Alan Tubbs

Thanks all.  
 

Always good to hear dissent, esp. when it has a happy ending.  Being Mac centric always shied me off before, tho motu seemed to offer bang for bucks.  I always tried to up the quality rather than quality, but the mk5 seems to have nice clean ins and outs and I have enough external hardware to stamp a transfer coupled sound going in.

Yea bitflipper, I thought you used them.

and thanks to the other comments. Many of the software  problems I’ve read about have people watching utube and gaming and answering email.  This will be a pure music computer and offline.  My retiring win 7 machine lasted a long time that way.

The full rematrix is very great.  It includes eq delay and a algorithmic reverb too.  But, as said above, it can be a bit much for simple convo.

Thanks all.  Good to know about the windows drivers.  After getting a summing mixer I need more outs.  I’d really like a lynx, but in the meanwhile the motu looks to fit the bill as a clean stream while the RND can “transform” things.  

any other examples are great -even bad ones.  I read the long gearslutz/space thread and as usual, the first pages had some good info while the last 200pgs were arguments about different opinions.  Hope to review it first.

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I’m thinking of getting the new ultralight 5.

any comments in general or specific.

I know, this question should be in hardware but that gets so little action.

No, as I corrected above, it came windows 11 ready.  My bad.

Thanks Jack.  And I guess this computer is windows 11 ready.

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I know how to back up my old win 7 machine which which is heading into retirement.

the new machine is win 11.  Do I need a program to make an back up installation or will windows 11 update with new programs natively?  
 

I don’t mind spending money on a third party software if needed, although I’ve done fine without them up til now.

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Part of the best is also easy to use, don’t forget.  As to my favs:

alchemy, rapture/dimension, kontak, massive x, synthmaster and falcon.

Since I haven’t really mucked with it, I guess it isn’t what we need for cakewalk. 

I haven’t checked it out but bandlab has a sampler that now comes with the daw.  I wonder if it is a vsti and could be used with cakewalk?  Or whether it will be imported?

My first music computer was a Yamaha CMX or something like that in the mid 80s. It used game cards to run music.  You could either edit the 4 op fm synth or run a sequencer.  Only one card slot.  I spent 350$ for a 3.5 inch drive (a step up from floppies.). It was rocking back then and more fun than programing a computer by line code.

I prefer to add a little hair from the get-go.  Not distortion but some nice transformer coupled saturation but not too much.  Same way with dynamic control.  Shave off a few hard hitting dBs that firms up the sound.  Then add more if necessary in the box.

Behringer uses generic drivers and or Asio for all which is a ms driver wrapper.  Lots of problems here.

the easiest thing is to ditch the B and get a TAscam or other cheap interface with real asio drivers.  The quality at the low end mechanically is pretty good as are the drivers.   But you will have to spend over a hundred dollars.

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The pro channels are all good.  The 1176 works esp. well for vol control and can add a little of that 1176 edge.  The pc eq is great, and when you dial in a sound you can jump between eq models.  And the buss ssl comp is my favorite and works great.

most of the time effects included were 3rd party based so you’ll need to supplement cakewalk there, but the native cake channel stuff is good to superb.

Two or three o’clock on the interface output.  For most volume control that is the sweet spot to produce a full signal without distortion.  However, I go through a summing mixer and then to an amp whose vol knob is in easy reach.  That is set about 11 o’clock.

yes,  it was in program file/vstplugins/.  That was in my to scan folders and I had started and restarted the computer a few times.  But now it seems to be running fine.  it is easy to forget what a nice synth it is.  Once I got it up I mucked about w/ it and  some libraries.  Fun stuff.

Thanks all.  And a certain reptilian persistence.  I'll probably need it since registering Rapture Pro is on the list.  I'vde got the solution so I did need any tips YET!  We' ll see.

Thanks again for being such a great Forum.

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I’ll check again on the vsti spot and check off the other suggestions.  Thanks all

The solo version works and the synthmaster folder is chosen for “look in” .  Anybody else have a problem?

No fan on this one.

As Dearing said, recording through hardware works for me.  No much, just a general shaping (which also keeps from mucking up a take).  Software works great esp. for further dynamic control.  You can take a third swing during mastering with more gentle control.  In general, I try to get more tone (including saturation) from analog, and more dynamic control with software.

I am reviewing the new RND Orbit 5057 summing mixer which is a perfect example of the power of analog.  Here at home I never ran a mix through a mix buss analog chain.  I wanted the cleanest version.  But with the orbit I turned up my home interface to 11, trying to get more sound into the mixer since the transformer just got sweeter and sweeter the more volume you pumped in.  I was actually leaning forward into and between the speaker pair.  Fun stuff and sounded great afterwards.

Stations and down sampling can play havoc. I had a lead song for a cd baby project and the mp3 process for apple etc completely removed the big bass that came in on the second phrase of the intro.  A major element just gone.  And there was nothing to do but remix the song or live with it.

Sonar worked great with touch and so does bandlab.

The bandlab daw is more of a prefab looper, as I recall. Cakewalk is a full function daw but only ships with a few instruments and fewer loops, if any (tho it used to have some good ones).

there shouldn’t be much difference between the sound of the daws themselves.

If you don’t get rid of the sound blaster I’d suggest bouncing all midi to audio, disable and archive those synth tracks so your computer can catch its breath and then record acoustic stuff.  I habitually do this even if I’m not pushing my computer so at mixdown I’m dealing with all audio.  If you need to change a track, unarchive it and edit away.  Once finished, bounce and archive it again.

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