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November 12, 2007, 02:06:52 AM
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Topic: Song is breaking up even during minimal usage of effects in Multitrack View  (Read 559 times)
« on: December 08, 2006, 07:23:24 PM »
psg1983 Offline
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Hi Folks,

I was using the Studio Reverb on only one channel in Multitrack View and my song started to break up (the way a song breaks up when you're using too many effects).  My pc has a 3.2 ghz processor and 3 gig of RAM with no other applications running,  so I didn't think it was a CPU issue.  Are there any other adjustments I can make? Anybody? 
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Session Steel Guitar/Dobro player
Reply #1
« on: December 08, 2006, 08:03:56 PM »
sound2man Offline
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Yes, IIRC, you can freeze the effect to the track.  Basically, this nondestructivly applies the effect to the track before playback so that your cpu doesn't have to apply it realtime.
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Ron
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Reply #2
« on: December 08, 2006, 10:40:29 PM »
psg1983 Offline
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Yes, IIRC, you can freeze the effect to the track
Sound2man: Thanks for the info about freezing the track, but I really wanted to use this effect while I was recording, listening to the effect and recording at the same time.
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Session Steel Guitar/Dobro player
Reply #3
« on: December 09, 2006, 01:31:18 AM »
SteveG Offline
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... but I really wanted to use this effect while I was recording, listening to the effect and recording at the same time.
No can do - and this is quite deliberate. Here's the rationale:

The moment you record a track with any effect at all added, you never get the chance to alter this if you need to. Accordingly, the basic principle is that you record everything flat, and apply the effects afterawrds, retaining full control over the sound.

I realise that a lot of guitarists especially think that this is a bit weird - as often it is the effect that they are actually using to define the 'correct' sound of the guitar in the first place. But even so, the principle remains good - and that's why Audition lets you monitor the track with effects added, but only records what's going in - if you want to add those effects again afterwards, that's fine, and you can add them in a controlled fashion. It even works as a principle with external stomp-box type effects - you record flat, and then re-apply the flat recording to the effects chain, and record that separately. There are two ways to do this, and one requires a multi-input soundcard; you simply record the flat signal DI'ed straight from the guitar on one track, and the effects output on another. But it's only worth doing this if you are ultra-confident about the sound you will finally want - the safest and most flexible option is still to record flat, and reapply the flat signal to the external effects when the rest of the tracks are established, and a basic mix is in place.

This has long been the way it's done in pro studios - and it's not just so that DI box manufacturers can sell more boxes, however much you might think to the contrary!

The other reason that it's not a good idea is based on the problem that you are running into. Effects are often processor-hungry, and clearly what is most important is making an intact recording. This is especially the case with a multiple-input session using a lot of separate tracks - the last thing your PC needs whilst doing this is a heavy extra processor load caused by adding effects. So, what is desirable from a mix perspective is also desirable as far as the PC is concerned - quite conveniently for a change... smiley  Even basic studio reverb, in the context of trying to record simultaneously, is clearly adding enough extra load to cause problems - it really doesn't take too much of this under these circumstances.

If you have enough processing power, a multi-input soundcard, and really are desperate to record the effects at the same time as making the original recording, you can do this - but the only way is to physically route the monitor output back to another pair of inputs, and record this as well. There will inevitably be latency, so you would have to shift the effected track forwards in time after you'd recorded it anyway. Generally, it simply isn't worth the hassle.
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Reply #4
« on: December 09, 2006, 05:43:52 AM »
psg1983 Offline
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Thanks, Steve.

Since 96' I've been kind of spoiled by how easy it was to listen to effects in conjunction with playing the instrument/voice from using the Roland VS recorders.  They made it very easy to do this  (apply and remove effects nondestructively), and it was an inconvenient surprise that AA was lacking in this area. 

Just out of curiosity, why would a unit like the Roland's allow one to record while listening to multple effects, while AA is very limited?  The reverbs and other effects in the Roland really are comparable to AA's.  Even with the uncompressed format of the VS's (like the VS2000) today they can do that.   Just wondering.

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Session Steel Guitar/Dobro player
Reply #5
« on: December 09, 2006, 09:30:02 AM »
SteveG Offline
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Just out of curiosity, why would a unit like the Roland's allow one to record while listening to multple effects, while AA is very limited?  The reverbs and other effects in the Roland really are comparable to AA's.  Even with the uncompressed format of the VS's (like the VS2000) today they can do that.   Just wondering.
The answer is simple - dedicated hardware. Once you can determine how the entire structure of your machine operates, then you can program it to do all sorts of things in a much more efficient way, also using a dedicated (and virtually invisible) OS that doesn't have to do all of the housekeeping that Windows does to run a general-purpose computing engine. Result - resources are dedicated where they need to be for whatever purpose, without anything like as many restrictions.

Doesn't make it a better idea to record with effects, though - even if it is possible - the foregoing argument still applies. And personally, I don't think that the effects on the Roland boxes are anything to write home about, but that is a purely subjective view - whatever floats your boat, as they say...
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Reply #6
« on: December 11, 2006, 03:14:18 PM »
jamesp Offline
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I think that Steve and psg might actually be talking about the same thing - reverb while monitoring rather than actually recording the reverb at the same time. Studio Reverb is a kind of halfway house between Quick Reverb and Full Reverb and shouldn't cause too many problems if there is only one instance of it.

Is the reverb assigned to a bus? If not, are you adding reverb to more than one channel by using individual reverb plug-in instances? Have you tried Quick Reverb instead of Studio Reverb? Have you tried increasing the ASIO buffer size?

Cheers

James.
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Reply #7
« on: December 11, 2006, 04:59:56 PM »
MarkT Offline
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Hey PSG (or can I call you PS? wink),

You should not be getting breakup with the system you describe. I have the same CPU speed but only 2.5GB RAM and I certainly don't have that problem. I can have effects on other backing tracks and play a new guitar track with Guitar Rack 2 on it and that is a LOT hungrier than Studio Reverb. I would guess there is an ASIO setting problem, have a look at the buffer settings - I usually find 512 works for live recording, but I go up to 1024 or 2048 when I am mixing (I have an Echo MiaMidi) . By the way, does the breakup you hear actually record onto the track? If it doesn't it would definitely point to the ASIO settings
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