Comparison of audio synthesis environments

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Software audio synthesis environments typically consist of an audio programming language (which may be graphical) and a user environment to design/run the language in. This article compares noteworthy audio synthesis environments, and enumerates basic issues associated with their use.

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[edit] Subjective comparisons

Audio synthesis environments comprise a wide and varying range of software and hardware configurations. Even different versions of the same environment can differ dramatically. Because of this broad variability, certain aspects of different systems cannot be directly compared. Moreover, some levels of comparison are either very difficult to objectively quantify, or depend purely on personal preference.

Some of the commonly considered subjective attributes for comparison include:

  • Usability (how difficult is it for beginners to generate some kind of meaningful output)
  • Ease of use (how steep is the Learning curve for average and advancing users)
  • Sound "quality" (which environment produces the most subjectively appealing sound)
  • Creative flow (in what ways does the environment affect the creative process - e.g. guiding the user in certain directions)

These attributes can vary strongly depending on the tasks used for evaluation.

Some other common comparisons include:

  • Audio performance (issues such as throughput, latency, concurrency, etc.)
  • System performance (issues such as buggyness or stability)
  • Support and community (who uses the system and who provides help, advice, training and tutorials)
  • System capabilities (what is possible and what is not possible [regardless of effort] with the system)
  • Interoperability (how well does the system integrate with other systems from different vendors)

[edit] Building blocks of sound and sound "quality"

Audio software often has a slightly different "sound" when compared against others. This is because there are different ways to implement the basic building blocks (such as sinewaves, pink noise, or FFT) which result in slightly different aural characteristics. Although people can of course prefer one system's "sound" over another, perhaps the best output can be determined by using sophisticated audio analyzers in combination with the listener's ears. The idea of this would be to arrive at what most would agree is as "pure" a sound as possible.

[edit] User interface

The interface to an audio system often has a significant influence on the creative flow of the user, not because of what is possible (the stable/mature systems listed here are fully-featured enough to be able to achieve an enormous range of sonic/compositional objectives), but because of what is made easy and what is made difficult. This is again very difficult to boil down to a brief comparative statement. One issue may be which interface metaphors are used (e.g. boxes-and-wires, documents, flow graphs, hardware mixing desks).

[edit] General

Name Creator Primary Purpose(s) First release date Most recent update Cost License Main user interface type Development status
ChucK Ge Wang and Perry Cook Realtime synthesis, live coding, pedagogy, acoustics research, algorithmic composition 2004 v1.2.1.0, Aug 2007 Free GPL Document Immature
Csound Barry Vercoe Realtime synthesis, Offline audio rendering, Algorithmic composition, acoustic research 1990s v5.08, March 2008 Free LGPL Batch processing Mature
Max/MSP Miller Puckette Realtime synthesis, hardware control mid-1980s $495 Commercial software Graphical Mature
Pure Data Miller Puckette Realtime synthesis 1990s v0.40.3, July 24th 2007 Free BSD-like Graphical Stable
Reaktor Native Instruments Realtime synthesis, hardware control 1996 5 $579 Commercial software Graphical Mature
SuperCollider James McCartney Realtime synthesis, live coding, algorithmic composition, acoustic research March 1996 v3.2, Feb 2008 Free GPL Document Stable

[edit] Programming language features

Name Textual/graphical Object-oriented Type system
ChucK Textual Yes Static
Csound Textual No
Max/MSP Graphical No
Pure Data Graphical No
Reaktor Graphical No
SuperCollider Textual Yes Dynamic

[edit] Data interface methods

Interfaces between the language environment and other software or hardware (not user interfaces).

Name Shell scripting MIDI OSC HID VST Audio Units Other
In Out In Out In Out As host As unit
ChucK Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Csound Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Max/MSP Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Pure Data Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Reaktor Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
SuperCollider Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes

[edit] Technical

Name Operating system(s) Source code language(s) Programming (plugin) API language(s) Other technical features
ChucK Mac OS X, Linux, Windows C++ Unified timing mechanism (no separation between audio-rate and control-rate)
Csound Mac OS X, Linux, Windows C, C++ C; also Python, Java, LISP, Tcl, C++ Plugin opcodes; several analysis/resynthesis facilities; can compute double-precision audio; Python algorithmic composition library
Max/MSP Mac OS X, Windows C, Java, Javascript, also Python via externals
Pure Data Mac OS X, Linux, Windows, iPod C C, C++, Faust, Haskell, Java, Lua, Python, Q, Ruby, Scheme, others
Reaktor Mac OS X, Windows
SuperCollider Mac OS X, Linux, Windows C, C++, Objective C C++ Client-server architecture; client and server can be used independently