Expert Advice re my studio setup

[theMusicMan]

Hi All

Something the wonderful Old Vantaa Man said to me recently has prompted me to consider something, and though this is a long shot, I thought I'd ask here anyhow.

Are there companies out there who offer configuration services such as a visit to your premises to overhaul and reconfigure ones amateur studio set-up? I would love for this type of service to be available and would personally pay good money to an expert who could come to my home and tune up all my studio and its gear.

I am a total amateur with all this stuff really, and would benefit from such an expert visit. To have an expert who could configure my studio PC, my Yamaha MW12 mixer and mixing routing, my 3 synths and soft synths etc so that they all worked well together, with an objective of optimising my set-up - would be so fantastic.

Does anyone know of any companies out there in the UK who perhaps offer such services? Looking forward to your replies... thanks all.

[Khazul]

I dont know of anyone who does this - part of the problem is that there is a huge varierty of software and gear out there, though most of it can be setup along common mixing/studio setup principles and part of getting a good setup is having the right combination of gear in the first place, and of course having an idea what you want to do and how you want to work - I appreciate the latter is near impossible without a background in audio/music production.

SOS magazine regularly do a studio makeover feature - basically sorting out accoustics, ergonomics, DAW setup (if one of the main DAWs - cubase, logic etc) and giving advice. One of my friends in london had this done for her (I think it was in Nov 2005 issue) and it made quite a difference. It may be useful to have a read of some of those make over articles to get a feel for the kind of things that they do - there is alot of very useful information in those articles beyond the common theme of accoustic panels...

For most people the issues they face tend to fall into maybe 3 categories...

1. Studio space itself - accoustics, layout/ergonomics
2. Wiring and signal routing - audio/mains/midi etc
3. Familiarity with old school mixing practicses in a studio - or rather lack of.

For all of these there are loads of good articles around the net that can give you a good idea of what can work well for layout of all you gear, controlling the accoustic space etc, what kind of things to do/not do in terms of wiring and of course how to make good use of a mixer, patchbays, fx routings etc and most important - gain staging through you mixer and fx to keep the noise floor down and still give you useful headroom to work with - ie some good practices around session mixer setup and use of tracking sheets or equivalent if appropriate. DAWs have a tendency to make people very lazy around gain staging - but even in the 32bit float world of a DAW - appreciation of old school mixer practices can make life so much easier.

There are loads of courses around for studio audio engineer type work these days as well - from intensive weekend courses to full year long courses - having the kind of background knowledge from such a course, or even better - actually working in large complex studios and edit suites (BBC in my case) can make a huge difference as well. Most of these coure tend to obviously focus on the core tasks of an audio engineer, however you can pickup alot of very useful bacground and good practice - especially if its run in an older more hardware based studio. Hardware practise tend to translate well into software - software practices tend to make hardware more like hard work than it needs to be...

[Timo]

My thoughts were the SOS crew, too. regards their monthly Studio SOS makeovers. You can read the sorts of stuff they've done in the past here:-

http://www.soundonsound.com/search?s...ord=studio+sos

Loads of great issues raised by Khazul.

John, I notice you have an increasing (and rather tasty) external hardware setup with the Karma, Radias, Virus, Electribe etc.. How do use them at present? Do you sync them all up together and mix them using a hardware mixer or multi in/out soundcard, or do you record/layer them one by one into your DAW? Do you have any outboard hardware processors and/or effects or such that you use and integrate?

Also, what deficiencies do you think you have in your current setup or knowledge that you'd like to fill, if any? What would you like to learn or achieve from here onwards?

For the first few years I was learning about music tech I found the SOS archives an absolute goldmine for info, interviews, techniques, studio tips etc.. I must've printed half a tree's worth of articles for reading and slow digesting in the past.

Their archive contains all articles from around 1998 i think, right up until about 6 or 9 months after the very latest magazine articles are published. (Meaning, for example, the January 2007 issue wont be made freely available for non-subscribers until the summer or autumn this year), but most if not all technique articles from the past are timeless (apart from the PC/computer music aspect) so they are just as applicable today as they were perhaps five, ten or more years ago.

[theMusicMan]

Hi Timo

Well, the Electribe I must admit was a Crimbo pressy for my lad and at present he users it upstairs with his set-up, I haven't connected this to mine as yet!!

One deficiency I certainly have is a drum machine, and I am currently looking at the Boss DR880.

As for how I record all these... well, I am learning about MIDI and how to link things up etc, so I tend to record them individually using MIDI, building up a track with say the RADIAS providing Drums and Bass parts, KARMA providing well... errrm... KARMA and several of the TI channels providing pads, arps and leads (if my piece were that complex).

Although - in the end - I can record a track, I am having some difficulty at most of the touch-points at the moment Timo. I can't seem to get the best out of Cubase Studio 4, have no idea as to routing and being able to play my cornet and hear what I am playing through headphones, while the backing track comes through the headphones too for example. I also can't seem to get the synths patch or arp tempos to sync to whatever tempo I set it as in Cubase, which is a frustration.

I also have routing issues with Cubase, and as for bouncing tracks... well, I have a lot to learn here. Here's an issue I experience all the time. Daz (from KF) offered me great advice once by suggesting that when I am happy with a MIDI track layer, I should bounce that to audio separately so i can EQ it singly etc and get the best results. However, when I mixdown that track to audio, if I play that new audio track AND the originating MIDI track back at the same time, they are not in tune and the audio track is lower in pitch and plays over a longer period of time (up to several seconds depending on the length of the track itself). I then cannot set that audio track to time with any of the other (currently MIDI) tracks - if you see what I mean

I am not fully experienced in MIDI timing yet, and can't seem to easily sync all of my separate synth parts, or even all of the TI parts. There always seems to be a combination of timing and synchronisation issues. I have yet to figure out how to successfully record any ARP data from the TI (though I have figured this out and can do this successfully on the RADIAS).

So you can see I really do have a lot to learn here yeah

I have today been on the telephone to several Tutors/programmers etc who offer the services I am after from £20 per hour, £200 per day to £300 per day plus travel. i am willing to pay good money as long as I can work out exactly what I want to know from any visit, and that I get it!!

However, any advice greatly appreciated.

[Khazul]

Probably a good starting point for us is a clear understanding of exactly what you have:

Synths we know - is the radias an TI keyboard versions or not?

How do you interface everything to your computer?

TI Via USB, Radias via USB?
Karma (keyboard) and other non USB midi devices via I assume a USB midi interface?

What audio card/mixer do you use?

Do you use Reason Rewired to Cubase - that in itself will add to yoru headaches - rewire that is. The problem with these two is that reason when rewire still want to contorl all the midi hardware (but not audio). Most this isnt a problem, but you cant get really strange things happening when you are using a DAW contol surface rather than just a midi keyboard.


MIDI clocks - if you want all the midi gear in sync, they (ideally) need to be driven off a common clock. Cubase can provide such a clock. In MIDI there are a couple of types of clock - synths reposne to one type and full sequencers respond to both - one includes song position info, the other is very simple and just send 24 ticks per beat. Is this simple that is recognised by synths as a tempo clock. Something called MIDI clock, or beat clock. It is NOT timecode (MTC), or MMC etc. In Cubase, you can set the beat clock destinations from the Transport menu - sync setup option. This give you a dialog - at the bottom right - tick all the MIDI outs to which a synth that needs sync is connected - this is not needed for the "Virus TI Synth" though.

When Im working with Cubase, I have all of my synths set to external midi clock. When you use Virus Control - that happens automatically. On the Radias - press global, Clock in 4th down on the MIDI page - set to EXT-USB if you are using USB, else EXT-MIDI if you are using a hardware midi interface.

Dont where this otion is on the Karma or Electribe - hmm - you seem to like Korg stuff


The next headache you might have is MIDI feedback loops - ie you try and record something and all hell breaks loose - if so - whats going on is that Cubase by default functions as a midi router - it like to sit between all keyboard and all synths and is routing every midi message it sees back out again, which inturn is forwarding it back in... Often its more subtle -you play a single note and you get two notes the same played toger and they just sound a bit phased.

Most keyboard synths are actually two units - a controller/keyboard and a synth engine. On the synth - if local control is on, then everything you do on the keyboard goes direct to the synth engine, as well as out via MIDI. With local control off - keys go out via midi only and not to the synth engine - Local off is what you generall want to start with in a DAW environment - this allwos the DAW to route what you play from any keyboard to the required synth. Again - you should find this setting in the global config menu of the various bits of gear. Virus Control sets local off automatically. If you are getting MIDI feedback (ie all hell breaksloose when you try and record - then Locla control is on, and midi routing is enabled int he DAW - you cant have both). In cubase the otpn to control this (On by default is in the preferences under MIDI.

Not everything likes to work with the DAW in full control of everything - I generally dont, but everything is often alot easier to use unless you tend to work allmost exclusie with haward and only use the DAW as a dumb recorder for tracking until your ready to work completly inside the DAW.


The audio issue (out of tune) you have - is that with a specific synth? That sounds like the audio was recording at what Cubase thought was 44.1 Khz, but was actually 48Khz and its playing it back at 44.1 without realising it needed to sample rate convert it. If that makes no sense - I assume the electribe can play sample and that there is a pitch control - you know if you reduce the pitch, the sample gets longer? - same thing happening.

The cause - dont know specifically - could even be Cubase is getting confused about the sample rate the card is working at - I have know this happen with some audio interfaces at times. It has sometimes happened with the Virus TI as well.

What sample rate do you normally work at? and are the Cubase default project preference set to be this sample rate? Cubase absolutely hates it when you change sample rates - even between sessions. Best advise - find a sample rate at which everything works and stick to it - never change it.


If you get someone in by the hour - do try and find out alot about them first - be abit of a waste to hand over 200 quid, end up functional, but not actually know what he did or why etc... - Much better to actually learn the basics - particularly the ways - and roughly what stuff does under the hood etc.

Anyway - give us more detail if what you have get there and Im sure people here can help to some degree and help sort out some basic issues.

[theMusicMan]

Hey Khazul

Many thanks for this. I started posting this information in another thread, and thought I'd start this one instead. So, here is some info for you:

OK, this ain't gonna be pretty, here goes.

I have 3 audio devices or soundcards in my set up;

• Built in PC sound card
• VirusTi Audio (USB)
• Yamaha MW12 mixer device (inbuilt USB)

I have no idea how to correctly configure each of these in Cubase Studio 4.

I have 4 USB ports on the PC, and have installed a PCI 5 port-USB card. I have the MW12 connected to a dedicated USB, the Virus TI connected to a dedicated USB, and my RADIAS connected to a dedicated USB.

I also have a Korg Karma which I connect the MIDI ports to a Edirol UM101 USB MIDI device which in turn is also connected to the PC.

I can record and playback MIDI (sometimes) from each of the Synths.

I have each of the synth Main Outs connected through 1/4" jacks to the various inputs on the MW12. I can control each of these using a slider on the MW12.

• Channel 1: VirusTI Left
• Channel 2: Virus TI Right
• Channel 3: RADIAS Left
• Channel 4: RADIAS Right
• Channel 5/6: KARMA Left and Right
• Channel 7/8: Not Used
• Channel 9/10: from Laptop soundcard
• Channel 11/12: Not used

I have my separate laptop headphones-out connected through a 6mm jack socket to Phono lead into channels 9/10 of the MW12.

I have no idea what the following buttons on the MW12 do;

• ST - on each channel (these are all ON)
• PFL - on each channel (these are all OFF)
• 1-2 - on each channel (these are all ON)
• ST/Group - under CR/Phones knob (depressed)
• to ST - to left of CR/Phones knob (depressed)
• 2TR In/ to USB (depressed)

How's that?

[theMusicMan]

PS: I am happy to provide photos and screen shots if required.

I also have some nifty web based presentation software that allows up to 10 people to view what's on my screen at the same time. if you want to have a look at this any time so you can see settings in Cubase, VC et al, please shout.

[Khazul]

I know Yamaha manuals often aint that good, but the functions of those switches should be well covered in the quick start guides and manual for the mixer. Mixers especially normally have good documentation (a signal routing diagram if nothing else) as people like to understand the internal audio routing options etc.

It might even recomend a normal setup for the monitoring as well, along with what channels at the computer end of the USB do what, and how to set them up in cubase.


If after reading through that you dont understand the terms - then by all means ask, but first port of call for information about using you gear should really be the manuals that come with it, and your post suggest that they are in need of a first read