Muddy sound when playing live

I did what you said in that thread and checked the MIDI message box and everything seems to be fine. Velocities go from 1 to 127 and the mapping is set in Minimalistic (Full-Featured sounds just about the same though).

(I can't seem to be able to post images, so here's a link to the screenshot: https://imgur.com/gallery/RAf1iep)

I checked everything I could think of outside Pianoteq as you said and still nothing fixed it.

I reinstalled drivers, checked my USB A to B cable to see if it was the problem, unplugged everything from the computer except the headphones, the usb connected to the DP and the mouse... nothing. I even had my family come and compare the sound in case I was going crazy and hearing differences where there weren't. There were.

Are we certain that this is not supossed to happen even with low tier headphones/soundcard?

That didn't make any difference either (It was already just getting input from the keyboard but tried getting it from All Inputs), but you did help me narrow the problem quite a bit. I tried another virtual piano demo, which I have to say can't compare to this one, but the problem still persists there.

Since you said it may be a problem with Asio4All, I swaped it to the Windows Audio and the only difference I got was higher delay. Same muffled sound.

Theoretically, when using Asio4All it mutes everything but the program is using it. Right? So it couldn't be that there is something interfering with it from within the OS.

Same thing. Is like a blanket is covering the speakers while I play.

That's quite normal, though. Note-off velocity doesn't have to match the value of the corresponding note-off

If you see a list of different drivers inside ASIO4all settings, instead of deselecting those in that interface.. consider beginning instead by:

first close Pianoteq (and other audio apps)

1
right-click the speaker icon in system tray

2
choose 'playback devices'

3
in the the 'sound' window which pops up, you should see the list of audio devices

4
right-click the one(s) you do NOT want to be active

5
choose 'disable' (you can always re-activate them if needed in the same way)

6
load Pianoteq - open settings/midi - open your ASIO4all settings

Now you will NOT see those other drivers.. either 'lit up' or 'greyed out' - they're just not there - no longer getting in the way. So you won't need to 'deactivate' them inside ASIO4all.

Unless I disallow those devices at system level, there seems to be just always be some internal Windows "fight" over these resources - no matter what logical things we set in our programs.

Sometimes Windows just wants to help, a bit like 'Clippy' - often we don't benefit from that kind of "I see you're running two audio drivers, allow me to try to load them both at the same time for you" kind of help It's helpful under some circumstances but not this.

You might also want to check settings relating to "allow this audio device to take exclusive control" - in the list mentioned above, choose 'properties' for any in the list and go to 'advanced' tab, un-select 'allow applications to take exclusive cont4rol of this device' - might help too - make sure the audio device you DO want to use CAN take exclusive control maybe.

I have found time and time again, these are the fix - hope this works for you. Cheers!

Sorry to know the issue persists Goumes.

Doesn't seem right that system-wide disabled drivers still show up in ASIO4all settings

SO many things it could be. Pianoteq doesn't seem the logical cause of this - but have you tried uninstalling it and reinstalling it. (less hassle than a reformat and reinstall of OS etc - especially not fun this time of year).

My first thought now is about where you say "speakers into amp" - are you plugging speakers out of 'line out', and headphones out of a 'headphones' at the same time? Or do you have an external audio unit involved?

An external audio unit has advantages if you have more than one thing plugged in at a time. You may already have done this, but certainly try only having one thing (speakers OR headphones) plugged into PC at a time to see if that's helpful.

Also - it just may be that one of these is coming out of the wrong output (or an inappropriate output). For example, some systems may have "Line Out" AND "Headphones" AND "Headset". Obvious what line out may be for right? But the others?

So before anything else, just quickly check if one of these outs, is also for headSET (which includes 'services' for a headset with microphone for telephony/gaming etc). That may explain the change when differentiating your input and playback.

Maybe, just maybe, when "handling input" (your playing) some 'dumb' service is trying to read/handle this signal 'as audio' rather than midi. Then when just playback, theres NO 'headset' microphone system in the way leading to the correct audio path.

Could be that this is also further related to one of the below..

a,
something else could be back-loading drivers from a previous install (clutter left behind after uninstall maybe). I'd comb through programs to see if there's something forgotten or not properly uninstalled before anything more drastic like reformat and reinstall of OS etc.

b,
if you have a PC with an ensemble of OEM features - these may add some layers (like home theatre Dolby 5.1 etc. and entirely separate but 'integrated' settings and features) into the mix. Although that layer of 'extras' may never get in your way visually inside settings, some of these 'services' can surface at times or crash or bork in strange ways.

c,
if you have things like games (or game ecosystems like Steam with their own overlays or features) installed, double-check you're not running it in background with their overlays which might be trying to keep those same 'disabled' drivers loaded. Sometimes elements can clash/crash. Things can go wrong without looking like it. Not singling out Steam for particular reasons (well behaved generally) but sometimes vendors have free reign over your settings sadly. "We know our users love to have always on! live streaming-buddybuddy-chat app for convenience - super excited!".. erm yeah, not if I'm running other audio gear and want to do anything else at all with this machine, kthnxby.

Often the fix is to un-do some unwanted clutter.

I forgot to mention, before you do anything like reformat, it could be good to contact support.

Goumes: If you're playing back the "last few seconds" from within Pianoteq, still using the same audio driver as you were when playing live, then I have a very hard time believing that the signal being sent to the speakers would be any different, and I'd strongly suspect it's just psychological.  If you're convinced otherwise, then one way to prove it to us would be to record the signal from your soundcard - the actual electrical signal, so we can all judge for ourselves. ;^)

Greg.