Foo_uie_peakmeter_spectrum is a foobar2000 plugin that combines a peakmeter with a spectrum analyzer. It requires Columns UI and is the successor of foo_uie_peakmeter. The component can be used as a peakmeter and/or a spectrum analyzer.



Download:
http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....st&p=546448

Wiki:
http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?ti...ter_spectrum%29

Todo:

• adjustable sensitivity and refresh time
• zoom in/out by left/middle click
• relative paths to the images
• additional window functions
• bar mode for the main bar gradient
• optional autosize mode for the spectrum analyzer main bar size
• "falling peaks" with customizable fall speed
• adjustable dB range steps (LED style)
• backgound picture and/or transparent background
• clip indicator with one or more adjustable db-values and assignable colors
• input assistance for the spectrum analyser bar labels

Woa Superb!!

At last!
Thanks!

Cool!
Thank you.

It's quite sluggish compared to the old peakmeter component. It seems to update much less often.

I've experienced the same thing.
The original peakmeter component is a lot more responsive...

Thank's!

Thanks!
It is nice.

But i am missing the transparent background very much.
I am using it as a panel in panels ui and would really like to have a transparent background of your component to see my global background picture.

The update interval has not been changed. But it's more accurate now cause the number of analysed samples is higher. In the next version you will be able to adjust these values (see first todo item). EDIT: I forget to tell you about the dependency between the FFT-size and the response. Sorry!

Thank you! It' planned, but not on top of the list. I will see what i can do.

Someone erase my post....i don't know why....

I only put:

YEEEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH BAAAABBBYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!...

for your new component...

This sounds like a respect fault for somebody??? This is no respect fault for my 80 years grandmother old...., then, this is no respect fault for nobody....i think
---------------------------------

Now, why don't autosize spectrum in horizontal..., but yes in vertical mode??

I want auto size in horizontal too...


I guess that you're speaking about refresh rate...., if not, please add it, cause' my eyes are going crazy when look the spectrum...jajaja.

Now, at same time i agree that:

Your Spectrum are Logarithmic or not? Well, i like the Channel_Spectrum plugin.., i love how it can show you every harmonic of a note, this is really impressive...i never see some like this..
...I think...that your spectrum was made in Logarithmic mode, cause' it don't show the truly levels in the highs frequency range and seems to match all frequency levels. Please add an option to disable or to enable this mode (Logarithmic).

For the last...Could you add a clip indicator in 0db or adjustable db???
And, can you add a textbox with a peak reached like the SoundForge meters have?? Its really usefull i think..., perhaps with an option to interchange it with the tooltip that actually exist. And once clicking on it to refresh peak please...
I want this two last things since the old PeakMeter (old!?)...


i think that your component becomes in a more professional tool for Foobar.

Bye. Thanks in advance.

sounds good to me!
I wrote "optional autosize mode for the spectrum analyzer main bar size". It meant autosize for both modes, horizontal and vertical.
Yes, refresh rate will also be adjustable. (see also this post)
The reason for writing this component is to display the frequency spectrum in logarithmic form. I think such an option is not necessary, cause it's easier to display the fft ouput linear, but the effect of frequency on the human ear has a logarithmic basis. (see also Psychoacoustics, logarithmic frequency scaling, about hearing)
Yes, with one or more adjustable db-values and assignable colors. It's on the todo list now.
hmmm... i'll think about it.
You can double click on the component to reset the peak. Left click will be used to increase the zoom in a future release.

So, the responsiveness will be changed or not??? Can only show an adequate responsive with a few bands and/or FFT size??
Why the Channel_Spectrum plugin have a lot of responsive??? Does it has FFT too?


Well, if its so easier why not?? Please, add the two options for the people who don't like logarithmic view...


This actually reset the peak tics..., but don't the peak reaching in the tooltips...

Nice! Thanks!

This has nothing to do with the responsiveness of the spectrum analyzer. Please read the posts! The number of samples used by the peakmeter is given by the FFT-size value. So i think a separate option is needed cause there are dependencies between the refresh time, the FFT-size and the sample rate of the song (for example, overlapping can occur). It will be implemented in the next release.
I think i answered this before ... (... but the effect of frequency on the human ear has a logarithmic basis.)

Ok..., you don't need to remember this to me. I know how is the effect of frequency on the human ear..., but this is for the ears only.., not the eyes.

I like to see every notes amplitude expanded, not compressed..., despite what i hear.
I don't like an spectrum with all frequencies like having the same amplitude...

Seems that you like the logarithmic view of the spectrum...., this is tastes question..

Greetngs.

excellent!

i never knew how much i would like having a spectrum analyzer sitting in my foobar window.

great work. looking forward to future releases.

This component looks very nice.

But there's one thing for me that's annoying:
It uses much more CPU time than the peakmeter-only component, which is ok while I use foobar2000 as my primary application. But when it's run in the background (minimized to tray) it still uses the same amount of resources.

Could you please disable the component while foobar2000 is minimized? So it wouldn't unnecessarily take resources from other programs.

OK! Thank's


Thank you!

Yes, you're right. I forget about that! Thank's !

Is it possible to get it to stretch across the entire screen in Columns UI as opposed to just the side panel in the vertical splitter? I am not good at figuring out formatting.

John

Yes, for example you can use the button “options” in the “spectrum analyzer” group to increase the size of the main bars or you can select more bands. You also can modify the space between the spectrum and the peakmeter in the group “Global” by setting the property “Space between modules”.

Hi, may you explain the "Window function" option (none/hanning/blackman)?
Thank you very much for your great work

Thank you! Cause only a part of the signal is processed, for example, a leakage effect occurs. The leakage effect is reduced significant by a window function. So the window function have a great influence on the quality of result. For more information about the window function visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Window_function or take a look at my example below.

220 Hz sine wave

Hi foo_pm,

Do you mean "hamming" instead of "hanning" ? I don't see any hanning here...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Window_...mparsion%29.png

Hann and Hamming look like the two best compromises for me (better than Blackman because "narrower"). Kaiser alpha=2 also looks better than Blackman (let's consider than having a dynamic range of more than 45dB is already very good, there's no need to go below with Blackman if Blackman isn't "narrow" enough for the essential information).

On the complete opposite side, the "larger" calculation methods (Nutall, or even the "Flat top") could be useful for those wanting to have very few bands ?...

Of course it's up to everyone to choose the "right" calculation method for him, according to his total number of bands. Maybe some "official guidelines" could help : e.g. "for more than XX bands, choose Hamming or Kaiser alpha=2 / for less than YY bands, choose Nutall or "Flat top". Because choosing hamming for only 7-10 bands or choosing Nutall for 31 bands looks like nonsense to me, don't you think ?

Hey, it could even be... automatic ? The component would choose itself the best calculation method according to the number of bands...

Just my 0.02.

Open the original link I posted and search for the term “Hanning window”. You will find it! Most applications (Wavelab for example) are using the term “hanning” instead of “hann”. The term was coined by "Particular Pairs of Windows." von R. B. Blackman und John W. Tukey (published in "The Measurement of Power Spectra, From the Point of View of Communications Engineering", New York: Dover, 1959, pp. 98-99). I found this in the german wiki .
Yes, but you can get a lot of information from the internet.
The idea is nice , but there are additional dependencies like the fft size for example. Furthermore the window function causes additional cpu usage. So I think this parameter must be adjusted manually.

I'd like to be able to choose at least one of these window functions: Nuttall, Blackman-Harris or Blackman-Nuttall. It would also be nice to be able to set the displayed dynamic range. Limited to 96 dB there would be no to very little visible leakage with the mentioned functions. Then we would have a function for every important type:

• Type A: very narrow but high leakage (Hann)
• Type B: less narrow with medium leakage (Blackman)
• Type C: even less narrow but little leakage (Nuttall, Blackman-Harris, Blackman-Nuttal)

Edit: What puzzles me a bit is that the Blackman function in your plugin causes the leakage to grow compared to no window function applied. Is that a bug? I tested three frequencies: 100, 1000 and 10000 Hz. While the Hann window decreased the leakage for 1000 and 10000 Hz and increased it a bit for 100 Hz, the Blackman window increased the leakage for every three frequencies.

Well, maybe manual, but with an optional "automatic" button that would handle everything if the user decides to and has enough CPU power ?

OK, will be implemented soon in the next release.
Thank's for testing! Yes you are right. You can get the fix (0.1.0.1) here: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....st&p=546448


OK.... i will give it some more thoughts.

What is "leakage"??

The spectrum analyzer is great. I am not complaining. It's just that I have a somewhat eccentric, "Monk'ish" outlook on life.

I have the bar widths reduces and the spaces eliminated so that the panel is fairly narrow. This means that I have to reduce the number of labels on the bars significantly. My "complaint/request/bazaar desire" is with the intervals chosen. I am sure that you had some reason for choosing them, but.... I would like to use the octave points for the labels: 32, 64, 128, etc. (OK, that's A=430, not A=440, but it looks soooo nice) Also, while there is a lot of noise at the very bottom, hall infrasonics and mathmatical artifacts, a lot of organ music does use the bottom octave, so a marker at 16 would be nice.

Any chance?

Bob

You can find a good explanation here: http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/4844#toc2. The meaningful main statement: "When the number of periods in the acquisition is not an integer, the endpoints are discontinuous. The result is the high side lobes seen in the un-windowed spectrum plot. This phenomena is called Spectral Leakage." Hope that helps.

Thank you! I don't know if this makes sense cause of the low resolution in this frequency range. But i understand you and will keep this in mind.

admittedly i don't understand a lot of what is being said in here, so forgive me if this has been brought up, but this component is not working smoothly for me. all of the bars seem to be getting stuck quite often. anyone else having this issue?

Ok, thanks...., but i can't understand all this 'language'...

Leakage means 'artifacts' maybe? How you discover these?

Thanks.

Thanks for this great plugin!

Great stuff! Some comments/requests:

1. CPU usage seems quite high when Foobar2000 is visible (and goes up depending on the size of the bars). I'm not sure you can do anything about this, but it is <1% when Foobar2000 is hidden, and >8% when Foobar2000 is visible (and I have an overclocked Penryn...).

2. I'd like to experiment with having peak fall down values of less than 1 second, but I can't enter something like 0.5 for the value (it doesn't like the "." character).

3. I know this might be a 2.0 feature, but it would be nice to separate the channels (e.g. show L peakmeter, L spectrum, R peakmeter, R spectrum).

4. It would be nice to have a master "show labels" (and show markers?) control so I don't have to turn them all off individually (and then try to remember which ones were on in case I change my mind and want to show them again).

5. Another 2.0 feature...animated falling peak values (rather than them snapping to the current level, with another spectrum analyzer I've tried it was interesting to see them gradually fall down to current levels at some tunable rate).

I think this was caused by other components, by Album Art Panel on track change for example. Do you notice the same behaviour with the standard spectrum analyser?

I'll try to explain it with a picture:

The picture displays an analysis result of a single 200 Hz sine wave. The red coloured area is caused by the Leakage Effect. Without leakage you would see only the bar at 200 Hz.

Thank you!

I can't reproduce that! The cpu usage is less than 1% on my 2,6 GHz "poor people" dual core. On a 1,7 GHz Celeron (single core) the cpu usage is less than 2-3%. Please disable the equalizer and other visual components and dsp's one by one to determine the causing component.

Yes, only integer values can be used. I will change this.

I remember your post. But until now no decision has been made.

Nice idea! It' on the todo list now!

That's already on the list.

Hi, foo_pm! Thank you for another great visualization plugin!

And now just one feature request to your to-do list. It's a... separated 'orientation' setting for each of peakmeter and spectrum analyzer.

i don't use the default interface much, but i switched over to it and had a look at the standard spectrum analyzer, and it is indeed very choppy as well. i cut out the album art element, but it didn't help.

in columns ui, i took out the album art panel, and that helped tremendously. well, so far at least.

i'll report back later.

Looks much better than the default one, but I have one issue with it, I can not seem to be able to remove the black border at the top and bottom.

I want it to fill the entire panel I am running it in.



Hopefully there is a way around it or it can be fixed.

Thanks for you excellent work anyway

Neil

Thanks for the suggestion! But i don't want to implement something like this cause it's unfortunately too time-consuming.

Thank's! It's fixed. You can get the new version here: http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....st&p=546448. Additionall, new window functions are implemented.

Thank you.


Well, if it can help the decision, I'd like that too.


Damn ! I was really hoping for that one. More precisely, what I was hoping for was not an orientation setting, but this :
(1) A symmetric layout for L spectrum / R spectrum :
=> Example :[L spectrum 20.000 --- 20 Hz] [20 Hz --- 20.000 Spectrum R] in the same row, not one over the other of course
(2) The possibility to add the peakmeter wherever we want (or at least between the two L and R spectrums) :
=> Example : [L Spectrum 20.000 --- 20 Hz] [L / R PEAKMETER HERE] [20 Hz --- 20.000 Spectrum R]
Can you imagine this totally symmetrical layout ? It would be REALLY beautiful !
(yeah, I like symmetrical things )
Pleeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaase !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't know what this "window function" accuracy setting does and have no time to find this out, but thanks!

kudos, very well done! looks great!

I'd also like the ability to auto-fill panel, including the potential to automatically adjust number of bands/fft size/spacing to achieve the auto-fill.

edit: Did you write the DSP math (fft, window function, etc) yourself?

any chance at releasing source code? pretty please? Might get some people to implement features and submit back to you (hopefully you've got some version control going, even if local)

Thanks for your super quick fix - was not expecting it so quick.

I go to bed after the post, and get up to find it fixed, you can't ask for better service.

Neil

Very nice plugin. But what I'm missing, is the possibility of transparent background.

You see my problem in the picture :


My 2nd problem is, that the plugin doesn't rezise, when I change the width of my foobar window...

Thank you foo_pm! Your plugins rock.

This is my simple yet useful layout on white background



Moderation: Please do not inline images larger than roughly 800x600 and 80KB. Please use thumbnails and/or links for large pictures instead.

Any chance for classic UI version? ;(

foo_pm has it on his list of things to do but an SDK for the default ui needs to be released first