This is probably more of a "why" question then a "how", but, what are the benefits/drawbacks of using a phasor~ based clock over a metro? I've been digging through patches lately, trying to absorb as much as I can, an I'm noticing more phasor~'s being used as clock sources.

I'm sure this has been discussed before, but I didn't come up with much when searchg the forums.

Thanks!

-pete-

I generally use [phasor~] clocks in situations where sample accuracy is important.

I thought Max users used phasor~ for sequencing because the metro was really shifty. As far as i know Pd doesn't suffer from this problem and has a really tight metro..

Using phasor as a clock source i guess is really cool for doing vari -speed/direction stuff. Using phasor~, wrap~ and edge~ one could do both message and audio based sequencing. You know, i havent tried!

boonier: I didn't realize Pd's [metro] is that tight. I guess I just assumed I'd run into the same problems I did with Max.

Here's the setup I use for [phasor~] clocks:

[phasor~]
|
[*~ 2] <--used to divide beats, e.g. if [phasor~] cycles at a rate of one 4/4
| measure, 2 will give half-notes, 4 gives quarters, and so on
[wrap~]
|
[expr~ $v1<.5]
|
[edge~]
|
[bng]

What's also nice about this is all of your beat divisions can link up to one [phasor~]; and if you stop the [phasor~] inbetween beats, you can pick up exactly from that point without things getting out of sync, which you can't do with [metro]. I haven't done this yet, but you could also use one of the [wrap~]s to lookup, say, a drum loop in an array, so when you speed up or slow down, the loop will stay tightly in sync as well, albeit with pitch changes.

that [edge~] object looks handy. wish there was something like that for vanilla pd.

Cool, good info!

Maelstorm: I'm going to try your phasor~ setup this evening.

Thanks!

-pete-

I remember reading [expr~] was very heavy computationally. Is this correct? obviously if you are only using one metro like this it should not be a big deal but perhaps this form should only be used in places where the extra precision is needed?

-Jon

I don't think in this case it's that much more computationally expensive. Of course, I'd rather just use [<~], which is less expensive, but that's not flying with Pd-extended right now.

i think it is [fexpr~] that is really bad for cpu usage. and maybe if you do really long expressions, [expr~] will hold things up a bit, but otherwise don't worry. i have made patches with dozens possibly hundreds of [expr~] objects running.

It is helpful for us thanx

Hey this is awesome, I still have to get used to using signals to do my work for me!

How would you go about turning this on or off if you are using it to count?

Ah I figured it out with [spigot~]

Send a frequency of 0 to [phasor~] to stop it dead in its tracks.

Ah that's even better! Thanks!