John Vere

Yes printed books are no longer an item as they would also cost money. Even as an e book. You tubes seem to be what the public wants. There are now hundreds of free tutorials about Cakewalk by Bandlab. That actually makes using You Tubes as difficult as reading a 3,000 page owners manual. The documentation is kept updated and you can easily search topics. I use them a lot for my research to make my tutorials. in researching I also watch tutorials. There’s the professionally made ones produced by Cakewalk and they are still possibly worth watching but they are also very outdated now. But I like the fact that this series is accurate and actually teaches properly. No BS or self promotion. The rest are amateurs creating the content. These will run the scale from boring to entertaining as well as not helpful to very educational. There are many containing errors and wrong information. And lots of outdated stuff. My complaint when searching topics is many video presentations take way to long to show you the answer to your question. They are trying to entertain and not actually teach . I think these are the most popular because people like being entertained. There was a thread a few years ago with the OP complaining about this. They where looking for a Course about Cakewalk. Like going to school. Step by step instructions with out the BS and self promotion. This was the birth of my series. The first 12 videos on the playlist are designed to take you step by step to understand Cakewalk and all the options and features. As a music teacher of 30 years or more as well as having a professional teacher as a daughter who specialized in learning disabilities. I understand that not everyone can learn from a video. Next’s winters project is to take my narrative and with the aid of screen shots put together a text based tutorial to place on my website. Gigs are being booked already so time to get out of the house.

Two things you have not mentioned yet. Have you tried a Brickwall limiter, A Compressor needs to be used very lightly on a Master bus. But a Brickwall is designed for this. Also as above, did you look at your low end frequencies. Common mistake is adding way to much low end which will result in clipping a mix and nothing over 100Hz survives in the mix. I have made lots of videos on these topics. These 3 are most relevant to your issue. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w24ZQIkY4fw&list=PL7YqVth30eGsdimFV6w1niyBN07M2uhRj&index=44 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6RB3uSbCoE&list=PL7YqVth30eGsdimFV6w1niyBN07M2uhRj&index=48 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc41XMPGQXk&list=PL7YqVth30eGsdimFV6w1niyBN07M2uhRj&index=15&t=74s

That's interesting. Add that to the second thing I learned this week. But it would seem that only a very , very small percentage of the people who use Cakewalk would be aware of that very, very hidden feature. I have a hunch the OP didn't even know that there was an input choice list. They got a reading on the meters and hit record.

I was just typing same answer but here's what it looks like on most Focusrite interfaces. The problem new people have is they wonder what happened to the even numbers? Its a long standing complaint. But if you uncheck the use friendly names box It will look like this So the Friendly version is actually not very friendly at all, it is confusing to some.

Yes and that’s great advice for the op @charles kasler Best way to get all the plug ins you want is to keep your eyes on the deals. I have a lot of $100+ plug ins I got for $10+. By paying attention. In the Instrument sub forum is a couple of threads that list freebies and deals. Also KVR has a newsletter. I always subscribe to emails with companies I want stuff from. I’ve ended up with Melodyne Editor for about 30% less from grabbing Essentials on sale a few years ago for $99, Then the next year they let me upgrade to Artist for another $99 and then this year it was yet another $99 to get Editor. that was a total of $300 and it's list price is $499. By the way I see all Melodyne versions are $100 off right now.

Yes the one on 50 free compressors took almost 2 months overall. But I ended up with too much info so made it into a 4 part series. Then this testing Midi had me doing more testing and trying to figure stuff out than I thought too. Best thing about the process is I really learn about about Cakewalk. Like I just discovered Aim Assist doing these. How come I didn't find that 1 year ago when I needed it! You never stop learning.

I used the BT 4 or 5 years but I was wondering why even though I'd set it for -1.0 db Wave lab would show it was -0.3 or even sometimes -0.1. It never went over but it most certainly never stayed close to the setting. So I'd set it at -2.0 db and then I got closer to -1.0. Then I started using the You Lean Loudness meter so I could work in real time and that's when I saw how bad the BT really was. I switched to the Loud Max Brickwall about 2 years ago and if I set it at -1.0 I mostly get -1.0 Odd time I will get -0.8. And believe it or not the Boost11 is very accurate too. I know a lot of Cakewalk users have dismissed Boost11 but it tested clean ( until pushed hard) and it does a very good job of limiting. IK makes good stuff but I like cheap or free! I'm really finding good things from Melda too.

It's simple to test the latency of a VST instrument. Use a Midi track and a Simple instrument track , Put some midi data in the Midi track and make sure it's quantized to the grid. Then freeze the synth. First you can zoom in and check using the M-B-T grid. Set timeline to Milliseconds and using Aim assist to read the difference in Milliseconds. Or use Samples which is a finer scale. The important thing to watch is where the actual transient is because that's what we hear. But we are talking music here and not robots. Real music was never this tight. 4ms is not really something you can put your finger on, but 50 ms is. It's been a common habit of long time midi users to nudge certain tracks back until they "sound right" slow attach of strings comes to mind. It would seems the case here as well. Use your ears.

Not sure about some of the others but the BT Brickwall limiter totally failed my tests. Even at a moderate setting of -2 db with out being pushed hard the music came through at -0.5 or worse. It was the bottom of the score card of 10 other limiters I tested. Boost 11 actually did very well. I excluded all the BT plug ins a while ago. Im sort of against pre sets of any kind. You never learn anything about how to use the tools and what the settings are for. I guess they can be a starting point.

The BT effects came with Sonar. I don’t think they come with Cakewalk by Bandlab

I agree this thread I think is one of those that the question would be why are my songs quieter than commercial releases. Answer- learn about mastering I actually gave you one of the tools that you would try in my first post. Boost11. A brick wall limiter will raise you RMS level and put a cap on the peak level. In my signature is the link to my tutorials look for any on the topic of mastering or mixing

Yes, understood. If you Google the Question " Is DIN Midi faster than USB Midi " you will find no real answer to that question. Therefore I tried my own tests. As I said I clearned up the information in the video to make it easier to follow and keep it short. One of the tests was to answer the above question. My A 49 has both Midi and USB connections so it was easy to test this. The USB latency with 1 note played was 3ms and the MIDI pathway was 4 ms. No big deal really. Without a robot I could test what happens with a 4 note chord. I thought about making a set of fingers out of wood but decided that was getting carries away. But of note was the Roland MKB 200 which was made in the mid 80's had a latency of 9ms. My conclusion was things have improved since 1985. INteresting feature uf the MKB is it has 3 Midi outputs which would have solved the daisy chaining issue for many people.

Question. Does the strummer generate midi notes? If it does wouldn't it work to just drag those back a bit to sync it up? I might need to figure this out someday as my hands are slowly becoming arthritic. Electric guitar is OK but I'm slowly loosing my grip on the wider neck of my acoustic.

Thanks for your input and I understand and agree with all you said. I wasn't initially trying to measure the latency of the Audio output of the drum module but it was connected so what the heck. I was actually surprised at it's higher reading. As you say it would have to be due to internal processing of the Brain. The above quote is another example of DAW weirdness that happens from time to time. Example as I was doing the test I made the mistake of opening a few web pages to look things up. When I returned to Cakewalk all the test results went crazy and made no sense anymore. There was very high numbers in the latency reading for everything. I restarted computer and it all returned to normal. Thanks I found a good source of info on good old wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_hardware My mention of this due too reading different discussions on the Midi Associations pages about developing Midi 2,0 to take advantage of USB C. Absolutely was part of troubleshooting the mystery of the phase reversal. The external loopback passed with flying colors. But the Motu's internal Loopback was early by 1.5 ms. I assume this is due to Cakewalk sees it as an actual external audio source and it's not being calculated by the driver properly. I think I'll contact Motu and ask. I was wondering why when doing screen captures if I accessed both my mike input and the Loopback mix to record Cakewalk there was a latency echo. 1.5 should not do this but things get complicated when running 3 apps that use audio simultaneously. I'm glad you mentioned this as I kept finding old articles that said part of midi latency over USB was because USB midi had more jitter than DIN midi. I guess the reference to jitter is trying to describe a screwed up data stream. Yet another deep topic with no solid info forthcoming. I'm sure the answers are out there but the topic is not THAT import to me as I have a very good Midi set up with both old hardware and some newer USB stuff. Some of my stuff is real old like the Roland 505 which I can still sync to Cakewalk. I get my moneys worth out of most of my older gear because it was well made back then. Go figure the only broken device I have is the newest. The Akai Synth station. What a POS. Laggy response bad drivers and now a dead key right in the middle and they don't make spare parts like Roland, Korg and Yamaha do. I've fixed dead keys before it's easy with new key sensors for $12 a strip. I'm glad I got it cheap. Anyway I've completely revised my plan for this video and I'm just in the process of filming (screen capturing) this morning. I decided to break the topic into 2 videos. First is focused on Midi Latency and how people can " attempt" to measure their systems latency and what to look for and how to fix it. Then the second video on Audio Latency and how to measure that. UPDATE: I posted the video at the top of the thread. Appreciate any feedback.

Talk about a timely post. I’m just screen capturing stuff about latency measurements and I noticed that little green line and box. Now I actually can give it a name and start using it. You never stop learning stuff here.

Boost 11 comes with Cakewalk and that can give you about 6db boost without clipping. But beyond that it will start distorting. Loud max is free and can be pushed a little harder. Just curious but is your master bus clipping? If it is and your monitoring system is not loud enough then a few things to look into. If you are using an audio interface do you have your settings correct on the front? If you are using on board audio do you have that turned up in Windows? Or is it your trying to use computer speakers? Go to the dollar store and by a set of studio size headphones.

This post came to mind yesterday after I had recorded a vocal track and realized after I was finished 1 hour later, that I had failed to turn my monitors off! argh! This made me think of a hardware solution that I don't think exists. A switch on the front of your audio interface to choose output.

The hilarious part of all that is in the end the best ones turned out to be what I already had on hand. As you say the CA 2A is a gem and I do use the pro channel module very lightly ( 40 /40 ) on vocals and guitars just to catch little peaks and when used lightly the CA 2A doesn't add noticeable harmonics. While the CA 2A was only available to Sonar users of the past, it lives on as the PC 2A Leveler which is exactly the same module minus the side chaining which is what the OP needs. Then the 2 other "clean" compressors are my Focusrite Red 2 compressor and the Melda M Compressor. Those are both not exactly free as the Red Compressor comes with a purchase of any Focusrite products and Melda compressor is part of the free bundle but I paid $50 for the upgrade which unlocks extra features. Therefore both of these had a much better lineage in development and I guess you get what you pay for stands true even with plug ins. But many I tested where certainly well designed and a few of those I'm keeping for when I have time to be brave and try something different. But what you find is by design a Compressor is a Compressor. There's absolutely nothing wrong with the old Sonitus stuff as example. It tested very high in scores. But it's days could be numbered.

First Thrillseeker I would not have bothered to download as I rarely use EQ. And when I do I use the most excellent Pro Channel EQ or the Scarlett Red. And it's promise of adding something would scare me off anyhow. That's exactly what I don't want. I'm of the camp from the old sound on sound days so I still only record parts that are already the way I want them to sound. The exception to that for me is acoustic guitar and after a 35 year quest I think I finally found the right guitar, PU and Mike combo. So I'm redoing a lot of older tracks. Anyhow I'm not interested in "Enhancing" my sound. But I'm sure others are. I might try it just for fun and curiosity. I'm a free VST sucker. Then Density mkII I immediately recognized the name. I just looked at my 6 pages of notes I made. Density was among the first batch and from what my notes say it was a distorted on a full mix and it added a lot of harmonics which would explain why. I think when I first started testing I was tossing out any that distorted a full song. I realize that is personal taste and many people seem to like what is falsely called color and is simply distortion. It's the DAW communities over obsession with wanting to sound analog. I was originally questing for a vocal compressor so distortion was defiantly out for me. I slowly was adding more free compressors and limiters to my list as the weeks went by and people made suggestions. I drew the line at 50. But I think I tested over 80. I of course avoided 32 bit as well as many were just plane boring designs and some even crashed or froze Cakewalk when you dragged from the browser. You slowly catch on that there are many Bedroom VST creators and they put these out there hoping for donations. Density probably should have stayed on my list but was a part of my earlier high grading. The first title was 35 free compressors. The testing took over 2 months and I made a video about that as well- https://youtu.be/REZ5H6GMWZY I still need to clean out my plug in folder.

Exactly. Last on my list would be isotope. There are a lot of great free compressors and a lot of them support side chaining. That's what its all about, Ducking or pumping a bass line from a kick etc. I made a video featuring 50 free compressors

A test of that would be to export the project as aMidi file. First go to preferences Midi and uncheck all midi outputs. Open the Midi file Don’t import. Open. That will give you a clean project with Just midi and the TTS-1. See if there’s any issues. Now midi track by midi track swap out the TTS-1 for the VST’ instruments you were using one by one. See at which point you get crackles. If all is still good Then start adding any VST effects and see what happens. I think using a USB hub is not recommended by most manufacturers. It says that in my Focusrite manual. It could well be the problem but seems strange you had same issues with old system too. Might just be aVST all along.

Update on the reverse phase issue. I would appreciate if anyone else could test this. I determined it only happens when I loop through Cakewalk with input echo on. The test is simple 2 mikes. One to record a transient sound. I hit my desk with a drum stick. The other mike on your monitor speaker. You have to set your monitoring so the mike on the speaker is not being sent there( obviously) The 2 mikes feed two tracks in Cakewalk and you see if they are out of phase. Thanks.

Ok huge progress and it seems you have all correct equipment now as well as your settings seem fine as well. Only weird thing I see is I was to understand there is no such thing as 32 bit audio interfaces yet? They are normally 24. But I guess this is new. I assume you still are using the same computer so possibly something in the USB bus is creating this crackle. Bad cable, or ports. I had to install a PCIe USB 3 card in my old computer to use my Motu interface and I do believe it was cracking as well. So big possibly especially if that interface is bus powered.

Nobody trust bundles even though I think they are fine but over the year many people have lost their work when it was saved that way. It’s usually a person who save as a bundle years ago and now it won’t open. I have back up CWP file in project folders that are from 2005 that open fine but just with warnings of missing plug ins.

A few things I can think of. Open the project by browsing to your storage drive and opening it using the CWP icon inside the projects folder. Personally I would never trust that Clean Audio Folder Utility It might have been what caused this. And when you used "save as" if you somehow didn't Check the "copy all audio with project" box this could also happen to the new version. It might be too late but here's a few ways to stop this in the future. If you are re doing tracks -Always rename them with a system . Like " Guitar lead Feb 24" Sounds dumb but it sure makes it easy to look in the audio folder for the track you want. Always name tracks BEFORE you record them so they will be stamped. They are also date stamped. When I'm closed to finished a project I make a "save as" copy with date in the name. I open it and then I export all the audio tracks as stems 48/32 bit no dither, no effects. I then delete all the originals which are probably broken up into a zillion clips and replace those with the stems by dragging from the export folder as complete tracks end to end. I then close the project and delete all the audio files except for the stems which will have different names or I could use the date. Now that back up copy is nice and tidy, way smaller in file size as well as could be easily transferred to another DAW. I also back them up as Midi files.