Question for Flavio

Multiple USB control Surfaces

Hi Flavio, I was wondering if n-Track can support more than one USB control surface at the same time? I know the Behringer BCR2000 works because I have one, but what if I wanted to use another USB control surface at the same time? I’m just wondering because, I’d like to use more than one device that is midi/learn so I have all my tracks, there EQ’s/fader/rotary in front of me when I mix. I get lost sometimes flipping through presets on the behringer and would prefer to have the whole works in front of me.

As a side note: I can daisy chain the BCR2000’s via the MIDI cables as the unit has MIDI/in and out in addition to it’s USB out. To accomplish what I want to do, I would need 4 units plus 2 of the motorized fader units to have a complete board. A lot of wires to say the least and space, but the works would go through a single USB cable while the units are daisy chained via MIDI/in and outs. I’ve been looking at some other units that are usb only and have 16 channels. If I could run 2 of these units, it would better sense to do that if n-track could daisy chain, for lack of better term the USB. Hence my question.


PACO

Hi Paco,

you should currently be able to use two BCR2000s by customizing the signals it sends, i.e. for the 1st track slider the BCR normally sendsController 81 on Channel 1. You could change the 2nd BCR configuration to instead send controller 81 on Channel 2, then create a row in the n-Track’s Settings/MIDI Faders-control box for Track 9 Volume by copying the row for Track 1 controller and changing the MIDI event from Channel 1 to Channel 2.
So far direct support for a 2nd control surface hasn’t been requested by other users. If you do get a 2nd control surface I could easily add support for it without having to customize the configuration as I’ve written above, and instead use the bank up/down feature and add a 2nd control surface that n-Track automatically assigns to bank 2, and n-Track would recognize the 1st from the 2nd device based on the MIDI port to which they are connected (currently there is no distinction on the source MIDI port, n-Track listens to events that come from any of the MIDI ports active in the Settings/Preferences/MIDI/MIDI devices box).
I would just need your help to confirm that everything works correctly.

Flavio.

Thanks Flavio for your response.

I mentioned earlier about the Allen Heath Zed-R16. It has a MIDI section on the board with very limited number of faders and rotary knobs, but I was interested in the board because they implemented a MIDI switch for each of the 16 tracks. However the the MIDI switch only allows for the fader on each track to be MIDI (Learn) but the knobs are not mapped (too bad and so sad), so as far as using the Zed-R16 as a DAW control surface is no go for me. In the thread about the Mackie Universal Control surface, the unit I believe should be useful, better than the Behringer in terms of control surface however, should you want to have more than 3 EQ’s on your track you will have to thumb through the presets to see and adjust the digital knobs, so in that aspect it’s no good either.

So I’m stuck with the behringer as my control surface and the whole idea has become really frustrating. What I need is a 16 channel, midi capable control surface with loads of knobs and faders so I can tailor it to my needs in n-Track. I’m sure I can daisy chain 6 Behringers together and make it work, however it would be cluttered. So far I haven’t found anything suitable yet.

As a side note: When first using the Behringer, eventhough I’ve loaded the midi configuration, I must turn a knob before n-Track see’s the movement. Once this takes place then anytime I move a knob it moves on the screen like it should. The problem here is, when I shut eveything down. When I restart and load the midi preset the buttons do not become active until I move them. Is there any way to have n-Track make all the presets active and not require this initial movement? This plays havoc with EQ settings. I have to write down all my EQ settings because when I do the intial movement it un does this previous settings.

For example, the range of the knob is 1-127 and I have an EQ mapped to a knob set at 31 on the behringer and I save the project in n-Track. When I reopen the project, load the midi config and go back to EQ I mapped, I have to move the knob to make it work, in doing so it resets to another value other than 31 I had it set at. So I have to re-move the knob back to 31 and make adjustments from there. So you can see this really makes it difficult to make adjustments when the works gets reset. Thats why I was wondering if n-track can send the stored values back to the midi device forcing them to be active without having to turn them. It would be nice but it’s not deal breaker, it just means I can’t turn the system off until I’m done mixing, and should I have to shut down I have to write down all the values from the behringer so I can recall them when I initialize their midi functions. Please note the behringer does save the values, it’s the initial movement so n-track can use it is where the problem exists.


PACO

Unfortunately, this is why some of us don’t use Midi to full advantage. I use to write Dbase and Basic and program DOS to run. Now, I just want to turn it on and have it work. I am not midi literate, but it seems I get frustrated when I try to use it along with my favorite audio program N-track.
Maybe, midi has been standardized more than I know, but if it is as hardware specific as you are outlining, and I suspect it is, then
the short term answer might be something like some other competitor applications have done - they picked out a hardware “partner” and made sure that hardware worked with their application. Doesn’t mean that it doesn’t work with others programs, they just don’t assure that.
Or am I talking about something that is not really a problem in most cases?

I’m with you there, Bax. I’ve been doodling with midi for ever but only ever learned as much as I needed to. Theres still tons I haven’t got a grip of. The basics, though, are the same as ever and when I first befriended n-Track, I wasn’t sure that it’s ‘basics’ were solid enough. As we all know, every setup is different and just takes ‘a bit o’ gettin’ used to’.
But, being lazy, I’m enjoying editing midi tracks in the timeline as much as possible, post take.