FabFilter User Forum

PRO Q4 artifacts issue (?)

Hi to all of you!
I ve been working on a project for some time now and I used to use a lot of Q3 instances on it, as it used to be my "go to" EQ untill Q4 arrived a few days ago, which I like a lot.
So, I upgraded to Q4 and tried the new eq on some channels , a kick for example with no other VST loaded. Tried also both AU and VST3. I must say at this point that I usually avoid to use Linear Phase mode , I usually work on zero latency which is the default.
And that's when the weird things start to happen! I changed with the same exact settings of a preset from Q3 to Q4 (not something extreme , a couple of bells hitting 2-3 dbs mid-high) on a kickdrum and I noticed that I had some artifacts similar to what linear phase does at some instances, like a reverse tail of the bell curve of the frequency I subtracted, right before the sample hits (for about
10-30ms ,couldn't measure it , when bounced it doesn't appear on the waveform,sounds something like what a reverse reverb does before a drum hit, like a cableguys snaphead effect , but at this point it is quite undesirable) .

I am on an M1pro with an ultralite MK3 hybrid monitors ADAM A7Xs,and a pair of HD 25 Sennheiser so it appears on my monitors and the headphones also. I thought of a probability that it may have to do with some delay compensation of my DAW (Ableton 11) so I experimented with the delay compensation times and the buffer size but as I said from the beginning the issue is non existent with Pro Q3. Same thing happens in every mode (zero/natural/linear). I live open a possibility that it may have to do something with Ableton 11 and VST compatibility but I doubt it since the DAW is not that old yet,it's on native ARM version .

Has anyone noticed the same? If not, please try to observe it as I really want to know if this is only on my system or a general issue to be fixed.

Stavros Konstantakis

I have a similar problem as soon as I use dynamic on the pro q3 or pro q4. When I bounce the track and compare it with a phase shifter, I hear strange artifacts in the region's I yoused dynamic or spectral eq. I can only avoid this if I write the track directly after the pro q 4

Sven

We have updated the filters in Pro-Q 4, so it's possible that they sound different. The dynamic processing was also updated. However, when you use Pro-Q 4 in zero latency mode you should not get any pre-ringing. The main difference is in the high end, so on a kick drum you should not hear a huge difference. If you're still hearing a difference please send us a video or a file that we can look at at info@fabfilter.com.

Ralph (FabFilter)
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