iPad Amp Sims

[ArteraDSP]

GIGFAST LITE Neural Amp Suite is $19.99 till the end of September.Turn your iOS & macOS device into a pro-level guitar rig with GigFast Lite – Neural Amp Suite.
Parametric Neural Amp Models
Built-in FX: overdrive, delay, reverb, chorus & more
Third Party nam support + IR Loader + MIDI support
Don’t miss your chance to upgrade your tone and take your playing anywhere.

 

[Progressive_disclosure]

I’m tempted to get the Gigfast Lite app and a small audio interface again for a simple setup. The three channel thing is nice, I could possibly play captures of my two channel tube amp with shared EQ as a three channel preset using three captures with different EQ settings. Maybe even pedal-into-amp captures.

@ArteraDSP can the app load ”Hyper Accuracy” NAM models as well? Is it just up to the hardware to pull it off?

 

[ArteraDSP]

I’m tempted to get the Gigfast Lite app and a small audio interface again for a simple setup. The three channel thing is nice, I could possibly play captures of my two channel tube amp with shared EQ as a three channel preset using three captures with different EQ settings. Maybe even pedal-into-amp captures.

@ArteraDSP can the app load ”Hyper Accuracy” NAM models as well? Is it just up to the hardware to pull it off?

You can absolutely load “Hyper Accuracy” captures on the setup you mentioned—even on an iPhone 6 or 7. However, if you plan to run multiple instances of GigFast within an AU host or mobile DAW, you’ll need to be mindful of CPU usage to avoid maxing it out.

 

[BenIfin]

You can absolutely load “Hyper Accuracy” captures on the setup you mentioned—even on an iPhone 6 or 7. However, if you plan to run multiple instances of GigFast within an AU host or mobile DAW, you’ll need to be mindful of CPU usage to avoid maxing it out.

Hey Artera !

Hope all is well. Just wondering if you are seeing this from your end.

My experience - using the same RME Interface - is that at 48k / 48 Samples I can run all day long on a PC at a Latency of around 1.5 ms rock solid.

The exact same RME and settings on my Ipad Air M1 deliver a latency of around 6 ms.

My conclusion is that the underlying IPad Core Audio Sub-system has a foundation base minimum level of hardware latency that is around ~4ms / ~5ms higher than on PC.

Hence why ... i.m.h.o ... it is impossible, regardless of the audio interface used, to get a RTL Latency on IPad of around 1.5ms [which any reasonable modern PC can do easily] ..... best RTL Latency on an IPad with a high end Audio Interrace Ive ever seen reported is always around ~5ms / ~6ms ?

Thoughts ?

 

[ArteraDSP]

Hey Artera !

Hope all is well. Just wondering if you are seeing this from your end.

My experience - using the same RME Interface - is that at 48k / 48 Samples I can run all day long on a PC at a Latency of around 1.5 ms rock solid.

The exact same RME and settings on my Ipad Air M1 deliver a latency of around 6 ms.

My conclusion is that the underlying IPad Core Audio Sub-system has a foundation base minimum level of hardware latency that is around ~4ms / ~5ms higher than on PC.

Hence why ... i.m.h.o ... it is impossible, regardless of the audio interface used, to get a RTL Latency on IPad of around 1.5ms [which any reasonable modern PC can do easily] ..... best RTL Latency on an IPad with a high end Audio Interrace Ive ever seen reported is always around ~5ms / ~6ms ?

Thoughts ?

Hi Ben,
You are basically correct we have not witnessed sub 5ms RT latency with our audio interfaces. I currently don't have a modern PC with RME interface but to be honest our macbook pros or Airs with M series processors could not do that either, using our class compliant audio interfaces. This was our measurements with in-house devices for further information.

 

[BenIfin]

Hi Ben,
You are basically correct we have not witnessed sub 5ms RT latency with our audio interfaces. I currently don't have a modern PC with RME interface but to be honest our macbook pros or Airs with M series processors could not do that either, using our class compliant audio interfaces. This was our measurements with in-house devices for further information.

View attachment 51846

Yep. Thanks and keep up your class leading work ! :)

Core Audio is great and stable - but in an IPad - the IPad audio sub-system is just not designed or capable of delivering RTL's of ~1.5 ms <-> 2.0 ms you can now easily get with a good PC or MAC.

All the best !

 

[Progressive_disclosure]

You can absolutely load “Hyper Accuracy” captures on the setup you mentioned—even on an iPhone 6 or 7. However, if you plan to run multiple instances of GigFast within an AU host or mobile DAW, you’ll need to be mindful of CPU usage to avoid maxing it out.

Great news, thanks for the reply. I’m gonna have to dig out my abandoned old iPad Mini and see if it can be given new life then!

 

[ArteraDSP]

A short thrash metal demo with Gigfast Lite and Superior Drive. Summer sale is still going on for both Gigfast Lite and Tone Guru Bundle.

 

[panhardleft]

Since I'm always using the iPad (for the awesome Loopy Pro!), I wanted to measure my latencies in the 'real world' too. So, I shelled out some cash and bought the Latencymeter app to measure the physical latency with a loopback cable.

And then the surprise: With IOS 26 there is a significant improvement!

Here's the table with the comparison values - it's noticeable that my ancient Focusrite (I think it's 2nd Generation) performs way better than the Zoom I bought, because it is really compact for 4in/4out. And to top it all off, I also measured my Helix LT. And what we all know: As an interface, it's really not great...

iPad-OS | Interface     | Buffer | 48 kHz | 88,2 kHz | 96 kHz
--------+---------------+--------+--------+----------+--------
18.6.2  | ZOOM AMS-44   | 34     | 7,58   | 6,55     | 6,39
18.6.2  | ZOOM AMS-44   | 66     | 8,96   | 7,30     | 7,05
18.6.2  | ZOOM AMS-44   | 130    | 11,63  | 8,75     | 8,39
26.0    | ZOOM AMS-44   | 34     | 6,48   | 5,33     | 5,17
26.0    | ZOOM AMS-44   | 66     | 7,81   | 6,02     | 5,83
26.0    | ZOOM AMS-44   | 130    | 10,44  | 7,47     | 7,18
26.0    | HELIX Audio   | 34     | 8,31   |   –      |   –
26.0    | HELIX Audio   | 66     | 9,63   |   –      |   –
26.0    | HELIX Audio   | 130    | 12,31  |   –      |   –
26.0    | Scarlett18i8  | 34     | 5,54   | 4,01     | 3,94
26.0    | Scarlett18i8  | 66     | 6,88   | 4,73     | 4,60
26.0    | Scarlett18i8  | 130    | 9,54   | 6,20     | 6,05

 

[PorcinePicker]

Slightly OT aside. With Apple's penchant for deprecating perfectly good older iOS hardware and rendering it unusable to accommodate their pointless AI agenda, I wouldn't trust an iPad for any serious work, even if the current specs and software look promising. (Still extremely peeved about my iPad Pro that would still be running perfectly and handling every app I need, but is now useless because Apple arbitrarily pulled support.)

 

[EOengineer]

With Apple's penchant for deprecating perfectly good older iOS hardware and rendering it unusable to accommodate their pointless AI agenda

 

[PorcinePicker]

Wtf?! I’m describing what has already happened; it’s not a conspiracy theory. Apple has borked perfectly capable devices because of claimed “hardware limitations” that shouldn’t keep any previous software from running properly. As app makers start to require the current version of iOS, those devices are slowly made unusable. Apple = wankers

 

[paisleywookiee]

Slightly OT aside. With Apple's penchant for deprecating perfectly good older iOS hardware and rendering it unusable to accommodate their pointless AI agenda, I wouldn't trust an iPad for any serious work, even if the current specs and software look promising. (Still extremely peeved about my iPad Pro that would still be running perfectly and handling every app I need, but is now useless because Apple arbitrarily pulled support.)

Apple supports mobile hardware longer than any other manufacturer. I could say the same thing for Microsoft, that basically killed a workstation because it doesn’t have TPM 2.0.

 

[PorcinePicker]

Apple supports mobile hardware longer than any other manufacturer. I could say the same thing for Microsoft, that basically killed a workstation because it doesn’t have TPM 2.0.

You'd be right, except that Microsoft backed off. You can now update to current Windows without the useless and annoying TPM 2.0.

 

[Chocol8]

Perhaps you should try writing and supporting operating systems for multiple generations of hardware, including regular security updates and bug fixes, before criticizing companies that drop support for old hardware. Old crap becomes increasingly time consuming and expensive to support. If you want to run old software on old hardware, go for it, but expecting continued updates forever is not reasonable.

 

[paisleywookiee]

You'd be right, except that Microsoft backed off. You can now update to current Windows without the useless and annoying TPM 2.0.

That’s good. I already did the hack anyway.

 

[paisleywookiee]

Perhaps you should try writing and supporting operating systems for multiple generations of hardware, including regular security updates and bug fixes, before criticizing companies that drop support for old hardware. Old crap becomes increasingly time consuming and expensive to support. If you want to run old software on old hardware, go for it, but expecting continued updates forever is not reasonable.

I honestly don’t view it as that big of a deal. I used a 9th gen iPad for several years, flipped it on Swappa, got a current A16. It’s cheaper than fancy coffee.

The whole argument of how long Apple supports their stuff has always been this way, for as long as I’ve used it. If that bothers people, that’s totally fine. There’s other stuff to purchase.

My dad is still enjoying the iPhone 11 that I gave him, 6 years old and on iOS 26. Just swapped the battery, and voila.

 

[PorcinePicker]

My dad is still enjoying the iPhone 11 that I gave him, 6 years old and on iOS 26. Just swapped the battery, and voila.

I'm still running an iPhone X, also with a battery swap, and it looks and works like new. That's what I expect from a thousand dollar computer. I'm astonished that anyone would view it otherwise. A phone is still just a phone, and the very simple functionality of even a very smart phone is easily handled by 2018 tech. Honestly nothing significant has happened in that space since the iPhone went to 64 bit architecture about a decade ago. We've gotten far too accustomed to buying hype.

I apologize for the somewhat OT diversion....but I sure wouldn't use an iOS device as a DAW for these reasons.

 

[paisleywookiee]

I'm still running an iPhone X, also with a battery swap, and it looks and works like new. That's what I expect from a thousand dollar computer. I'm astonished that anyone would view it otherwise. A phone is still just a phone, and the very simple functionality of even a very smart phone is easily handled by 2018 tech. Honestly nothing significant has happened in that space since the iPhone went to 64 bit architecture about a decade ago. We've gotten far too accustomed to buying hype.

I apologize for the somewhat OT diversion....but I sure wouldn't use an iOS device as a DAW for these reasons.

Well, I disagree. It’s really quite trivial for me to use a device for five years, and then flip it for a decent price and get the new one.

 

[BenIfin]

Since I'm always using the iPad (for the awesome Loopy Pro!), I wanted to measure my latencies in the 'real world' too. So, I shelled out some cash and bought the Latencymeter app to measure the physical latency with a loopback cable.

And then the surprise: With IOS 26 there is a significant improvement!

Here's the table with the comparison values - it's noticeable that my ancient Focusrite (I think it's 2nd Generation) performs way better than the Zoom I bought, because it is really compact for 4in/4out. And to top it all off, I also measured my Helix LT. And what we all know: As an interface, it's really not great...

iPad-OS | Interface     | Buffer | 48 kHz | 88,2 kHz | 96 kHz
--------+---------------+--------+--------+----------+--------
18.6.2  | ZOOM AMS-44   | 34     | 7,58   | 6,55     | 6,39
18.6.2  | ZOOM AMS-44   | 66     | 8,96   | 7,30     | 7,05
18.6.2  | ZOOM AMS-44   | 130    | 11,63  | 8,75     | 8,39
26.0    | ZOOM AMS-44   | 34     | 6,48   | 5,33     | 5,17
26.0    | ZOOM AMS-44   | 66     | 7,81   | 6,02     | 5,83
26.0    | ZOOM AMS-44   | 130    | 10,44  | 7,47     | 7,18
26.0    | HELIX Audio   | 34     | 8,31   |   –      |   –
26.0    | HELIX Audio   | 66     | 9,63   |   –      |   –
26.0    | HELIX Audio   | 130    | 12,31  |   –      |   –
26.0    | Scarlett18i8  | 34     | 5,54   | 4,01     | 3,94
26.0    | Scarlett18i8  | 66     | 6,88   | 4,73     | 4,60
26.0    | Scarlett18i8  | 130    | 9,54   | 6,20     | 6,05

Thanks for this - very good info ! :)

It seems to support my "hypothesis" [ <- wanker ] that the CoreAudio Subsystem simply cannot process RTL Audio at anywhere near as well written PC ASIO Drivers or Hardware modelers.

It just seems that no matter how powerful your iPad is and how great your Audio Interface is, it just cant get to the 1.5ms <-> 2.5ms RTL's you get with Top Tier modelers and well written [ie: RME] ASIO PC drivers.

And now Windows ARM is getting its own native ultra-low latency subsystem like CoreAudio, the differences could/will get even greater.