Multimix 8 Firewire

  • Thread starter Thread starter waltermi
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waltermi

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ok I just purchased one of these and I will let you all know how it goes...

I should be picking it up tonight or tomorrow...

I have read various reviews of this box, any review I have read that came from a magazine, they have been positive. Comments on the unit in some of the forums I have come across have been varried, leaning towards negative...

the truth of the matter is, it doesn't matter what you buy there will always be those who have problems with it.... I consider myself pretty pc savy, it's what I do for a living, working with pc's and trouble shooting... so If I have problems with it, I will let you know....


I did have a presonus firebox which I had to send in for repair only 3 months after purchasing it, because of a problem with the channel 1 level pot... it was fixed, however I had to pay one way shipping... either way it was a great box, I just wanted something that was a little more flexable...

will let you know how it goes...
 
I really wanna like these boxes.. Really I do... In theory they are just about everything I can think of I'll ever need.. Ok maybe a few more Mic Pre's, but it's got plenty for now...

However, I went through 2 laptops, and 3 Fireware cards before I found a combo that worked (noticed I didn't say worked RIGHT).. And now in just over 2 months and less than 20 hours use time, it is on its way back to its morther-land to be rebuilt...

I wish you nothing but luck with yours...

--
Rob
 
Well so far so good, installed perfectly, and seems to work fine...
no issues in cubase or reason... I did notice one thing...

my multimix 8 firewire has three buttons above the main mix and hdph/ctrl rm
the manual shows only two, and so does the alesis website...

mine has starting from the left: Firewire 2 track to mix button
middle button is: Firewire 2 track to control Room button
to the right of that button is: mix to control room....

interesting... and like I said now issues.

cheers.
 
I was wondering - when you're recording through the FireWire connection to your PC, is the EQ bypassed on the mixer, or can you actually use it? I'm looking at buying a FireWire enabled mixer, and i haven't found one yet where i can use the EQs that are on the channels.

EDIT: I've just gone through the website and it appears as though it does send the channel gain and EQ through the FireWire connection. Although, after thinking about this, i can't really say whether i need this or not now.
 
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Yeah the Alesis Firewire units send gain and the 3 band EQ. I tend to record pretty much flat and level things out later though..

My MM16 is a bit different in layout, but the switches are there, but here's the low down on what each switch SHOULD do..

2trk to Mix - sends the left and right channels from the RCA Aux Inputs to the main mix out.
2trk to Ctrl RM - Sends the Aux inputs to your control room out
Mix to Ctrl RM - Sends the 8 channel mix to the Ctrl Rm out. (leaves the main mix out uneffected)

--
Rob
 
my firewire 8 has the three buttons: 2trk to Mix, 2trk to Ctrl RM, Mix to Ctrl RM. The manual doesn't mention the middle one... and photos on the net, the button does not appear...

Either way, just spend a full day playing around with it... worked perfectly... infact I found it easier to work with than my firebox...(which I traded in for this multimix 8 firewire....

It does get warm though... mind you it's pretty cool in my basement, so I don't mind using it as a hand warmer...

:o) but so far so good... very very happy with it...
no crashes, no issues, and I love having the built in effects....

Cheers one and all...

Crash is correct in that the eq, and gain get sent to the pc, the built in effects do not... (unless you are recording from the two channel master out...

:o)
 
I wasn't aware the effects didn't get patched through to each channel.. But I've never even turned 'em on to see what all is there to play with...

--
Rob
 
I was also thinking of picking up one of these. A question though. This may sound kinda stupid and obvious, but I honestly could not for the life of me determine if each track was actually sent individually to the computer. I need to be able to record "live" guitar bass drums and vox and then go back and add effects, compression etc to each track individually or possibly overdub them individually. The firewire is not just stereo out is it? It would be great if it actually does show up as 8 different inputs on a computer. Thanks

Adam
 
there are 10 individual inputs ( 4 mono inputs, 2 stereo pairs, and then the master mix is also sent to the pc as a set of inputs...) so you can record these to cubase no problem.... I have recorded so far 4 tracks at once with no problems...

there is only a stereo output back to the board... so you could not use the faders or knows to adjust the sound once it's recorded... it would be nice if it also behaved as a control surface but it does not... any affects could be added from with in the pc via vst effects...

I hope that makes sense... it's 2:25 AM...

:o) cheers....
 
yes I am sure, the Alesis Multimix 8 firewire offers no control surface driver or midi implimentation of any kind...

I don't mind so much as I have a tascam US224 standing by as control surface as well as a Edirol PCR M30 keyboard with plenty of knobs to play with...

Although I do not use the Tascam US 224 as a sound card ( it is a very capable usb based two in and two out sound card, ) I like the transport and 4 bankable faders and one master...
 
fire-wire

I got a 16 track fire wire last week, when I hooked everything up and downloaded the new drivers, everything seemed great. recorded a stereo drum track on 1&2, perfect, layed a guitar track down and the latency was horrible.After I whiped the guitar track out, cubase wont record on anymore tracks, Im not getting a signal into the pc??Ive used a paris system for years and was hoping to get something really portable, maybe I have to get to know cubase better (its the version that came with the board only 4 inputs at a time.
Thanks
Scott
 
You can fax your reciept to Alesis at 401-658-3640 and request a upgrade of Cubase LE.. The upgrade version is 1.0.8 It's rumored the new version will allow 8 channels at a time..

A fix for right now is to lock your drum tracks from recording, add two new tracks to your mix and direct them to get their inputs from 1 & 2, 4 & 5, or where ever you want on the board..

You should be able to adjust the latency by playing around with the buffer sizes and keeping any effects off until you get all of your dry tracks recorded.

Of course if it's to bad, you may have to look at a faster PC... When i was playing around with a 1.23 GHz/512MD SDRAM laptop I had some latency problems (when it would actually record anything.. With 2Ghz/1MB DDR SDRAM I have little to no latency..

Portability was why I went this direction.. The MM16 hooked to a laptop.. I don't think you can beat it in the field right now.. I can plug a 110v DC-AC converter into the cig lighter in the truck run a short extension cord and go out into the middle of nowhere and record just about anything.. Mostly my thoughts were recording parking lot jams on the extreme end...

--
Rob
 
Thanks,Rob

I faxed the reciept,now waiting on a response...Hope it works out
Thanks again
Scott
 
Haven't sent the info in for mine yet...
Got a new MM16 back yesterday after my first one went TU... Haven't done anything other than plug it up and turn in on to make sure it would... Had been holding out to see if it was shipped with 1.0.9 but it came with 1.0.8 as well.. Figures...

--
Rob
 
I just bought a MM8 and compared to my Tascam US-122 it is a giant step up IMHO. I had to tweak my laptop (Presario X6000) with the 122 and use a PCMCIA USB card to allocate a dedicated IRQ just to get 95% audio stability, not perfect but useable to an amateur I suppose. I want to take it a step further now that I have some recordings and experience with some DAW applications and MIDI, and I heard good things about Firewire audio in general. So I decided to take the gear plunge and get the MM8. I needed to still tweak a couple of settings to get the audio perfect with no pops, clicks or stuttering but I did reverse almost all of the tweaks and workarounds I needed to use for the US-122 setup. So I have my fast new laptop back now, with a great audio interface and mixer I can use to record live stuff on location (my original goal). I think the MM8 is great so far, works flawlessly with FL Studio 5 XXL, Ableton 4 and Kristal Audio for multi-track stuff and effects with very low CPU load from what VST effects I tried. Pricewise its not bad either for what you get under the hood.

Regards,
Mark
 
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