Hello
I have two questions here.
Firstly when i click the live button i get constant echo,How do i remove this.
Secondly
I have just purschased a soundblaster live 24 bit card and when i select 24 bit recording and listening i get the error hardware not supported.
All the drivers are installed.
Thanks in advance
Nick.
#1 Look in the mixer applet for the SoundBlaster and uncheck “What you hear” if it is checked. That selection allows the software to record whatever the Soundcard is playing back and can cause a sort of feedback loop or echo.
#2 Go to n-Track Preferences > Audio devices and try the different drivers there. If you have WDM drivers listed there, they will probably be your best shot. Drivers are kinda like this;
MME - old reliable, clunky, slow but usually work.
WDM - usually pretty fast and reliable.
ASIO - arguably faster than WDM but a little finicky sometimes about settings and such.
I’m not sure if MME even supports 24 bit playback… 
Anywho, try 'em ALL! 
If you don’t get sorted, pop back in here. Somebody will know the trick to fix you up.
TG
Thanks for the quick reply gtr4him.
I am at work now and i will try it tonight and let you know.
Cheers
Nick
gtr4him
Home now.
Thanks again as i just fixed the 24 bit problem with your advice and call me stupid if you may but where do you mean with the mixer applet to uncheck “What you hear” .
Hi there - I think the echo that you’re talking about is the latency in the Live processing.
See how low you can get the latency without clicking/popping/dropouts (File -> Settings -> Buffering stetting).
It might be needed to use something like KXProject or Asio4All drivers to get that out of the way, as the native Creative drivers aren’t always the best.
In essence the ‘live’ function applies the effects realtime, and if your drivers can’t handle latencies below 5-10 ms (10’s pushing it), you’ll get that delay. 1st sound is the hardware monitoring, and the 2nd echo is the software monitoring.
Do you have a need to use it ? (Play live effects etc …)
HtH !
Wihan
| Quote (nicka @ May 06 2005,08:31) |
| gtr4him Home now. Thanks again as i just fixed the 24 bit problem with your advice and call me stupid if you may but where do you mean with the mixer applet to uncheck "What you hear" . |
Oh NO! The only stupid questions are the ones unasked!
If you have the little default speaker icon in the system tray, you can double-click it to open the soundcard mixer. From there, go to Advanced or Show Advanced Controls or whatever. You may see a check box under Recording sources for "What you hear" or something similar. Uncheck it. You probably only want the Line-In and Mic-In inputs selected.
HTH,
TG
PS I don't have an SB myself so I am recounting most of this from memories of reading other posts. So bear with me and also try the forum search.
PPS HERE is a tutorial on setting up basic soundcards in Windows for use with n-Track. May be helpful.
TG’s on the right track but I think he got diverted. Wihan is right too: you have a latency issue to resolve.
When you say you hear an echo, does that mean you only hear the signal once but it’s delayed, or do you hear it twice (once right away and later echoed)?
If once: You just have a latency issue.
If twice: You need to turn off direct input monitoring when using live mode. You still have a latency issue.
First, though, why are you using LIVE mode? If you don’t need it, you don’t need to worry about either of these problems. You would need to use LIVE mode to hear effects as you’re recording (which I think is usually just a crutch that you should get over, unless they’re crucial effects like guitar amp/cabinet sims). You’d also need it to use a plugin soft synth. Other than that, you’re just pushing a button that should stay unpushed.
First, direct monitoring. Your soundcard is capable of sending the incoming sound directly to its outputs, without going through the computer. This is called direct monitoring, as well as the buzz-phrase “Zero Latency Monitoring”, in hopes of getting you to fork over your cash. You control this from the soundcard’s mixer. Built-in soundcards usually use the Windows mixer, which you get to like TG said, or else use n-Track’s menu: “View -> Soundcard’s Mixer -> Playback Controls”. Go to Properties and check every item in the list, just to see what’s there. Most you’ll never need. One of them will be your line inputs (if your soundcard uses this mixer). You should mute this channel if you’re using LIVE mode, otherwise you get two copies (one direct and one LIVE).
BTW, there’s another important control nearby, so let’s see that: View -> Soundcard’s Mixer -> Recording Controls. This is where you set your record levels.
If your soundcard doesn’t use the Windows mixer, you’ll need to find it. Try looking under Windows “Start -> Programs”, and if it isn’t there, read the manual.
Now, latency. This can be a HUGE issue. But for starters, just try the ASIO drivers mentioned above, and see how that works!
Thanks again guys and again i appologise for my basic questions as i have a lot to learn here i think.
O.K so i don’t neede the live input so that eliminates that problem.
The delay is constant though and as i put any sound in it keeps delaying about 1 second apart and amplifies each time so that i have to turn the live processing off after a about 5 seconds as it increases in volume but it doesn’t matter as you guys have explained that i don’t need it anyway.
I will check out the tutorial gtr4him as this should help me to get started.
My little speaker changed in the task bar when i installed the creative drivers and this changed the mixing console completely and thats why i could not find the “What you hear” check box.
I will get down there there and review some of the songs shortly but now i am just trying to get up and going.
Thanks again.
Hmm, I think something’s amiss. The latency echo shouldn’t be getting louder (in LIVE mode). If it is, it sounds like somehow you’re feeding your output back into your inputs.
If you’re using speakers to monitor when recording, that could cause it. (Use headphones!)
Otherwise, I’m not sure what the problem is. Just make sure you’re not unintentionally feeding the output from the computer back into its inputs, because that would be a bad thing!
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| The latency echo shouldn’t be getting louder (in LIVE mode). If it is, it sounds like somehow you’re feeding your output back into your inputs. |
hhmmmm
I don’t know how that is happening as the problem happens even if i touch the end of the lead with my finger
only being plugged into the sound card so it must be to do with the soundcard somehow.Thanks for your help and i will keep at it.
Had a long reply typed, but somehow I managed to close the browser window before I posted it …
Here’s the highlights …
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The latency echo shouldn’t be getting louder (in LIVE mode). If it is, it sounds like somehow you’re feeding your output back into your inputs. Just make sure you’re not unintentionally feeding the output from the computer back into its inputs, because that would be a bad thing! |
Thinking out loud here, I think ‘record what you hear’ will do this.
If you have latency of ,say, half a second, your PC will pick up your origional source, and then ‘slap back echo’ half a second later.
Because it is something ‘that you hear’ the soundcard will then route it back to the recording input again. Half a second later the same thing happens.
If you add to this that your monitoring probably amplify the signal from the input to output, this will then increase in every ‘round trip’ and give you the ‘increasing echo effect’.
You can test this (if you really need to) by increasing the latency, and then doing the same test again. It should now take longer between ‘slapbacks’.
Don’t test it by decreasing, as I don’t think you’d be able to disable LIVE mode before damage happens to either you or the PC.
You need to find out where to disable ‘what you hear’. This will also ‘tune you grief’ (SA slang, sory) when you start to do multitrack recording. (it will record your 2nd track, but on it will be the new take and whatever was on your 1st track as well, together).
Go into the SB’s mixer and look at the recording setup.
You should have ‘Line in’ checked as the recording source.
HtH.
Wihan
Btw, and this is very important :
Do not appologise for asking questions over here - this is what this board is for.
Especially if you’re new to this, there isn’t many problems you can come up with that someone over here haven’t seen.
Collectively, everyone over here have invented so many wheels over the course of time, so why should you have to do it as well ?
The only time that I’ve seen board members get upset about new board members’ questions , was when people asked ‘newbie’ questions, and then got arrogant about the (very good) answers they got. As long as you are patient in trying to solve your recording problems, people over here will be patient in trying to help you.
Members over here are more than helpfull and very knowledgeable. Some of 'em even created documents that ended up being in the N-Track official manual (like Learjeff’s signal flow chart).
Happy (n)tracking, and let rip with questions as and when you have’em.
Thanks Wihan Stemmet i appreciate the help.
I have started recording and i left the live box unchecked so that has solved that problem.
I was going to use this for some plugin effects during live recording but i have reverted back to my guitar efects box onstead and also i thought it would be good to help me with singing as to get it to sound better while i sang but again i can use an external effects box.
I have been using n-track for a while now but previosly i only used it for mixing wav files created on a digital 4 track but this has a lower quality bit rate and i thought i would give n-track recording a try so i have never acctually recorded into it.
I have about another 50 questions but i have just started reading the manual right through so that should bring me back to about 25 
Thank you.
Cool !
Have you multi track recorded anything yet ?
Cheers !
W.
Nothing that gets anywhere near posting,
just playing around at the moment.