connecting a VF160 and a drum machine

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rondo

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What's the best way to do this?

I have a RY20 Yamaha drum machine which has MIDI in/out. Should I be utilizing this? Or just use the stereo out and go into two tracks of the VF160?

I'm not familiar with MIDI at all. So please use small words and step-by-step instructions! :)

thanks!
 
VF 160 audio/midi

Hi:

In order to hear sound from your drum machine, you will need to plug the audio outputs from that machine into one or more inputs on the V160. At least 2 is preferrable,for a stereo mix, but if you have multiple audio outputs on the drum machine, you can use all of them, which is better because you can apply FX, compression and pther processing ,to individual drum sounds.

MIDI has nothing to do with producing audio. It is a protocol that was designed to allow one device to control 1 or more devices. without going into a long-winded explanation, i can tell you that some very creative things can be done with MIDI.

In your situation, you could sync the drum machine to your VF160, meaning that pressing play on the VF160 will cause the drum machine to start. This is very useful if you want everything to line up properly for punching in and out, or dumping tracks to another device, such as a computer based sequencing program.

Or, you could have the drum machine control the VF 160. By starting the drum machine, the VF 160 will sync to the drum machine's clock.
I'll give you an example: I use a VF16 to record 8 to 16 tracks of my band's rehearsals.
I then take it home, and connect a midi cable from the "out" port to a spare midi "in" port on my computer.
I then transfer those audio tracks in to SONAR XL, and they are perfectly in sync. Pressing play on the VF16 causes SONAR to start recording.

Hope this helps.

Tony
 
Cool - that's exactly what I needed to know. I like the idea of having the drum machine start and sync to the VF160. Gonna have to expirament with that. That would be a huge help.

All this stuff is just so crazy!!!

Is there jsut a standard MIDI cable? Or are they specific to a brand?
 
nope, they're standard. it's a bit of a deal setting up the VF160 to send and receive, and slave to a time clock, so if you need help when you get to that point, let me know.
i'm pretty sure that my VF16 uses the sme setup. I've done a bit with this stuff, especially Fostex. I used to have 2 D-90's that I had sync'd to cakewalk

happy Fourth,

t
 
Re: VF 160 audio/midi

tonester said:

I'll give you an example: I use a VF16 to record 8 to 16 tracks of my band's rehearsals.
I then take it home, and connect a midi cable from the "out" port to a spare midi "in" port on my computer.
I then transfer those audio tracks in to SONAR XL, and they are perfectly in sync. Pressing play on the VF16 causes SONAR to start recording.

Hope this helps.

Tony
Click to expand...

I have tried to do that with Nuendo, but the tracks are just a little off , enough off to sound off. I do not know how to start asking how you set it up to work, but is there any pitfalls you encountered when setting up your system that you can help me avoid?

Wild Phil
 
I'm not sure how Nuendo handles it SONAR will automatically detect a clock source change when I press play on the VF 16. it syncs to SMPTE, and it's frame accurate. I normally have my clock source set to audio, using the ADAT clock from my Dakota.

I'm sure there's a way to set it up in Nuendo. probably just a clock change. i'm going to ask you a really basic question, and forgive me, but you do have a midi cable from the VF16 out to an "in" port on your copmuter, right?

Tony
 
tonester said:
I'm not sure how Nuendo handles it SONAR will automatically detect a clock source change when I press play on the VF 16. it syncs to SMPTE, and it's frame accurate. I normally have my clock source set to audio, using the ADAT clock from my Dakota.

I'm sure there's a way to set it up in Nuendo. probably just a clock change. i'm going to ask you a really basic question, and forgive me, but you do have a midi cable from the VF16 out to an "in" port on your copmuter, right?

Tony
Click to expand...

Tony:
Yes the VF and PC are midi connected. When I press the record on Nuendo the VF starts and the track transfers via S/PDIF. Subsequent tracks are a tad out of sync. Here is an old post from the Fostex BBS

Tia
Phil
_______________________________________

Hi: After days of messing I finally got my VF-16 to sync as slave to Nuendo. I set the VF as slave and when I hit record on Nuendo, the VF starts to play from the time set on the nuendo window.

Thats the good part. What I will want to do is re-record VF tracks into Nuendo. I think this is refered to as flying tracks from VF to DAW. I will mix down the tracks in Nuendo and perhaps never send them back to the VF.

The problem I am having is I have to fly the tracks one ( or two if it is a stereo track - an EQ/Effects/Compressed applied re-recorded buss recorded mono to stereo track- ) at a time to Nuendo. When I do this the tracks are not perfectly in sync in Nuendo. To test this I recorded a click track on the VF and then flew it to Nuendo multiple times on multiple tracks. On playback and scrub in nuendo I can tell that each track is a little bit off, the click sounding like it is struck several different times but generally at the same time ( like my lousey playing for double-tracking.

These are the settings I have on the VF.

Fostex VF 16 Settings to sync with Nuendo
Signature Set -002Bar Offset
001 Bar 4/4
Tempo set 001Bar1 =112
Preroll time 05sec
Midi Sync Out mtc
Frame Rate 25
MTC offset Set
Offset Mode Abs
Slave Mode On
Slave Type Spdif
Digital In L01R02
Digital out spdif
Beat Resolution off
Device ID 00

As far as I can tell I am similarly set up on Nuendo. I have not found the Nuendo beat clock however.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Thanks
Wild Phil Harmonica
____________________________________________
 
hmmm.


if Nuendo is anything Cubase 5.0, isn't the bar/beat clock in that floating transport?


if Nuendo slaves to the VF via midi, i don't see that you should have a problem flying those tracks into your DAW, especially if you're not going to be flying them back.

try setting both devices to 30ND, get rid of the preroll, and make sure that both absolute times are at 00:00:00:00. If you're not punching in and out, I don't think the pre-roll is a neccesity.

experiment, and let me know.

by the way, how is that Fostex BBS?

Tony
 
just a clarification:
when i posted that I have SONAR's internal clock set to audio, I meant as a default. As soon as SONAR detects play on the VF16, it asks me if I want to switch clock sources to SMPTE. If I click "yes", it does it automatically
 
The Fostex BBS is a hell of a lot better than guessing in the wind. There is absolutly no support from Fostex AFAIK, just a bunch of great musicians and engineers sharing Ideas. The page does not work so great. I did a search on Nuendo to find my previous post quoted above and the search comes up empty.

http://pub15.ezboard.com/bvf16
 
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