Reducing CPU load from tanh~ with lookup~

    farfisavox
    Jun 14 2013 | 2:33 pm
    Hi guys,
    I'm trying to save a bit of CPU on my main performance patch. I use tanh~ a lot on the outputs of audio modules as a kind of cheap limiter that gives a slightly nicer distortion than the using clip~.
    I came across this post that says to use lookup~ instead for lighter CPU usage: https://cycling74.com/forums/valve-distortion/
    I've been doing a few tests and using Max's built in 'Show CPU usage' function I have found that tanh~ seems to be much cheaper on CPU than standard MSP lookup~ or indeed Gen~ lookup~ with linear interpolation. Here's my readout: -tanh~ 16.46% -lookup~ 20.59% -gen~ 37.22%
    Have I done something wrong? Should I be looking elsewhere to lower my CPU usage and leave the tanh~'s alone?
    Here's the patch:
    • Peter McCulloch
      Jun 14 2013 | 3:12 pm
      Not sure what's happening; could be that C'74 came up with some optimization. How'd you benchmark it? (a lot of copies?)
      Something that I often go after as low-hanging fruit for optimization is line~. Most usages of line~ can be down-sampled by a factor of 16 with relatively negligible consequences. (Inside a poly~, and be sure to turn resampling off)
    • farfisavox
      Jun 14 2013 | 4:12 pm
      Thanks for your reply. The benchmarking process was simply using the 'Show CPU usage' from the 'view' menu. If you engage it, then disengage it you get a printout in the Max window of the average CPU usage and then a list of all of the MSP objects and what percentage of the average they take up.
      downsampling line~ seems interesting. Would the footprint of poly~ not limit the difference though?
      I'll give it a go though most of my DSP is being migrated to Gen~ so I generally smooth values with the history/mix combination now.
      Cheers.
    • farfisavox
      Jun 14 2013 | 4:29 pm
      Just tried out the downsampling line~ trick and it appears I was right, the footprint of poly~ actually makes it take up more CPU.
      The show CPU usage readout gave me an average of 0.8% CPU usage with poly~ taking up 27.54% of that and line taking only 5.32%.
      Is this right or is the Show CPU usage function not giving me a proper readout?
      Here's the poly patch:
      Here's the master patch:
    • farfisavox
      Jun 14 2013 | 4:36 pm
      Having said that, I've just tested with four of each in a patch.
      With the poly~ method, the first poly~ costs lots but then each instance of the poly~ thereafter seems to cost less. Four instances of the poly, cycle~, live.gain~, *~ and ezdac costs 1%CPU
      Also using the line~ method seems to make the live.gain~ cost more? Four instances of line~, cycle~, live.gain~, *~ and ezdac costs roughly 1.3%CPU.
      Does that sound right? Am I benchmarking this stuff wrong?
    • Peter McCulloch
      Jun 15 2013 | 5:31 am
      I'd say beware the micro-benchmark. Most of the benchmarking patches I've seen use a lot of copies. (50-100 at least!)
      Away from machine so can't check right now, but are you using @resample 0 for poly~?
      You can also use x / (1+0.28*x^2) as a replacement for tanh. (Need to clip input, though, as it goes back towards 0!)
    • Augustine Bannatyne - Leudar
      Jun 15 2013 | 10:59 am
      You can use the multithreading option for Poly too (see help file)