Running mulitple audio applications simultaneously

J

jasonreese

New member
Hello,

I'm running Reason, Maschine/Battery, Kontakt Komplete, Guitar Rig etc. but I can only run one application at a time.

I have Propellerhead balance as an interface going in through USB but the applications are still running through my stock/onboard crappy sound card.

As a result I always get a message saying something like "the application is already in use" or something like that. It sucks because I have to reboot the computer to
go from Guitar Rig to Kontakt or Reason or vice versa.

Is there a better sound card I can get that will allow me to run all my applications at once so I can record properly?

Thanks

Jason
 
It sounds like you're running each of those as stand-alone applications.

I'd suggest using DAW software as a host (e.g. Reason) and running those applications as VST/VSTi on separate tracks in the host. Then you can run them all at the same time, limited only by your computer's horsepower.

Also, in Reason, go to the options and set the Balance as your input and output device.
 
You should be able to just disable the sound card and run all apps through Balance. I don't run anything through my sound card. I use Reason and Amplitube and SSD4 (through Reaper) all at the same time.

As a matter of fact, my church runs most of their audio out (as well as recording services in Reason) through a FW interface and runs Microsoft media player through the sound card (for some strange reason) and I believe that's why they have blue screens and lockups. XP allowed multiple audio streams through multiple audio devices (until recently, the church's OS), but MS says they did not intend W7 to be used that way. It does not support it. You can get around it, but you pay the price.
 
Setup Balance and Disabled sound card

BroKen_H said:
Did you make Balance the default device for playback and recording?
Click to expand...

I disabled my sound card and set up balance as default and made it the in/out in reason and it's working great.

I just have to figure out how to make Reason the host as you suggested, never done that before.

Jason
 
Isn't this a good case fore rewire? I've never really worked with it, but have experimented with it only. You can route sound through one and back to the other.
 
It seems like Rewire will work but the info I'm seeing doesn't show how to use Reason as the host.

They are coming at it from the perspective of using the major DAW's like Protools, Ableton, Sonar etc. as the host.

I'm having trouble figuring how to use Reason as the host as Broken_H suggests above...
 
Tadpui said:
It sounds like you're running each of those as stand-alone applications.
I'd suggest using DAW software as a host (e.g. Reason) and running those applications as VST/VSTi on separate tracks in the host. Then you can run them all at the same time, limited only by your computer's horsepower.
Also, in Reason, go to the options and set the Balance as your input and output device.
Click to expand...

+1

The whole idea of using another interface is to GET RID of the crappy onboard soundcard that's really only for beeps, boops and light gaming.
 
I have disabled the crappy onboard card but I still can't get multiple applications to run.

How do I make Reason the host or do I need ProTools or the like?
 
Last edited:
jasonreese said:
I disabled my sound card and set up balance as default and made it the in/out in reason and it's working great.

I just have to figure out how to make Reason the host as you suggested, never done that before.

Jason
Click to expand...

Great, one step down!

As far as using Reason as a host, that's no problem. Just open Reason, create a new track, and load (for instance) Kontakt as a VST effect or VST instrument. This would probably be through an "FX" button or menu for the track. You may need to go into your options and point Reason to your VST plugins folder (or wherever the VST plugins for Kontakt, Battery, etc were placed during their installation). Otherwise they probably won't show up as options when looking for VST/VSTi to insert on your track in Reason.

DM60 said:
Isn't this a good case fore rewire? I've never really worked with it, but have experimented with it only. You can route sound through one and back to the other.
Click to expand...

Good point. I haven't messed with ReWire much either so I don't have any pointers for that one either. But this is pretty much what it's meant for...routing outputs from one or more applications into your host DAW, or to each other.
 
Problem with making Reason the host is it was specifically designed NOT to run VSTs for stability. Reasons version are called REs (rack extensions), and they are proprietary. So to run a compression VST, you would need to start Reason, run Reaper, put the compressor in the Reaper channel, ReWire from Reason to that channel and back again as a sub. I'm just now learning how to play that game for SSD4, as I learn more I'll post, but for now I've got my weekend schedule and no free time to research...
 
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