• rlejr
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Topic: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

I am interested the HDSPe MADI FX and Totalmix for live tracking. I need monitoring and effects. After researching I am unclear on the following items.

1) Can the dsp dynamics provide drum gating or not?

2) Is the dsp reverb one send/one setting at a time or multiple ( e.g. say I want to have a lead vocal reverb, a different backup vocal reverb,  a different drum kit reverb and a different overall mix reverb concurrently).

3) I need 8 fully customized headphone mixes. It looks like provided I have enough outputs I can set this up no problem. However I notice the control room section shows only 3 headphone mixes. I want to make sure I would not be limited to 3 separate mixes.

Thanks in advance for the help.

2 Reply by MC

  • MC
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

1) That is possible by using the Expander function.

2) One setting only.

3) There are 4 phones mixes within the CRS. While this inclusion is helpful for overview and normal work, you can set up any number of 'headphone mixes', as all outputs are available as completely independent mix outputs. Monitoring such an 'external' headphone mix is done via Cue. Thanks to the latest addition to TM FX (Talkback send to any output) even that feature will work.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

  • rlejr
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

Thank you Matthias. That sold me.

If I use a lite native VST reverb plugin for the other 3 reverb settings, will the latency still be low enough for live tracking or should I expect to use external hw instead?

  • From: Washington DC, USA
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

I want to be sure you are clearly understanding the reverb settings as it is not entirely clear what you mean by "different" reverbs.  As Matthias wrote there is only one type of reverb you can use (for both reverb and delay).  However, you are able to set the level of that reverb independently for each input.  So you can add a lot of reverb for the snare, and just a little (or none) on the overheads etc.  I find for tracking this is plenty of flexibility.

  • rlejr
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

You have a good point neirbod. I may be able to work as you suggest. I will plan to try that approach first.

However, I was asking about different types.
Example
- a nice drum room setting on OHs
- a plate on the lead vocalist
- a medium hall on bkup vocals

  • From: Washington DC, USA
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

You need all of these at the same time?  I can't imagine many instances I would want to track drums and backing vocals at once except for a live show. 

In any event, I have also routed through my DAW in the past to use VST effects (prior to owning a UFX).  In my case I could get down to 5 ms or so and have a stable system, which for me was just small enough of a delay to work.  But your particular experience will depend highly on your overall system (e.g., computer specs, how well the OS and BIOS are tweaked) and your project (e.g., # tracks, sampling rate) so you won't learn much from asking online.  You will just need to just try it and see.

  • rlejr
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

Crazy as it may sound, part of the overall picture here is to have the studio system double as an awesome band rehearsal environment. Thus my reason for pushing the limits.

Thanks for the input. I'm off to try it and see.

8 Reply by MC

  • MC
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

rlejr wrote:

Thank you Matthias. That sold me.

If I use a lite native VST reverb plugin for the other 3 reverb settings, will the latency still be low enough for live tracking or should I expect to use external hw instead?

Reverb is not critical with latency. A good sounding reverb often has an initial delay of 50 ms up anyway. And Reverb is only added to the (here undelayed) direct signal. So using VST plugins for it is no problem except for the higher routing and setup work.

Regards
Matthias Carstens
RME

MC's Website

  • From: Washington DC, USA
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Re: TotalMix FX and Monitoring Questions

MC wrote:
rlejr wrote:

Thank you Matthias. That sold me.

If I use a lite native VST reverb plugin for the other 3 reverb settings, will the latency still be low enough for live tracking or should I expect to use external hw instead?

Reverb is not critical with latency. A good sounding reverb often has an initial delay of 50 ms up anyway. And Reverb is only added to the (here undelayed) direct signal. So using VST plugins for it is no problem except for the higher routing and setup work.

Good point. There will not be a problem even with relatively high latency from the DAW as long as the signal returning from the DAW is just the reverb and not the dry/ wet mix. You can monitor the dry signal direct through the UFX to get effectively zero latency and just use the DAW as an effects unit.