• Registered: 2007-05-02
  • Posts: 316

Topic: Surround FRs

I really love Digicheck: talk about value added to a product! I use it all the time and now that I'm working on surround projects, I find it indispensable.

There's a couple of things I'd like to see Digicheck do for surround:

1. Channel order: I was at a post studio and their 35mm production studio and both had 5.1 meters organized this way: L-C-R-Ls-Rs-LFE. I found it very useful to see the C between L-R and the LFE at the end. I'd like to be able to spell out this config on the Digicheck meters.

2. Spectrum analysis of more than just L and Right: being able to route an entire 5.1 mix to the Spectrum Analyser would be useful to get an idea of the overall Frequency distribution of a mix. Being able to mute and phase reverse individual channels would be a great diagnostic tool. 

3. Non-specific to surround, I'd also like to be able to restrict and expand frequency bands in the Spectrum analyser, for example to get a detailed look at 0 - 85 Hz.

I honestly don't know what the above entails or if its even posssible, but I thought them worth mentioning.

Thanks!

PC1 = HDSPe PCIe: DF-ADI-8 DS / HDSPe PCIe: MF2
MBP = HDSPe Expresscard: MF1

2 Reply by MC

  • MC
  • MC
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  • From: Germany/Thailand
  • Registered: 2007-04-06
  • Posts: 24,866

Re: Surround FRs

1. Added to list.
2. You can do all this with TotalMix Loopback.
3. Not possible, as we do not use FFT but a real third-octav bandpass analyser.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

3 Reply by undertone (edited by undertone 2010-05-21 16:10:27)

  • Registered: 2007-05-02
  • Posts: 316

Re: Surround FRs

MC wrote:

2. You can do all this with TotalMix Loopback.

But the Digicheck docs specifically say not to use Totalmix alongside Digicheck because the level metering will then be inaccurate in both. Is this no longer true?

I tried setting this up but while loopback sends each channel out to it's input, I'm unable to mix the inputs to an output. And the Digicheck Hardware Level option is greyed out on my system (PCI/Multiface + HDSP9652). I assume that this is not possible with this hardware? Then again, I'm using the Multiface as my WDM system card: could this be the problem?

And even if it did work, I'd still have to mute and phase reverse from my host. I believe all of this would be better handled in one interface.

Thanks!

PC1 = HDSPe PCIe: DF-ADI-8 DS / HDSPe PCIe: MF2
MBP = HDSPe Expresscard: MF1

4 Reply by MC

  • MC
  • MC
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  • From: Germany/Thailand
  • Registered: 2007-04-06
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Re: Surround FRs

undertone wrote:
MC wrote:

2. You can do all this with TotalMix Loopback.

But the Digicheck docs specifically say not to use Totalmix alongside Digicheck because the level metering will then be inaccurate in both. Is this no longer true?

Only for hardware level, which is not part of the Surround Meter.

undertone wrote:

I tried setting this up but while loopback sends each channel out to it's input, I'm unable to mix the inputs to an output.

I see no problem to do that. You can mix playback and input channels to any stereo output, then put this one in Loopback mode, then use DC on that input.

undertone wrote:

And even if it did work, I'd still have to mute and phase reverse from my host.

In this case (your cards) - yes.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

  • Registered: 2007-05-02
  • Posts: 316

Re: Surround FRs

Got it working, thanks!

PC1 = HDSPe PCIe: DF-ADI-8 DS / HDSPe PCIe: MF2
MBP = HDSPe Expresscard: MF1