give other improvements in realism. However, if you don't have sufficient memory to load the whole sample set, it is generally best to disable multiple attack/sustain samples in preference to disabling multiple release samples, since multiple release samples give the most obvious improvement in realism. Release sample truncation causes Hauptwerk to truncate release samples artificially, using specially-shaped frequency-dependent decays, to simulate 'dry' samples (with no reverb). With very 'wet' sample sets, which have long release samples, simulating dry samples in this way can save a considerable amount of memory. It can also allow such sample sets to be played in reverberant spaces and helps to reduce noticeable differences in acoustics when using sample sets containing samples drawn from several different sources. However, the results are never completely the same as using true dry-recorded samples, mainly because a room acoustic also affects the attack and sustaining portions of the sound, which simple truncation of releases cannot model. True dry samples are thus highly preferable to using this option, and it is recommended that it only be used as a last resort. The licences for some sample sets do not allow modification of samples in this way, and this option is disabled for such sample sets. The Destination output group setting refers to audio output groups created and maintained by the General settings | Audio output groups screen, and is the means by which multi-channel audio output is configured - see the audio routing section). It is only relevant if your computer has an audio interface that has multiple physical audio outputs which can be accessed independently (often not the case with surround-sound sound cards). Click on the pointer/question-mark icon immediately to the left of a screen's OK button:
... then click onto the screen background to get additional help information about the screen as a whole, or onto any given setting for help on that setting. The same is true of almost all screens in Hauptwerk. Continuing with the other menu options in the Organ menu, the Organ | Unload organ menu is used to unload the sample set, freeing up the memory it occupied.
If you have loaded at least one sample set previously, the Organ | Load recent organ sub-menu will list those most recently accessed, providing a convenient short-cut to recall them. When a sample set is loaded, the Organ | Show organ information option opens documentation specific to the sample set that has been provided by the creator of the sample set. Typically, this will include photographs of the original recorded instrument, history and other background information. If you have the Advanced Edition of Hauptwerk you can open up to four virtual console display tabs (pages) at once in separate windows using the Organ | Show another console window menu function:
This is most useful if your computer has two or more touch-screen monitors attached to it. For example, you could display one window (display tab) on a monitor to the left of your MIDI keyboard(s) and another to the right to give a traditional organ console layout with some stops on either side of your MIDI keyboard(s) when using sample sets that have their virtual console tabs laid out in that way. With a sample set loaded (such as the St. Anne's, Moseley organ), select Functions | Enter capture mode from the menu:
Now go to the Organ menu. Select Organ | Set current organ as stand-by organ 1:
Then select Functions | Leave capture mode. Now go back to the Organ menu. Note how seven of the eight stand-by organ entries are greyed out again, but that the sample set you have loaded now appears on the menu in the first 'stand-by' organ position:
From now on you can always select the sample set directly from the menu with this option. However, the main benefit of assigning a sample set to the menu in this way is that it can be recalled uniquely via MIDI, or from computer keyboard key short-cuts. Thus you can have up to eight sample sets assigned directly to the menu, and you can have up to eight external MIDI switches (usually push-buttons) configured to recall them. If you are using Hauptwerk from a sequencer rather than a MIDI organ console, you can even make Hauptwerk load the required organ by including the appropriate MIDI message at the start of a track (although that may be inconveniently slow). If an organ is loaded, you can also assign it directly to one of the eight stand-by 'slots' using the Organ | Set current organ as a stand-by organ sub-menu. These menu functions avoid the need to enter and leave capture mode, but can only be accessed from the menu. They are short-cuts provided for convenience. When a sample set is loaded, its name appears in the title bar of the main Hauptwerk window. |
