Hi Everyone,

I'm wondering if anyone else has had this issue...

[b]Summary:[/b] I'm finding that Sibelius/VDL will sometimes randomly drop accents -- it just doesn't play the note at the accented level (it will still play the note as a tap though).  You can see what I mean when I open two files in Audacity:  both of files are from the same part but exported at different times, one where Sib decided to play the accent and one where it didn't (yellow circles on L/R channel).

I have tried a myriad of things:
[list]
[li]setting the velocity of the accents manually[/li]
[li]changing the flam before the accent to voice 2[/li]
[li]copying and pasting the contents from the old TWS sib 6 template to the new sib 7 template and manually verifying all of the note heads are correct (R/L)[/li]
[li]verifying the 2.5.5 library is loaded in Kontakt[/li]
[li]reloading the snare voice in the mixer[/li]
[li]changing the voice from snares manual to snares manual lite[/li]
[/list]

...and many more things and this issue keeps popping up (worst of all it's random when it appears but usually appears on the same few accents and thus far only in the snare part). 

[b]Details:[/b]  It will do the same thing when playing back the part in Sib (and by same thing I mean drop the accent volume randomly) so perhaps this isn't just limited to the export function.  In fact, I just ran 10 passes to illustrate how random this issue is (see attached).  I also included the part for your entertainment. :)  Now here's a brain twist... only the flammed notes are having this issue, accent 3 and 5 never fail and accents 1, 2, and 4 are the ones with flams...  Could that be the issue?  My flam grace notes are set at a live velocity of 74 and a live start of -9.

The instruments in the score are snares, tenors, and basses and all are the manual patch.

I'm really out of ideas, any ideas on how to overcome this?

[b]System Info:[/b]
Windows 7 64 bit Lenovo Laptop
Core i7 CPU
8 GB RAM
SSD
Sib 7.1.2
VDL 2.5.5
Kontakt 5
The Write Score Template 7.0a
Audio Configuration: 1 instance of Kontakt 5 with VDL soundset 7.0a
Interface: Microsoft Sound Mapper - Output MME

Thank you for any thoughts,

Rob

In typical fashion, once you ask for help you stumble up a (possible) answer.  I thought to myself while looking at the inspector window . o O ( Well, what else could a mess with in here? )  So I brute forced the live duration, starting with 20, play -- skipped accent.  19, play -- skipped accent.  Until I got to 9... the flam still played but I consistently did [i]not[/i] get a skipped accent.

So instead of a call for help I'll turn this into a request for info.

1)  Why would this be the case?
2)  I never had to tweak this setting before, why need to tweak it now?
3)  Is this in fact the correct fix?
4)  Any other thoughts?

:)

Thanks everyone,

Rob

You might get a better response in the Sibelius forum since this isn't actually a VDL issue.

Understood.  Just didn't know [i]where[/i] the issue was so I thought I'd start here...

it's possible your computer is dropping notes to keep up with the playback.  You are using the MME drivers on a laptop- not good for audio production.  Try out the free [url=http://www.asio4all.com/]ASIO4All[/url] drivers and update your Sibelius playback devices.

Thanks Jesse.  I bought a Soundblaster card a while ago but it turned out it didn't have ASIO. :(  In the attached picture are the options available to me, I'm not sure what the difference is between the various options are but do you have a suggestion on which is best?

In the mean time I'm going to see if Creative has a laptop card with ASIO on it (I thought they said they'd launch one a number of months ago) and I'll also check out the ASIO4ALL drivers as well.

Thanks again for your thoughts.

Rob

don't use any of those, use ASIO4all

Alrighty then! :)