wdm and mme simultaneous playback??

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mrhairy

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I'm trying to playback two programs at the same time, sound forge 7.0 with mme drivers and n-track 3.3 with wdm drivers, with a delta 66 sound card. Only one program can playback back though. Is this a fact that wdm and mme drivers can't be used simultaneusly from the same sound card, or is there something else I'm missing?
 
I don't understand how this could be done, even with the same drivers.

Seems to me the sound card can only convert one signal at a time.
 
Mr Hairy,
You are correct, your soundcard can only be "driven" by one set of drivers at a time. Both devices or programs can playsimultaneously if you choose the same drivers from each program.
 
Depends on your soundcard drivers - are they multiclient?

I don't know N-track, but using WDM drivers does not mean much. Is it Kernal Streaming (KS) like Sonar for instance? The point being that MME is but one interface a WDM driver can have. What does N-track mean by WDM?
If it is Kernal Streaming, then the MME will be switched off and nothing else can use it, but the same would be true if the soundcard drivers were not multiclient and N-tracks "WDM" is in fact MME.

It is perfectly possible in the right circumstances to have two or more seperate sources feeding the same output. I can, for instance, have a VST softsynth host (Console) using ASIO, running alongside Adobe Audition which is MME - both feeding the analog out of my Audiophile2496 card. The one that won't play is KS as in Sonar, because as I said, using KS takes over the driver and MME can't get through.

If things weren't confusing enough, it doesn't help if manufacturers use the wrong terms.
If you read this article...
http://www.staudio.de/kb/english/drivers/
... you'll understand that WDM is not an alternative to MME. WDM is the "whole" driver structure and MME is one part of it. At the end of the article it explains KS, which is what I think some mean when they say "WDM".
 
cool very helpful Jim Y

Well the delta 66 is multiclient so I guess its safe to assume that N-track uses kernal streaming for wdm, and thats were the problem is. So exactly does "multiclient" mean then? That various programs can access the soundcard simultaneusly with the exception of kernal streaming for wdm??
 
In n-Track .... go to Preferences\Audio Devices\Advanced .... make sure there is a check mark where it says "Keep audio devices open".
The reason I say this is because with two different machines, I'm able to playback different audio from both n-Track 3.3 and Sound Forge 7.0 simultaneously.
Not that I do something like that for any particular reason, but tested it after reading this thread. I would be more inclined to use Rewire to simultaneously playback audio from different applications.
Both machines use XP Home (if you don't have XP ... I highly recommend it).
One machine has a Soundblaster Live using WDM drivers with n-Track and the other machine has a MOTU 828mkII using ASIO drivers with n-Track.
If you are using Windows 98, you may not be able to have more than one program access the audio device at any given time.
If in fact you are using 98 or 95, for that matter, you won't want to select "keep audio devices open", or you will get an error stating "cannot access audio device ... device is in use by another application". Or something of that nature. Forcing you to close one application prior to opening another.

HTH

-Ken
 
yeah I don't know. I'm using xp pro and I have the keep devices box checked. I open N and start playback and then open sound forge and start playback. I can see the playback meters in sound forge moving but can't hear the output from sound forge. maybe it has to do with my delta 66.
 
Well, the 66 uses the same driver as my Audiophile. They are multiclient.
Having a 66, there's one trick you could try.
Use the Delta Monitor Mixer to feed the hardware analog 1/2 output (patchbay)
Use different channels of the 66 in the two programs and select them in the Monitor mixer. You can use the s/pdif out for one program if you like.
If it still won't play, try deselecting the channel you assigned to Soundforge from N-tracks devices (assuming you can pick what to use or not use in the program).

Why not use the ASIO drivers with N-track though? If it's "WDM" mode is KS, then you would get the condition you describe - Soundforge thinks its playing back, but the Audio simply can't make it thru the driver.

As a matter of interest, where you select your sound channels in N-track, what are the channel names you see?

The Delta driver has two kinds for MME/WDM - Multi and Seperate.
Seperate probably looks like this (inputs)...
Maudio Delta66 1/2, Maudio Delta66 3/4, then s/pdif and monitor mixer
While multi says so...
Maudio Delta66 Multi 1/2.... Multi 7/8 - The multi's only show channel numbers, although they follow the same order as the seperate drivers.

You will either see both choices, or the Seperates plus one un-numbered "multi".
Although there is no clear info from M-audio, it seems the Multi driver was provided for KS operation, although I've seen no difference picking either (but don't mix them). For programs (including Windows Sounds control panel) that can't see the Multi channels (when you only get the un-numbered multi option), don't use Multi - specifically pick one of the seperate channels instead.
 
Jim Y,
You will either see both choices, or the Seperates plus one un-numbered "multi".
Click to expand...
Actually I'm not next to my computer right now or at all this weekend so I don't remember the exact names. I do remember for both mme and wdm I have delta 1/2, delta 3/4, spdif and multichannel. I do not remember seeing any numbered multichannels. Another slight problem too...If I select midimapper or microsoft gs wavetable sw synthesis as the midi device in n-track. And select the same channel in windows sounds control panel(ex. delta 1/2) as I do in N-track (ex. delta 1/2 wdm), I get this pop-up window in n-track saying something like "can't open midi out device". :(

I don't know if I mentioned this earlier but this doesn't just happened with soundforge. It occurs whenever n-track (wdm) plays back with any other program using mme from the same channel of the soundcard.

And yeah the monitor mix switch-around makes everything work. I just wish I knew what's wrong since this seems to work for other people :(

what driver are you using for your audiophile?
I'm using Version 5.10.00.27 for my delta.
maybe it's driver related.
 
I have the latest .46 driver (actually the very latest is .47, but don't try to use it, it's for 64bit Windows!).

The Microsoft midi software synth not working is a sure sign that something is using WDM/KS - that must be N-track. KS involves taking over the WDM driver and the softsynth can't get through. Same thing happens with Cakewalk, you have to switch to MME driver mode to use the synth.
All should work if you use ASIO instead in N-track.

If you are avoiding ASIO because you get glitching, have you tried switching Windows performance from Programs/Applications to Background Services?

How to change the performance of foreground and background programs
Click Start, click Run, and then type sysdm.cpl in the Open box.
Click the Advanced tab, and then click Settings under Performance.
Click the Advanced tab, and then use one of the following methods under Processor scheduling:
Click Programs to assign more processor resources to the foreground program than the background program.
Click Background services to assign equal amounts of processor resources to all programs.

Background setting seems to suit the ASIO driver better on a lot of machines.

Re my question about driver names - I'm doing a little research. The Multichannel driver contains all the devices channels wrapped up in one. It's up to the program to sort them into seperate channels. Some manufacturers are only providing multi, so if the program can't use it, you can't use all the channels, just the first stereo pair. If a program can't use Multi, it just sees one Multichannel; but if it can, it sees numbered channels - 1/2, 3/4 etc.
Sonar for instance, can see both with a Delta card (because the driver provides both a multi AND seperates) while CoolEditPro/Audition only sees seperates and one single Multi. This is just an MME issue, no problem with KS or ASIO.
 
Jim Y,
Actually the asio drivers work great for me. I'm just trying to iron out some problems with the wdm drivers that I've had along the way. I have background services switch on along with a few other tweaks mostly from musicxp.net .

But anyway, about this "multichannel" option... I'm also researching on what exactly this does. I found very little information on what exactly this option does and the delta manual doesn't even mention it. When ever I choose "multichannel" as windows playback, playback happends only at the delta 1/2 outputs. maybe its just like you said, it can't use multi.

After spending a large portion of my time search the net on this topic, I finally emailed m-audio tech. support asking them information on this "multichannel" function. We should keep in touch, and I'll contact you when or if they email me back. thanks again Jim Y
 
By all means!

You might find sections 5 & 6 of this interesting...
http://www.marian.de/files/marc8midi/w2k/readme.htm#5. MME, DirectSound and Classic MME

Although I found it confused me further!
I'm also suspicious of the statement that XP is limited to 16 stereo MME channels - I have come across evidence that there is no limit at all (though it is true what it says of Win2000).
Oddest though is that seems to say that multichannel numbered channels are only seen by error and should not be used! I disagree with this, I think it's the un-numbered Multichannel that should not be used (which is the one we see with the Delta card).

Two audio interfaces have come to my attention with multichannel MME but without any seperate ones. This is why I think the last statement I mention by Marion is incorrect. These Multichannel drivers do show numbered channels in programs that can support them - else you could not use all the channels!

The devices are M-audio FW1814 and E-magic 6|2 USB. The former has an 8 channel ADAT input - so you could extend to 16 analog ins with an ADAT equiped pre-amp such as Behringer market. According to M-audio, the ADAT is only provided with a multichannel. The reason for doing this is that Win2000 has a 10 device limit. By using a Multi, Windows only sees one driver device for the whole ADAT interface, whereas it actually contains 4 (8mono).
With the 6|2, I don't know. Maybe its easier to get a total of 4 stereo channels in a USB1.1 interface with the multi driver as all channels would be in sync. The problem though is that none of these multichannel drivers will work if the program is MME and not designed to use them.

I have Adobe Audition (CEP), this is MME only and therefore sees exactly the same driver names that Windows Sounds control panel does.
Does Soundforge do likewise?

Cheers.
Jim
 
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