azslow3

1. msmcleod probably  will fix sends in HUI part. Theoretically, everyone is free to do this (the source code is on GitHub).
2. HUI is even more archaic then Automap and Windows 7. And it was not invented to have cross-DAW compatibility nor to support different controllers. It just happened one particular DAW was (is) a "standard" in "professional studios". This DAW was almost refusing to use anything not "specific for me", hardware manufacturers was proud to claim "market leader compatibility" and other DAWs (with way more bright controllers support) could gain some users by "you can use pro hardware". BTW mentioned DAW has other owner and own controllers with new own protocol now (Cakewalk partially supports these controllers)
3. Novation Impulse comes not even close to the capability of original "HUI device". It simply has way less physical controls (and those which are there are of lower quality...). So, it is "usable" with HUI software but functionality and usability is not at the level of specially build for such controller solutions.
4. "InControl" on "Newer devices" is just... yet another MIDI button. The rest is up to particular DAW plug-in for particular device. I guess they was tired supporting Automap and decided to sell "MIDI controllers" instead (Automap devices was not standard MIDI class devices for OS).
5. HUI protocol use 2 MIDI messages for most controls and is not symmetric (controls and feedback messages are slightly different). In contrast, Logic protocol use 1 MIDI message per control and is symmetric where possible (so except for encoder rings). There is a good reason to use 2-4 MIDI messages per control, when the number of such controls is huge (f.e. to map all parameters of digital mixers to the MIDI world). For dedicated DAW controllers it make no sense.

Well, that confirms the device use Zone 0xb for Assigns 🙂

You have realized that.. knobs are always sending the same messages. And since you can control Pan, they are working fine in Cakewalk.

So record messages when you SWITCH to SendA...D, so messages from buttons.

@chakko Well... if motivated... you can install AZ Controller (https://www.azslow.com/index.php/topic,6.0.html), load HUIv2 preset (https://www.azslow.com/index.php/topic,223.msg1386.html#msg1386) and with a bit of luck it will switch device into HUI mode. Then you can press keys Novation specify for switching into Sends mode and switching sends and write down what you see in the "Last MIDI event" doing so (in the Options tab check CC interpretation is in 14bit mode, HUI sends 2 CCs per button, but at the end any of them will give us some hint what should be defined).

@msmcleod It is hard to find high resolution picture for original HUI, but knobs assignment section is in Zone 0xB ("Send a" ... "Send e")

In your code I see you translate assignments from buttons in Zone 0x17 (Auto enable).

I recommend find out and post which MIDI message the button responsible for switching into Sends mode send to the DAW (MIDIOx or simply recording it as MIDI event into track when Control Surface module is removed). Probably msmcleod will be able to help then.

BTW I suggest to try MCU mapping on the device. MCU protocol (more precisely LC protocol) documentation is still freely available, HUI always was closed proprietary protocol. Mackie plug-in implements all features of MCU, while HUI as you can see is "Beta".

Yes, I have started to write it when I was stuck in attempts to setup existing plug-ins the way I want 🙂

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Baoo0-CysSI&t=87s is a good starting point in your case.

For switching between strip and sends control... that can be challenging for you at the beginning. In case you have future questions about AZ Controller, please use my forum or PM.

With "Cakewalk ACT MIDI" you can't configure 8 buttons + extra 4 arrows (at most 1 of them as a "Shift" for  8 buttons). WAI based buttons (f.e. Mute) is also not an option, if I remember correctly. But with 2 Banks and corresponding switch buttons you can make vol/pan <-> sends working.

With "Cakewalk Generic Controller" you can configure 2x8 + 8 + 4. But  switching banks, like vol/pan to sends, is not possible.

To avoid any limitations you can use AZ Controller (www.azslow.com). But it is harder to configure.

The world is not perfect 😏

Most discussions when it comes to 32 vs 64 bit (44.1 vs 96 kHz, etc.) ends discussing fidelity. While in practice the problem is in bugs/mistakes (sure they can influence fidelity up to destroying the sound or even crashing the DAW).

32bit floating point is sufficient to represent 24bit audio (fixed point) bit accurate. Really meaningful for the best audio interfaces are 20-21. Really meaningful for a human is even less (16-17 at most).  But people which write music software are way less careful then people calculating atom reactors, also checking that cranking all possible parameters will not produce crazy math calculation is almost impossible. As the end effect final numbers calculated using 64bits and 32bit can differ in the first 16  most significant bits. F.e. if you export audio as 16bit after 32bit and 64bit processing the result can be (up to significantly) different.
I repeat, that should not happened in case the author is careful in what he/she is doing, but all of us are not perfect.

Also audio processors (f.e. VSTs) use different code to process in 32 and in 64 bits (VSTs process audio in these 2 formats only, f.e. they can't process 16/24bit fixed audio). Normally one code calls another or one source is used to produce both codes, but that is not guarantied. I mean it can happened one code has a bug while other doesn't. May be not really a bug, just different result.

Based on written, I suggest to use the same engine all the time to avoid possible troubles. So after mixing in 64bit engine also export in 64bit engine (but not into 64bit file formats, that is not my suggestion).

I guess when computers was old, there was people who prefered mix in 32bit and export as 64bit, a kind of "online"/"offline" quality.

-----------------

Still OP question is valid and not yet answered: does the option in the Export dialog still switch the engine or just a historical artifact? F.e. in case 64bit is on in the preferences and that option is unchecked, does Cakewalk "downgrade" the engine to 32bit during export?

Up to date there is no usable solution (since X1). But there was  a thread where BandLab has mentioned a movement in that direction, so may be some lucky day Cakewalk is more accessible...

Till than I can suggest another DAW with strong accessibility support and related active community: https://reaperaccessibility.com/index.php/Main_Page

Original scripts for Sonar 8.5 are problematic since Windows 8 because of GUI change. There was rumor with some "classic" schema that was possible with Windows 8, but I doubt there is something stable for Windows 10. Better stay with Windows 7 in this case.

On hardware side, NI keyboards are accessible. I mean Native Kontrol  and so all wrapped synths are accessible using these keyboards (in any DAW, in REAPER a part of DAW controlling as well).

With Behringer X-Touch Compact or USB Gamepad it is possible somehow control Cakewalk accessible way (last time tested long time ago with Platinum), but that will be disappointing experience.

3 hours ago, Wookiee said:

If a person wishes to use their native tongue in these forums so be it.  There is no part of the TOU that state one must speak English so those requiring the OP to use English you are somewhat out of line.

That was my impression. May be adding "preferred communication language is English" to the TOU as well as one single "International" board (for those who don't want or can't use English, threads like this one can be moved there instead of deleting or confusing some people) is a good idea. But that is up to BandLab.

I am so used to be in multi-lingual environment (up to 5-6 different languages in parallel within one room) that I don't feel anything unusual once someone write/speak in any language (known or unknown for me). But I understand that can be confusing (as it was for me 25+ years ago).

What I find really confusing is proposal "please write in English" (written in English) to someone who has used some other language... And even more confusing the same proposal to someone who has replied using the language of the question... That make no sense for me (unlike for example a suggestion to repeat the question in English, written in original language). 

35 minutes ago, Andris Rinkis said:

Third - you can go on your local russian forums

If that is written to me, I think that violates the spirit (and may be community rules) of this forum.

BTW my forum is in English, but I explicitly accept questions in languages I know. Everyone is free to define own rules on own resources. If you have a link which explicitly or implicitly FORBID other languages on this forum, please post it. I am not aware about such restriction and I am ready to apologize in case it exists.

It is not so simple to find forum rules. I somehow remember on old forum there was some. https://blog.bandlab.com/community-guidelines/ does not mention any language (but has "Respect" section...).

Yes, there are many sites about Sonar/Cakewalk in Russian. F.e. http://sonarmusic.ru/forum/index.php

Yes, Sonar/Cakewalk is originally US software with English as primary language.

But... I don't think there are sufficient users/supporters to have "International" sections on this forum. English is not the language most people on this planet know. Cakewalk's current "home" has 4 official languages and national language is not English.

So, as I also wrote several times, in case 1-2 threads are not in English, I don't see that as a problem. Till these threads are spammed by statements "write in english".

Just imagine one day coming to this site you see "Bahasa Melayu sahaja"  and  every other related site is in native for the owner language.

If a question is asked in Russian and Russian is my native language... Why the hell should I answer it in English??? 🤪

Если версия относительно новая, в меню "Помощь" есть соответствующие пункты ("Войти в BandLab", "Основить активацию" и т.д.).

Если версия старая, проще обновить через BandLab Assistant https://www.bandlab.com/products/desktop/assistant
Если он сам обновиться не может, проще его заново установить загрузив с указанной страницы.

После подключения к BandLab (через меню "Помощь") Cakewalk будет ре-активироваться сам (разумеется если есть подключение к интернету).

Writing from memory (my... not RAM): computers are using numbers to report errors. And different libraries use the same numbers for own (so different) errors. If an error comes from one library but the text for it is asked using another, obviously the text has nothing to do with real problem. So, as I remember, standard code which corresponds to "not enough memory" is something like "device is busy" in one other library (I can't remember which exactly, I just remember the number clash). I will not go into details, but that particular case has no easy fix. That confusing message appears in many applications for many years...

I am too young... My "computer operator" curse was already with disks, which had to be loaded into (wash-machine like) disk drive.

In Cakewalk everything is processed in real-time.

REAPER and some other DAWs have "precalculate" mode. So currently recorded or monitored tracks (including up-chain) are processed in real-time, all other (in fact all till you record or monitor something) are processed way more forgiving way. For that reason it is possible to have more plug-ins/tracks without problems even when audio buffer is small, no problem with recording into projects with PD plug-ins already inserted (till in the same chain as recorded track).

But that comes with price... In REAPER PD is always rounded to the next buffer size, so if you record with a plug-in which has 1ms PD and the buffer is 3ms, that plug-ins adds 3ms. Two such plug-ins in the chain and you have 6ms. In Cakewalk you get exact PD or the sum of them, so 1ms and 2ms in the example. Also in some of my tests Cakewalk was able to drive more plug-ins in recording chain then REAPER, using the same buffer size.

Note that any DAW has many obvious and not really obvious settings which significantly influence CPU load.

BTW my upgrade 2 years ago was under 1k€, with i9, 32GB and 1TB fast M2 SSD. Note that in many (most?) cases only one M2 works as fast as possible (insufficient PCIe lines in desktop CPUs). Optimizing the computer for audio is the most challenging task, one single component or setting can render top configuration less usable for audio then 10 years old optimized system... 

ACT plug-in supports fixed number of conrols, 8 faders, 8 knobs and 8+1 buttons. So in the configuration there are 16 slots for buttons, 8 without shift and 8 with shift. What each control does is freely configurable, so you can assign Record to "B3" (without shift). BTW the documentation describes all that in details.

If your controller is going to have feedback (LEDs, display, motorized faders) and/or has more then 8+8+8 controls, you better switch to AZ Controller right at the beginning. ACT and Generic Surface do not support feedback. The only alternative is mimic Mackie and use corresponding plug-in.

Sorry for late reply. Just for clarification. As Mackie controllers, XTouch and XTender are completely independent on hardware side, they are "synced" inside end software, in this case Mackie plug-in.  So it does not matter how they are connected to computer. When Xtender is connected to XTouch, XTouch is just USB hub.
 

Just to make should you have tried right things... You need 2 control surfaces inserted, one is "Mackie Control" (pointing to X-Touch) and another is "Mackie Control XT" (pointing to XTender).

If still no luck, cleanup MIDI devices in Windows (using Device Manager with disconnected devices shown throw an option in View menu). Delete AUD.INI. Enabled both devices in Cakewalk again, setup both surface plug-ins.

In other words: while devices are physically completely independent, plug-ins "cooperate" them. Important to do this right, "MIDI busy loops" can be created otherwise. After dis/re-connecting MIDI devices, Cakewalk can be confused what is where. What is displayed then is not where signals are set, triggering the first problem while is the settings everything looks "right".

PS. Configure surfaces without any project in Cakewalk. Till surface plug-ins "block" MIDI streams, something can be sent to devices and the input wrongly processed by Cakewalk, triggering the problem.

I know only one modern solution which can survive offline as long as your Pentium4+XP+Home studio:  RPi4/Intel i3+/AMD equivalent +SSD +Linux supported audio interface +REAPER 🙄

Otherwise any half way modern computer + SSD + Win10 + Cakewalk + any audio interface (with sufficient inputs) should do the trick. Just be prepared you have to go online periodically. Modern Windows and Cakewalk like be online, at least from time to time.

I was keeping XP as long as I could. But that time is over. The same for Pentium4 and HDDs (except for backup or huge data).

From my knowledge, I still have no fellows in cross DAW converters. So, it is possible convert projects from Cakewalk into REAPER only (free but in-official and incomplete, at least it tries convert audio+MIDI+FXes with reasonable success). For audio (no MIDI, no FXes) there is AATranslator which covers most DAWs.
In practice, if projects are complicated and working with Bandlab is an option, that is most convenient approach.

If MPK25 is not broken on hardware side, it is not worse than other controllers. And it is more capable then Mini.

But with any generic controller, some time has to be invested into setup. In short:

• windows device manager should be used to cleanup all midi devices, specially duplicates (even they are not currently connected, any connection to different USB port creates new device)
• when in doubt, Cakewalk MIDI configuration INI file should be deleted (and later all used MIDI devices enabled again in Cakewalk preferences).
• the device should always be connected to the same USB port
• all devices should be connected before starting Cakewalk
• the device should be properly configured (see its Reference manual and configuration editor)

All these topics (except the last one) was discussed on this forum, you can use Google to find related posts.

BTW devices with special drivers can be worse then class compliant, f.e. when manufacturer "forget" update the driver rendering the device unusable with new Windows version.

PS many troubles with audio/MIDI/other devices come from the cable or particular port/hub. Try to use another cable, connect to hub, etc. Note you need to repeat the first two listed operations after changing the port.

PSPS for device configuration... note MPK25 is represented by 2 different MIDI devices (ports), current configuration tells which messages send to which device. Disabling external MIDI synchronization,  configuring controls to use port A and set CC modes for knobs is a good start. When Cakewalk recognize MIDI device, you can see small icon in the Task bar. If you see "LED" on it blinking when you use controls, that is a good sign (doesn't mean they send what you want, but at least something...).

If you mean "Dynamic plug-in mapping" (which is sometimes called ACT). Original Mackie plug-in was not supporting it. So till msmcleod has implemented parameters learning, particular plug-in configuration has to be defined in text file.