New Setup Help, Mixer to AI to Renoise.

Hello,

I am very new to this whole hardware set up and need some help, I have been trying to read up about using send tracks etc only to confuse myself more!

I have a MOTU Ultralite MK3 which is picked up fine by Renoise, I also have a Mackie 1202 VLZ4 which I am trying to get working.

I think all the cables are connected to the AI correctly now im just trying to figure out how to pick the Mackie up in renoise so that I can use the channels to mix, panning them L and R in mono etc.

Really not sure where to start, I managed to put a send track on one of my tracks in Renoise but I dont know if im even doing the right thing!

Any help much appreciated!

You want to mix renoise tunes with an analog mixer? Don’t know about the mixer and its possible midi capabilities, but you know that you most probably can’t automate and 1:1 reproduce your mixing moves with this - it is quasi “recorded in audio” live action, each mix unique?

Look into track output routing. In the mixer view, make sure “show/hide track output routing” is enabled (lower-right dot-arrow button in the right side of the mixer view). Make sure your soundcard runs all its output channels, and renoise is configured to have them enabled. In the mixer view the list box under each channel should give you option to either route the channel to “master” or to a pair of soundcard outputs. I’d say these outputs connect with the mixer, and mixer outputs back to soundcard ins. You can then use the “line input” device to catch a pair of soundcard inputs into any channel in the dsp chain.

Renoise understands only stereo pairs. Panning “mono” could mean that you make use a channel mono, use only l or r of a pair to a mixer mono channel, the output of the mixer should be stereo into renoise or whatever recording device/app with the panning applied by the mixer. Maybe if you use mono as standard channel format, you could try software routing on your pc so a stereo pair gets routed into a single mono output of the soundcard, as not to waste all those channels. Under linux I’d use “Jack” for this, I don’t know about possibilities under other OS.

The latency introduced by each link should be equal to the input/output latency of the soundcard, and needs to be compensated. Not only buffer settings, most soundcards also have a slight physical extra delay that can be measured with software and a backlink via a patch cable.

I’ve done many times with a similar mixer, the 14 track VLZ. All analog, I don’t think we’re talking about MIDI here.

But like OopsIFly points out, you need to choose a driver which is capable of multi-output

Jack on Linux (but also other platforms I guess), ASIO on Windows or Core Audio (OSX)…

Without this, you can’t really do any per-track routing into an external mixer.

Ok thanks for replys, I was a bit scared there for a second that I had bought this hardware for no reason!

I am running the latest renoise on 10.10.5 OSX Yosemite, not sure that has a suitable driver. I will need to check if the MOTU driver is capable of multi-output, and if not I will get my hands on a core audio driver then?

I think figuring all of this out is going to take a fair bit of time and patience!

I have found a list of various routings underneath the channel tab, but I have managed to make the sound go into the AI interface but I cant see it going through the mixer.

How do I make sure my soundcard is running all the necessary outputs?

Yes, you will have to wrap your head around a number of things now to get it working.

Can’t help with OSX and your soundcard. But I’d use the latest manufacturer (MOTU) drivers, and look into the software brought by the manufacturer to configure the sound interface. A quick google brought to me that MOTU seems to offer a software called “Cuemix” for these purposes. There will probably be some tool (if not Cuemix itself) for configuring the routing coming with the driver installer/download from a cd or download from the company.

Also go to the next best store and buy a cheap 12 pack or different colored electricians tape, to put loops next to each cable’s jacks & keep a list of color/channel associations, so you don’t get lost with all those cables…