How do I test AudioStrobe and SynchroMuse?

I've just bought a Procyon, and wondered how I can quickly test both the AudioStrobe and SynchroMuse features? I can see AudioStrobe CDs on Amazon, but I can't see any SynchroMuse CDs. Is it possible for me to simply play a short test example off the internet on my PC, using the AUX connector connected to the Procyon, with the other end of the cable connected to my PC's sound card?

When I select the dAS and AS modes on my Procyon, what happens next? Do I press the play button on the Procyon, or will the Procyon simply start working in those particular modes as soon as those modes are selected?

In order to use either the AudioStrobe or SynchroMuse features, do I need to download any driver and/or software and/or editor for my PC beforehand, or will the Procyon work in either of those two modes as soon as it detects sound coming through the AUX connector cable, without the prior use of "PC software initialization"?

Thanks very much for any help on these matters! It would be most appreciated.

Hello and Welcome!

Here is a link to a Synchromuse track and discussion which should help get you started.

If I select the AS mode on the Procyon, then the frames immediately light up with two top flickering green lights, and one lower flickering red light. If I connect the Procyon's AUX socket to my PC's sound card using a standard audio cable, and then play some of the following tracks on mindplace's soundcloud account:

https://soundcloud.com/mindplace

, then nothing happens. The lights on the frames stay the same - that is they remain two flickering green lights and one flickering red light.

Can someone please tell me what I'm doing wrong. Or is my unit defective? Thanks a lot.

It sounds like you might have noise on the audio line.
If you disconnect everything from the Procyon (including audio cables and USB cables) but leave the Ganzframes connected, do you still see the Ganzframes lighting up when you choose AS mode?
Does everything work properly in the Pxx mode? (xx is some number)

Here is some free AudioStrobe sessions: http://www.mindplacesupport.com/foru...Your-Enjoyment

For AudioStrobe you only have to put the Procyon in aS mode. AudioStrobe is sensitive to the level of the sound so you will want to set your audio player as high as possible before you start to get false triggers. False triggers show up as low level light flashes when there is no audio playing. Back off your volume until these go away. For some laptops, the false triggering will never go away, especially if you are running off a wall outlet. If you have this issue then you can buy a 3.5mm ground loop filter at Radio Shack or an electronics store.

Synchromuse is a trigger technology. The Procyon needs to be in dL2 or dAS mode. You have to select the mode manually. In dL2 mode you can stop the session before it ends. In dAS mode you cannot stop it without turning off the Procyon.

A short burst of sound at the beginning of the audio file selects a session that is loaded on your Procyon. Think of it like an automatic session navigator. So for it to work you must have a matching session loaded to your Procyon that corresponds to the header information contained in the Synchromuse trigger. It can be located in any memory slot on the Procyon. So to load a Synchromuse session you will have to use the editor. Then you can play the matching audio file and it should load. Solar Neighborhood by Esteban is a really great session.

I did exactly as you suggested, and I now do not see the frames light up. I guess that means I have "noise on the audio line". Please can you tell me how I can avoid that? Thanks a lot.

Also, when you say "Pxx mode", unfortunately I don't know what you are referring to. However, I'm guessing you mean when I play one of Procyon's built in sessions, such as when the LED displays the value 001, or 002, etc. When I play 001 for instance, the frames appear to light up correctly.

However, I wonder if you mean playing something using PC mode? I haven't yet downloaded any driver/software/editor for the Procyon. Shall I do that now, in order to test "Pxx mode"?

Thanks a lot.

You won't be able to stream the files from SoundCloud on the internet by the way. When files are uploaded to SoundCloud they get compressed to 128kbps for streaming and this is too low to preserve the AudioStrobe signals. You will have to download the tracks to get the full quality.

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

I did exactly as you suggested, and I now do not see the frames light up. I guess that means I have "noise on the audio line". Please can you tell me how I can avoid that? Thanks a lot.

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Ok, the Procyon is fine then, you just need to get rid of the extraneous noise on your audio feed.
We'll need to do this step by step to see where the interference is coming in.
First, plug the included audio patch cable into the AUX connector on the Procyon, and the other end to the headphone output on a portable music player (like an iPod), running both pieces on battery with no other connections. With it connected this way, and the Procyon in AS mode, do you see anything light up on the Ganzframes? If not, then try plugging your headphones into the Procyon and playing some music on your music player. Do you hear the music through the headphones? Does the music sound clear or is there any hum or interference?
Let me know and we'll proceed further.

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Also, when you say "Pxx mode", unfortunately I don't know what you are referring to. However, I'm guessing you mean when I play one of Procyon's built in sessions, such as when the LED displays the value 001, or 002, etc. When I play 001 for instance, the frames appear to light up correctly.

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Sorry, the "xx" (should really be "xxx") is a number like 001, 002, etc. P is the "Preset" or "Program" mode where the Procyon plays internal sessions. The display will show something like P001 or P002 or some other number after "P".

Thanks very much for everyone's help. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to buy a portable music player that runs off batteries. The only "audio capable machine" that I have at the moment is my desktop PC, with its sound card.

Because I'll only be using a battery powered portable music player to continue with this step by step testing process, can someone please recommend a cheap device that I can purchase quickly from Amazon? (An Apple iPod would be too costly for me.) Thanks a lot.

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

Thanks very much for everyone's help. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to buy a portable music player that runs off batteries. The only "audio capable machine" that I have at the moment is my desktop PC, with its sound card.

Because I'll only be using a battery powered portable music player to continue with this step by step testing process, can someone please recommend a cheap device that I can purchase quickly from Amazon? (An Apple iPod would be too costly for me.) Thanks a lot.

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No need to do that! Do you have a CD player, smartphone, Walkman or anything?

Sansa Clip Zip is a neat little player. Here is a refurbished one: SanDisk Sansa Clip Zip 4GB MP3 Player SDMX22-004G-A57K (Black) - Manufacturer Refurbished

Actually no (seriously), but I've just had a brainwave. I've got a netbook, and it can be operated via battery. I've just dug it up, from my various boxes of clutter, and put it on charge. The battery is as flat as a pancake, so it might not be till tomorrow that I can try it out, but I'll test it first thing tomorrow morning. Thanks!

EDIT. Yes SanDisk are a good brand. If my netbook fails to perform properly, I might get that, as I really don't have any battery powered CD player.

I'm expecting that the problem may be noise coming from the soundcard, which we can solve, but I want to be sure the issue isn't with the audio patch cable first.

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

Actually no (seriously), but I've just had a brainwave. I've got a netbook, and it can be operated via battery. I've just dug it up, from my various boxes of clutter, and put it on charge. The battery is as flat as a pancake, so it might not be till tomorrow that I can try it out, but I'll test it first thing tomorrow morning. Thanks!

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The audio from the Netbook may be noisy as well, but please give it a try before buying anything extra. Unless of course you want to get a portable player anyway... It would come in handy if you want to roam around with your Procyon away from your computer.

One thing you can do to but you have to install the Procyon software (which you have to do for Synchromuse and transferring sessions anyway).. Under the Utilities menu in the editor is an item Set AudioStrobe Colors and Balance. This lets you set the analog noise floor and will probably help you to eliminate the spurious signals. This setting is saved to Procyon so it might need to be adjusted again if you switch to a different player.



Attachment 870

Thanks a lot. While waiting for the netbook's battery to charge, I installed the driver & editor to my W7 PC, and played around with the Gain & Noise Floor values in the editor's utilities section. I didn't know what I was doing, so I just randomly moved sliders this way and that, and eventually managed to get the frames to stop flickering lights when no sound was playing, and then when I pressed play on the Windows Media PC application for a downloaded AudioStrobe track, the frames' lights came on.

One effect I enjoyed was to then switch the Procyon's mode back to Session mode, and play one of its built in tracks (001), but leave the AudioStrobe music playing "in the background". I guess this "layered effect" could be done using any music track, and not necessarily an AudioStrobe one.

I wonder - does the Kasina make this whole process easier? For instance, can you buy a CD (such as an AudioStrobe CD), then "rip it" using your PC, and then download this ripped album to the Kasina, and then play it in AS mode? If you can, I'm tempted to send the Procyon back to Amazon, and simply upgrade it to the Kasina.

Also, does the Kasina offer any other features/benefits that are considered to be better than that of the Procyon's, such as general sound and light quality, etc?

Sorry, I've just noticed something else. I could have edited my previous post, but didn't want the following observation to go unnoticed: with the AudioStrobe PC music now stopped, I can hear a constant hum/buzz in the headphones. I can't seem to get rid of it, or even diminish it to any any degree by using the Editor's Utilities settings as mentioned above.

Here is my "boilerplate" answer when people ask about the Kasina vs Procyon:

The Kasina is the culmination of over 5 years of development, 2 years of design and testing. It is the "soup to nuts" solution for the avs enthusiast. It is MindPlaces' flagship product and the leader in it's field, at any price.

The main differences between the Procyon and Kasina are:
- Windows and Mac compatibility
- Music playback from integrated micro-SD card
- Expandable, unlimited storage through the use of micro-SD cards
- Rechargable battery, chargable via USB
- Very simple add/delete sessions and OS update procedure (drag and drop)
- 6-channel Ganzframes (Red/Green/Blue x 2 (Left and Right))
- Spectrastrobe encoding as a 6-channel format - big improvement over AudioStrobe
- Easy to use free KBS editor available for Windows and Mac
- 3rd party editors available
- In-Ear style headphones
- Colour screen with much more information
- Very simple to use with simple control pad and graphical screen
- Modern styling and packaging
- Works as USB audio device for playback of music or sessions via PC

Please have a look at some of our customer reviews on Amazon to see what others are saying about the product.

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

Sorry, I've just noticed something else. I could have edited my previous post, but didn't want the following observation to go unnoticed: with the AudioStrobe PC music now stopped, I can hear a constant hum/buzz in the headphones. I can't seem to get rid of it, or even diminish it to any any degree by using the Editor's Utilities settings as mentioned above.

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You have a cable or groundloop issue, as I suspected.
I'd like to verify that the cable is ok by running audio from your battery-powered netbook. If that is ok, I will help you solve the ground-loop issue on your desktop PC.

It's good to hear you got a suitable level. You should really only have to adjust the 'Set Analog Noise Floor' slider. The others set the brightness of the 2 AudioStrobe channels relative to each other. As you see you can set the AudioStrobe colors to other combinations than Red and Green. The gain sliders are useful if you use Red and Blue for instance which has very different perceived brightness levels in closed eyes.

The Kasina does make the process a lot easier. MP3 files (just music for the ColorOrgan), AudioStrobe, or SpectraStrobe (unique to the Kasina and all light colors controlled not just 2 like in AudioStrobe), all these formats can play from the internal SD card. So, it is a simple MP3 session player. Transferring files to the Kasina is really easy to as it mounts an external disc on your computer. Audio playback from a computer is higher quality as well because the Kasina acts as a USB Audio device and the audio is digital. No level troubles or noise. The Kasina does have an AUX jack like the Procyon if for some reason you needed to go that route.

AudioStrobe on the Kasina is very advanced as you can control the light colors and the way the lights are mapped in realtime.

The Kasina has an LCD interface with the names of the sessions organized in folders. It has a rechargeable battery and as mentioned large internal storage on an 8GB SD card.

So yeah, it is more modern and easier to use. The Procyon is still a nifty device but most first time users given the option would fare better with the Kasina.

Hope this helps,
Scott

You've both convinced me - I'm sending the Procyon back for an upgrade! I really want the audio from my PC's sound card to be clear, without any hassle/worry over noise issues. And I really like the idea of being able to "layer/mix" an AVS unit's built in sound with all types of music being played on my PC.

Can I go ahead and safely uninstall both the Procyon's driver and editor? I noticed that there is no specific uninstall executable. There is a single entry inside "Programs and Features" (Windows Control Panel) called Procyon AVS.

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

You've both convinced me - I'm sending the Procyon back for an upgrade! I really want the audio from my PC's sound card to be clear, without any hassle/worry over noise issues. And I really like the idea of being able to "layer/mix" an AVS unit's built in sound with all types of music being played on my PC.

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Just to be clear, the Kasina will not fix the ground-loop or noise issue with your computer. It will however allow you to load the tracks onto the Kasina so you don't need to connect your computer to the Kasina to play tracks. Any audio device, while connected to your PC, may have issues. I would be happy to help you to resolve that problem, though.

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Can I go ahead and safely uninstall both the Procyon's driver and editor? I noticed that there is no specific uninstall executable. There is a single entry inside "Programs and Features" (Windows Control Panel) called Procyon AVS.

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That is the way to uninstall it. Go ahead.

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Originally Posted by Andy

Just to be clear, the Kasina will not fix the ground-loop or noise issue with your computer. It will however allow you to load the tracks onto the Kasina so you don't need to connect your computer to the Kasina to play tracks. Any audio device, while connected to your PC, may have issues. I would be happy to help you to resolve that problem, though.

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I see. neuroasis mentioned that

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Originally Posted by neuroasis

MP3 files (just music for the ColorOrgan), AudioStrobe, or SpectraStrobe (unique to the Kasina and all light colors controlled not just 2 like in AudioStrobe), all these formats can play from the internal SD card.

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Does this mean that the only non AS/SS files I can load in to Kasina are MP3 ColorOrgan files? I was really hoping to be able to listen to any type of music using the Kasina (either in conjunction with a PC, or "standalone") in CD/lossless quality, without any risk of experiencing noise issues.

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Originally Posted by neuroasis

The Kasina does make the process a lot easier. MP3 files (just music for the ColorOrgan), AudioStrobe, or SpectraStrobe (unique to the Kasina and all light colors controlled not just 2 like in AudioStrobe), all these formats can play from the internal SD card. So, it is a simple MP3 session player. Transferring files to the Kasina is really easy to as it mounts an external disc on your computer. Audio playback from a computer is higher quality as well because the Kasina acts as a USB Audio device and the audio is digital. No level troubles or noise. The Kasina does have an AUX jack like the Procyon if for some reason you needed to go that route.

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

Does this mean that the only non AS/SS files I can load in to Kasina are MP3 ColorOrgan files? I was really hoping to be able to listen to any type of music using the Kasina (either in conjunction with a PC, or "standalone") in CD/lossless quality, without any risk of experiencing noise issues.

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Any MP3 or WAV files can be played from the microSD card on the Kasina. (WAV is uncompressed)
From your computer, via the USB or Aux input you can play any format your computer supports, but as I say, we'll need to sort out the ground-loop or interference issue you're having with your computer to get you clean audio. You SHOULD be ok if you're using USB audio from your computer, as I haven't heard of anyone having problems when using the Kasina that way. It's digital to digital transfer and doesn't use your audio soundcard.

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Originally Posted by Andy

Any MP3 or WAV files can be played from the microSD card on the Kasina. (WAV is uncompressed)
From your computer, via the USB or Aux input you can play any format your computer supports, but as I say, we'll need to sort out the ground-loop or interference issue you're having with your computer to get you clean audio. You SHOULD be ok if you're using USB audio from your computer, as I haven't heard of anyone having problems when using the Kasina that way. It's digital to digital transfer and doesn't use your audio soundcard.

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That's all good to know - thanks. Hehe, I just noticed your little edit there, with the extra bit of "good news" at the end! ;)

BTW, when using a PC with USB audio, is it possible to "stream/pipe" audio from internet sites like YouTube to the Kasina? Or would this require the AUX connection? (If it did require AUX, then yes I would really want to clear up the "noisy sound card".)

Do you have any general/generic tips on how to clear up sound card noise that I could try please? Thanks a lot.

Right, as Andy said you can load WAV files. High bitrate MP3s (256kbps - 320kbps) which we use for the internal sessions are for the most part indistinguishable from uncompressed. But you do have the option of completely uncompressed with WAV. The ColorOrgan will trigger the lights based on the beat of any audio file, internal or external.

You can use Programs and Files to uninstall the editor. You might want to check afterwards in the Device Manager and see if the SiLabs Driver is still present and uninstall it too.

Scott

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Originally Posted by ProcyonUser

That's all good to know - thanks. Hehe, I just noticed your little edit there, with the extra bit of "good news" at the end! ;)

BTW, when using a PC with USB audio, is it possible to "stream/pipe" audio from internet sites like YouTube to the Kasina? Or would this require the AUX connection? (If it did require AUX, then yes I would really want to clear up the "noisy sound card".)

Do you have any general/generic tips on how to clear up sound card noise that I could try please? Thanks a lot.

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Yes, you can play any audio source that you can hear on your computer by selecting the Kasina as your sound output device in the Sound control panel in Windows.


A ground loop isolator like this: PAC SNI-1/3.5 3.5-mm Ground Loop Noise Isolator should clean it up. Andy might have other suggestions. As mentioned there is no reason that USB audio should have any noise unless your computer power supply is unstable or radiating. If there are problems then a USB cable with a ferrite filter will help.

Thanks a lot! It sounds to me (no pun intended) that if I stream/pipe music from my PC's sound card to the Kasina using a USB cable, then the likelihood of getting unwanted noise/interference is at least low. Consequently, from my understanding of the situation thus far, I needn't be concerned about obtaining noise isolating equipment just yet. Granted, if this turns out not to be the case, and I get noise problems using a USB cable when "music streaming" to the Kasina, then certainly this situation needs to be reexamined.

Incidentally, my PC's PSUnit is a fairly good one, and not too old. My PC is positioned next to a radiator though - I wonder if that can cause problems? I may move it soon, to see if that makes a difference. Also, as luck would have it, I do actually have a ferrite "clip on" gadget that you can clip around any cable, to help reduce "noise" in cabling. I'll see if I can find it..

Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. You will probably have no issues.