1 Topic by Meshplate (edited by Meshplate 2024-02-03 13:10:42)

  • Registered: 2020-09-17
  • Posts: 16

Topic: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

I want to just say the menus are the most complicated and non-intuitive ever. 5 years on and I still don't understand them nor am I able to recall anything about them later after I've hacked around on the controls until I find by chance what I am looking for.  I just have to ignore all that additional parametric EQ functionality and other subtleties and just use what is available through the remote. I can't be the first to be similarly frustrated. Furthermore in order to even make an attempt at making any adjustments, I have to pull the DAC out of my equipment rack and place it on my desk while I watch the "how to" videos on youtube, all of them each time as it turns out, because I can't tell where the function I am looking for will turn up in the video series. This is to say the manual is basically no help either. I know there is a new remote system for the DAC available via USB cable to iPad. I haven't got around to using it yet. This seems to be a concession to frustrated users like me. Thank goodness. I am sure RME is familiar with predicaments like mine and I can't be the first. I just wanted to express my long lasting frustration with an otherwise reliable solid and good sounding unit. Lots of you other specialist users and audio engineers may laugh at me, but for the average user like me the DAC's menus are just much too non-intuitive. You wouldn't imagine an average driver to be able to reprogram the electronic fuel injection parameters of their car without a lot of training. That is what trying to use the RME DAC menus feels like to me subjectively.

  • From: Milan, Italy
  • Registered: 2012-02-19
  • Posts: 187

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

That's why they made the app...

https://www.rme-audio.de/software.html

https://musicwall.app/hermetech

Babaluma's Website

  • Registered: 2024-03-13
  • Posts: 1

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

Lol, that looks like the manual except on a screen.

I completely agree with the OP. About as cryptic as could be. Notes for the designers/engineers to remind themselves about various points they'd otherwise forget laid down in manual form.

That's fine cause this thing is aptly named (unlike most other things that are actually consumer products that call themselves "Pro"). It's not for me, it's for professionals.

However, the one thing I want to use it for--to get the best possible sound out of my DCA Stealths (along with some other nice HPs)--it hits out of the park. So, despite the, for me, alphabet-soup useless manual, I am extremely happy with my PRO SE in the extremely limited use case I'm employing it.

In fact, I'm listening to Billy Raffaoul singing his song "Acoustic" as I type this and couldn't be loving it more, lol!

  • Registered: 2023-03-26
  • Posts: 11

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

I have the ADI-2 Pro FS R Black Edition, and I find its plethora of features to be impenetrable. The only way I could be fluent with most of them is if I spent hours each day committing them to memory. That’s not an option for me. I just want to get on with recording. So I understand only a tiny fraction of what my RME device can do. Fortunately, the one thing I really need from this device is a no-brainer. I use it to run my mic preamp into my computer. Nothing more. So other than turning on the device, there’s nothing else I need to know.

RME’s user manual (at least the one I have) isn’t aimed at novices. Rather, it’s professional audio engineers talking to other professional audio engineers. If you’re not highly knowledgeable about audio gear, then much of it will go over your head.

This is the downside of making a device that’s crammed with features. It’ll do a dizzying array of things—but only if you have the expertise, patience, and time to figure it out. If not, then your reaction is likely to be a befuddled “wha..?”

regal1956's Website

  • waedi
  • DAW Mastermind
  • Offline
  • From: Swiss Zürich
  • Registered: 2020-12-08
  • Posts: 3,419

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

You are absolutely right, this is professional high-tech gear.

At this moment, can you record ? Is it doing what you want ?
What is your computer ? Mac / Windoes ?
How do you connect that mic-preamp to the ADI-2 ?

M1-Sonoma, Madiface Pro, Digiface USB, Babyface silver and blue
  • Registered: 2023-03-26
  • Posts: 11

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

waedi wrote:

At this moment, can you record? Is it doing what you want?

It does exactly what I bought it for.

What is your computer? Mac/Windows?

MacBook Pro M1.

How do you connect that mic-preamp to the ADI-2?

TRS cables from the preamp to the RME’s analog inputs—USB cable from the RME to my laptop. The ADI-2 Pro FS R BE detects this automatically and routes the signal with no action needed from me. If I want to listen to a recorded file via headphones, the ADI-2 Pro FS R BE also detects this automatically. So the two things I need to do require no knowledge from me. The ADI-2 Pro FS R BE is sorta idiot-proof in that way.

It would be nice if I better understood my RME. Then again, I don’t really understand my MacBook Pro, but that doesn’t stop me from watching YouTube cat videos. Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

regal1956's Website

  • waedi
  • DAW Mastermind
  • Offline
  • From: Swiss Zürich
  • Registered: 2020-12-08
  • Posts: 3,419

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

Congratulations you are on the right way.
No shame on you. Digital audio is a huge book, you can't know everything overnight.
Feel free to ask for help for specific step, the forum will help you.

M1-Sonoma, Madiface Pro, Digiface USB, Babyface silver and blue
  • Registered: 2019-07-12
  • Posts: 45

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

I agree, it can be confusing and I struggled initially.

I then reread the manual section on encoders, followed the example in the manual on the unit and practised until it became clear to me. I tried again soon after. Once the concept and practice was understood I have been OK with interface since.

From initial dislike and frustration, I now appreciate how clever a solution it is.

For such a complex device there is unfortunately an initial price to pay to learn how it works, a price worth paying I think.

9 Reply by ramses (edited by ramses 2024-03-17 12:17:45)

  • ramses
  • DAW Mastermind
  • Offline
  • From: UTC+1
  • Registered: 2012-10-14
  • Posts: 12,091

Re: 5 years later, I still can't navigate the menus.

All I can say, operation is really logic and well thought.

It is a device with plenty of excellent features. No other vendor can deliver a device with this feature density and unique features like auto ref level, dynamic loudness, Bit test (to mention only a few), which give you really numerous useful options.

All you need to do is to learn operation which is really not too hard.

Don't be anxious. You can save and recall your settings at any time, now you have even ADI-2 Remote with a nice-looking GUI.

You do not need to know about everything at the beginning. Should you struggle at any point and if the manual is not your friend, you have a very helpful community here. Everybody in the forum got professional help, be it from RME directly or other studio professionals or end-user.

Thanks, Matthias and team, for your exceptional support over the years and for listening to customers' demands, which makes an excellent product with unique features even better and better.

Special thanks for the well-structured manuals, which contain a lot of useful information in a still quite compact format.

BR Ramses - UFX III, 12Mic, XTC, ADI-2 Pro FS R BE, RayDAT, X10SRi-F, E5-1680v4, Win10Pro22H2, Cub13