ASIO4All problems

[Michael Talada]

I'm running Windows 10, with the latest version of Cakewalk. My usual interfaces are an IK Multimedia Axe I/O and Boss GT-100. I just bought a Native Instruments Komplete Audio 6. It didn't seem to want to work with ASIO, so I downloaded and installed the specific ASIO driver for it. But I've had nothing but trouble since. I even uninstalled that driver, but still Cakewalk doesn't work right with ASIO4All, which I've had installed for ages (and is up to date.) I keep getting this message: "ASIO4ALL v2 This driver is known to be incompatible with Cakewalk. Continuing to use this driver may lead to instability. For best results, we recommend switching to a compatible ASIO or WASAPI Windows driver. Would you like to switch to WASAPI mode now?" And if I go ahead and try to use it anyway, all the inputs and outputs are listed as ASIO4All, and the usual ones for the Axe or GT-100 are greyed out. Things seem to work in WASAPI mode, but it's my understanding that that isn't the best choice. What should I do, how do I get back to the way things were up until a couple days ago?

[murat k.]

Use FL Studio ASIO Driver.

FL Studio ASIO Driver.zip

[Michael Talada]

I'm not sure how. All I see is 2 .dll files and 1 .nfo that gives me an error message when I click on it. I'm not sure what to do with those.

[murat k.]

Read NFO file and follow the instructions. You'll figure it out.

[Michael Talada]

It won't open. It says it may be corrupted.

[murat k.]

Use Notepad.

[Michael Talada]

Ah. Ok. I'll try that.

[Michael Talada]

Done. I'm not seeing the error message again yet, but my inputs are still all ASIO4All and the ones for my Axe I/O are still greyed out. Which is not how it has ever been before I started wrangling with the Komplete Audio 6.

[Michael Talada]

[Michael Talada]

[scook]

Remove and forget about generic ASIO drivers regardless of where they come from.

All a generic driver is doing is adding another layer of software between the actual audio driver (MME, WGM or WASAPI) and the DAW causing the DAW to believe it is communicating with an ASIO driver. This is completely unnecessary with CbB.

 

WRT, ASIO drivers being disabled in CbB preferences. Only one ASIO driver may be used at a time. To change ASIO drivers, deselect both input and output before making a new selection.

 

[Michael Talada]

Ok, so the FL thing didn't work after all. If I switch to WASAPI and switch back, I still get that error message. BUT... thank you scook! So, all I had to do was to deselect ASIO4All in both the Input Drivers and Output Drivers sections to ungrey the others? That certainly was easy, lol! I tried unchecking the input one yesterday, but I guess it only works if you do it in BOTH sections. I feel dumb now. Well, live and learn. Hopefully everything will be back to normal now. Thanks again!

[murat k.]

It seems that you didn't installed it. No problem, you'll figure it out.

FL Studio ASIO will give you low latency with Shared device like support. This means you'll get no input/output issue anymore and get no "playback error" issue inside or outside of the Cakewalk when it's running.

I tried all other driver modes in the past but FL Studio ASIO Driver is the best for work efficiency.

[scook]

3 minutes ago, Michael Talada said:

I tried unchecking the input one yesterday, but I guess it only works if you do it in BOTH sections.

That's right. ASIO is restricted to one driver at a time. In order to insure only one ASIO driver is in use, the DAW disables all other ASIO drivers in preferences while any selection exists.

[Jeremy Oakes]

I am currently using  a Soundcraft MTK 22, which has its own Asio drivers.

i have several DAWs that have tried to install their super duper low latency drivers. (cubase, Fruity Loops, Samplitude etc.)

After each app’s update/upgrade I automatically delete all their drivers from the registry just leaving those from Soundcraft. If you have a good audio device with decent drivers,  you do not need the crap installed by the above apps, nor the dreaded Asio4all………

YMMV,

J

Edited November 27, 2022 by Jeremy Oakes

[murat k.]

I have had no issue with ASIO4All since I found a way to use it. In the beginning, people get some issues and leaves it, but after getting its working principle, you can handle it without a problem.
But the problem with ASIO4All and some other drivers, you can't get sound outside of the DAW. There is a solution with WASAPI Shared but it has too much latency. With the MME(32bit) you get sound crackling eventually. Suspending the Audio engine is not working all the time depending on the task you want. 
With FL Studio ASIO you don't get any issues with the sound or latency. I mean it also focuses on your DAW, but still allows you to hear/send other audio on your PC and still get low latency.
Yes, there is a way to get low latency with no audio issues. Having multi-input/output soundcard with the internal one and connecting one to another. But you don't need this since you have a working solution called FL Studio ASIO.
Also, it reduces the CPU load on the DAW, you can see the difference when you switch between WASAPI and FL Studio ASIO.
And also you can switch the active playback/recording sound device easily without having to open the Preferences menu.
This is why I recommend FL Studio ASIO to people when the topic comes to sound drivers. I tried all others and came back to it all the time. 

Edited November 27, 2022 by murat k.

[Alan Tubbs]

Asio4all wasn’t any good 10 years ago and I haven’t heard a good thing about it in the last 10 years.  Everybody who has used it has moved on.  If your interface didn’t come with custom drivers and the generic drivers don’t get the job done, why would a another layer of cludge work?

[murat k.]

44 minutes ago, Alan Tubbs said:

Asio4all wasn’t any good 10 years ago and I haven’t heard a good thing about it in the last 10 years.  Everybody who has used it has moved on.  If your interface didn’t come with custom drivers and the generic drivers don’t get the job done, why would a another layer of cludge work?

Actually the topic is about FL Studio ASIO vs WASAPI now. But thanks for sharing your thoughts. ?

Edited November 27, 2022 by murat k.

[azslow3]

8 hours ago, murat k. said:

I have had no issue with ASIO4All since I found a way to use it. In the beginning, people get some issues and leaves it, but after getting its working principle, you can handle it without a problem.
But the problem with ASIO4All and some other drivers, you can't get sound outside of the DAW. There is a solution with WASAPI Shared but it has too much latency. With the MME(32bit) you get sound crackling eventually. Suspending the Audio engine is not working all the time depending on the task you want. 
With FL Studio ASIO you don't get any issues with the sound or latency. I mean it also focuses on your DAW, but still allows you to hear/send other audio on your PC and still get low latency.
Yes, there is a way to get low latency with no audio issues. Having multi-input/output soundcard with the internal one and connecting one to another. But you don't need this since you have a working solution called FL Studio ASIO.
Also, it reduces the CPU load on the DAW, you can see the difference when you switch between WASAPI and FL Studio ASIO.
And also you can switch the active playback/recording sound device easily without having to open the Preferences menu.
This is why I recommend FL Studio ASIO to people when the topic comes to sound drivers. I tried all others and came back to it all the time. 

"FL Studio/ASIO4ALL/other generic" ASIO is visible from applications as ASIO. But they have to access hardware driver, which is not ASIO. Back in time, proxies sitting in the "kernel" could reduce latency a bit. MS has done relatively good job with WASAPI, on some hardware it even beats dedicated ASIO driver in latency. So for normal use, extra proxies are pointless.

I agree that for using multiple interfaces in parallel (tricky in any case since that needs hardware sync between them) or using several applications in parallel they still can be used. But if that is "usual" activity, getting an interface which natively allow that is the best way to solve the problem. In my experience,  "tricking" with fancy external software till some degree works, but can't be perfect (such software still has to deal with "laggy" hardware and Windows design). Note that is not automatically expensive. Like 8 years ago I have payed around 20€ for M-Audio Audiophile FireWire, it has own ASIO and allows other apps in parallel. And it is still my "default" interface for desktop ?

[murat k.]

2 hours ago, azslow3 said:

"FL Studio/ASIO4ALL/other generic" ASIO is visible from applications as ASIO. But they have to access hardware driver, which is not ASIO.

FL Studio ASIO is a WASAPI drive actually.

This is why the file's name is ILWASAPI2ASIO. Means Image Line (company name) WASAPI (The actual driver) To ASIO (Acts like an ASIO driver)

2 hours ago, azslow3 said:

Note that is not automatically expensive. Like 8 years ago I have payed around 20€ for M-Audio Audiophile FireWire, it has own ASIO and allows other apps in parallel. And it is still my "default" interface for desktop

Thanks for the suggestion. I was thinking to buy a simple mixer to route audios which is cheaper than you suggest then I gave up because I have no trouble with latency anymore with this solution. Also these are extra profits which comes besides working with multiple interfaces:

11 hours ago, murat k. said:

Also, it reduces the CPU load on the DAW, you can see the difference when you switch between WASAPI and FL Studio ASIO.
And also you can switch the active playback/recording sound device easily without having to open the Preferences menu.

And the new prefence "Enable MMCSS for ASIO Driver" made it better. In the past sometimes I was getting audio crackling on the playback, nowadays I don't get any issues.