Fast Track Pro + Mac + ?

PTravel

PTravel

Senior Senior Member
My writing partner uses Macs (but otherwise she's a very nice person :)). I'm setting her up with with a Fast Track Pro, a mic, pop filter and a stand so that she can record pickups on her own, without my having to drive 2 hours round trip to do it.

Here's the problem: I'm looking for some kind of cheap and simple DAW for the Mac that will work with the Fast Track Pro.

I'm not a Mac guy. I installed the Fast Track Pro without problems. I tried Audacity, but it doesn't seem to recognize the interface. I suppose I can try Reaper, but I couldn't find any verification that it will work with the FTP on a Mac. The two DAWs that I use, Sonar and Audition 3.0, don't come in Mac versions.

Any suggestions?
 
Hey,
Pretty much any daw should see it if it's working, so I guess you want to know if the FTP is recognised and working?

Go to spotlight (mag glass, top right) and type system profiler, or system information depending on OS.

That brings up a device manager equivalent. Look under USB for the device.
If it's there that's just basic recognition; You need to check drivers beyond that.

Go to spotlight and type audio midi setup.
In there there's a list of devices. See the FTP?
If so, right click it and select is as the system audio device, if you want of course.

If that checks out, any software should see it ok.

Gime a shout back if you're stuck. :)
 
One of the first things to check, if you hadn't already, is the Sound output settings in System Preferences. (That's accessible via the dock, or by clicking on the Apple drop-down menu, very top left of the screen). Once the FTP is connected and powered on, go into System Preferences and click the "Output" button near the top. You should see the FTP listed so that it can be selected. Close and done.

As far as a DAW, does Garageband not fit her needs? Comes with every Mac, pretty powerful.
 
The FTP is working. Not being a Mac guy, I have to use "Windows-speak." It shows up in the Mac equivalent of Devices, and I was able to select it in the system sound output section (whatever that's called). However, when I opened Audacity, the FTP didn't show up in the section where you can choose the audio interface -- just the same two choices as before the installation.

I didn't realize Garage Band comes with the Mac. I don't know the software at all. All she needs is the ability to load an MP3 of the instrumentation, record to a wave file on a separate track, then save the wave file separately and send it to me. Will it do that?

Also, she is not exactly IT guru material. Last night while I was trying to install the FTP and Audacity, I noticed that I could figure out how to configure her Mac for the FTP much faster than she, and I've never touched a Mac. Garage Band would have to be pretty straightforward for her to use it.
 
hertzdonut said:
One of the first things to check, if you hadn't already, is the Sound output settings in System Preferences. (That's accessible via the dock, or by clicking on the Apple drop-down menu, very top left of the screen). Once the FTP is connected and powered on, go into System Preferences and click the "Output" button near the top. You should see the FTP listed so that it can be selected. Close and done.
Click to expand...
Yes -- this is what I did and the FTP installed fine. It did not appear as an option in Audacity. When I got home, I installed Audacity on my Windows machine and verified that I was in the correct screen and was going about the selecting the FTP correctly -- on my machine, the Fast Track Ultra that I used showed up where the FTP on her Mac did not.
 
PTravel said:
I didn't realize Garage Band comes with the Mac. I don't know the software at all. All she needs is the ability to load an MP3 of the instrumentation, record to a wave file on a separate track, then save the wave file separately and send it to me. Will it do that?
Click to expand...

With GarageBand, she can do exactly that. She can load the mp3 into one track and record her voice in another track. She can then export just her voice track as a wav file.

Also, she is not exactly IT guru material. Last night while I was trying to install the FTP and Audacity, I noticed that I could figure out how to configure her Mac for the FTP much faster than she, and I've never touched a Mac. Garage Band would have to be pretty straightforward for her to use it.
Click to expand...
While I believe GarageBand is pretty straightforward, there is always a learning curve with anything. Patience, and asking questions will get her through. Unless she's like my sister: Clicks 12 buttons before I even have a chance to say "Whoa, stop!" :facepalm:
 
That's strange. I can only assume Audacity doesn't like the FTP for whatever reason.
As said though, Garage band should be capable of what you're after.
 
hertzdonut said:
While I believe GarageBand is pretty straightforward, there is always a learning curve with anything. Patience, and asking questions will get her through. Unless she's like my sister: Clicks 12 buttons before I even have a chance to say "Whoa, stop!" :facepalm:
Click to expand...
It is quite possible that your sister IS my writing partner. :)

Steenamaroo said:
That's strange. I can only assume Audacity doesn't like the FTP for whatever reason. As said though, Garage band should be capable of what you're after.
Click to expand...
Thanks. We'll give it a try.
 
Since you are a Windows guy, try her out on Reaper.

You can run the Windows version, she can run the Mac version.
The files interchange. So you won't have any problems trading files.
The setups are the same.
It's cheap and the "demo" is fully functional (it's guilt-ware).

I use it on my Windows laptop and my iMac with zero problems.
 
TimOBrien said:
Since you are a Windows guy, try her out on Reaper.

You can run the Windows version, she can run the Mac version.
The files interchange. So you won't have any problems trading files.
The setups are the same.
It's cheap and the "demo" is fully functional (it's guilt-ware).

I use it on my Windows laptop and my iMac with zero problems.
Click to expand...
I was thinking about Reaper, but I'm guilt-ridden enough that I would pay for the two licenses. ;)

I don't want to switch from Audition (I use 3.0 and CS6) and Sonar -- I've been working with them for years and I'm an old dog. However, all I need from my writing partner is for her to give me decently-recorded raw audio of the female vocal lines (I do the male). It's easy enough to pull the resulting file into the DAWs that I already use and work with them there.

If Garage Band doesn't do the trick (and she just confirmed that she has it), I'll get her a Reaper license. Are you sure that it will work with the Fast Track Pro? My recollection is that the m-Audio interfaces had some problems on Macs with certain software (and, evidently, Audacity is one of them).
 
TimOBrien said:
Reaper works with any asio interface (yes, the fasttrack is one.)
We're well past the "SoftwareX only works with interfaceY" stage... Protools hardware stuff was being used for copy dongles and thats over now.
Click to expand...
Thanks, that's good to know. If Garage Band doesn't do the trick for her, I'll invest in a couple of Reaper licenses. It would be good to have the same program on each of our computers so that I could talk her through the process.
 
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