Focusrite Mix Control and Sample Rate Changing

[DonaldM]

One of the issues that's been reported here by me as well as several others is that when you need to switch your sample rate from one session to another, say going from 48k to 44.1k, you can't just open Mix Control, switch it, and then open your PT session and off you go. Most of the time PT just won't respond and you end up having to not just re-boot PT, but your computer as well...sometimes twice. I have personally gone through every system check possible with Focusrite on this issue with no resolution.

Well, at long last, I think I have found a workaround that at least makes it easier and avoids all the re-booting. This works for my Windows 7 based system...I don't know if there would be a corresponding workaround for Macs (or if MAc users even have the issue at all). But if this HAS been an issue for you, then here's a workaround.

First, go download ASIO4ALL, which allows to use your PC or MAC itself as the interface. Set that up as an additional interface in your Pro Tools.

Now, let's say you want to go from a session using 44.1k sample rate to one at 48k sample rate. Do the following.

1. Close your current session
2. Exit Pro Tools
3. Open Mix Control
4. Set sample rate in MC to the new rate - 48k in this example
5. open PT...but NOT the session
6. Before opening the new session, change your interface in PT from your Focusrite to the ASIO4ALL
7. Open your new session
8. Hit play...if it plays, all is well.
9. Now, go back to PT settings again and switch your interface back to your focusrite and you should be fine.

A few steps involved I know, but its better than having to reboot your entire system and once you've got the process, it takes all of about 2 min from start to finish.

Until Focusrite and Avid can solve this one, this is a reasonable work around. Hope this helps anyone who has this issue. Good luck.

[DonaldM]

ADDENDUM: I stumbled on this by accident over the weekend. I was working in a session that is at 44.1k. Saved and closed it and went to reopen another session that I thought was 44.1k, but was really 48k. The Mix Control was still at 44.1k from the prior session. As soon as I opened the new session I heard a little pop pop in my speakers, which is always there when a different sample rate session opens. I thought "Great", I'll end up having to reboot my entire PC!"

When the session opened, I hit play, and the stop button turned blue and nothing played, as usual. Just for fun, I opened the settings and switched the interface to ASIO4ALL. When that was done, I hit play and it played. So I immediately switched back to the Focusrite, and it was fine! So, no more having to close sessions and reboot! Just switch to the ASIO4ALL, then switch back and that should work! I'm assuming switching to some other interface might also do the trick too, but I don't have another to check that with.

[Katherine_Focusrite]

ASIO4All is not a true ASIO Driver. It is a WDM Driver wrapper.

It uses the WDM Driver rather than our ASIO Driver and then reassigns things so that it appears to your program as "ASIO4All" ASIO Driver Type but then routes audio to a WDM Device.

Thus you can use it but will have significantly worse latency performance due to use of the WDM Driver.

It may also limit your channel count as our WDM Driver does not always support all channels. This is being updated in the version 3.x drivers on our Beta Page.

Kat

[DonaldM]

Originally Posted by Katherine_Focusrite

ASIO4All is not a true ASIO Driver. It is a WDM Driver wrapper.

It uses the WDM Driver rather than our ASIO Driver and then reassigns things so that it appears to your program as "ASIO4All" ASIO Driver Type but then routes audio to a WDM Device.

Thus you can use it but will have significantly worse latency performance due to use of the WDM Driver.

It may also limit your channel count as our WDM Driver does not always support all channels. This is being updated in the version 3.x drivers on our Beta Page.

Kat

Kat, I don't actually use the ASIO4ALL for any audio in/out. In this instance I use it simply to more easily go from one sample rate to another with the Focusrite Scarlett 8i6. As I've mentioned before, whenever you switch sample rates with Mix Control while in Pro Tools, it causes PT to lock up and not play. But what I've found, and am mentioning here, is that by switching to a different interface within PT, and immediately back to the Focusrite, the new sample rate will register correctly with the Focusrite and PT and everything works fine. Prior to figuring this workaround out, I was shutting everything down, rebooting PT, and sometimes even my PC to get the new rate to "take" in PT. But with this little workaround, I don't have to even shut down PT, just switch to another interface, in this case I'm just using the ASIO4ALL as the placeholder, then right back.

Ultimately, what needs to happen is that the Mix Control will not cause PT to lock up when opening a new session with a different sample rate than MC is set at. We've been over this many times with email and such, and I've provided you all with all my tech and specs.

This is just a workaround, not suggesting actually using the ASIO4ALL for any actual I/O.

[Kevi302]

Hi Donald,

You mentioned that you heard a little pop pop from your monitor speakers whenever you open a different Pro Tools session that has a different sample rate. Is this totally normal or will this actually cause damage to the speakers? I too am experiencing this with my Focusrite Forte. Whenever I switch from 48k sessions to 44.1k sessions or vice versa, there would always be a little pop from my speakers. Should I be concerned about this? Thanks a lot :)


Kevin

[DonaldM]

Originally Posted by Kevi302

Hi Donald,

You mentioned that you heard a little pop pop from your monitor speakers whenever you open a different Pro Tools session that has a different sample rate. Is this totally normal or will this actually cause damage to the speakers? I too am experiencing this with my Focusrite Forte. Whenever I switch from 48k sessions to 44.1k sessions or vice versa, there would always be a little pop from my speakers. Should I be concerned about this? Thanks a lot :)


Kevin

I doubt it'll hurt the speakers as its pretty low level. But you can always turn off the monitors when opening/closing sessions to be safe.

[Terry Wetzel]

As to the Focusrite sample rate back and forth. I am poor! The 2i4 first generation is my only option, I'm Windows 10, 64 bit with Pro Tools 12.7. I have found that setting all sessions to 16 /44 is the ultimate answer to the problem of trying to find a solution that doesn't exist. It works for me. That's the way music winds up anyway and I argue that there is all that much noticeable difference in the sound quality unless your one of those fortunate people with super hearing!

[DonaldM]

This seems to have gotten much easier since PT 12.x Here's all you need to do to avoid all kinds of hangups and issues.

Let's say you have your MixControl set at 44.1k and now you want to work with a session at 48k. Simply exit PT, change the sample rate on the MC, and reopen PT and load your new session at 48k. Vice versa going the other way.

Now, if you forget to change the MC sample rate, and you open a session at a different rate. Just, close the session and PT, change the MC, and reopen PT and the session and you should be good to go.

Since 12.x I have not had ANY crashes or lockups due to this issue. (I have had crashes for other mysterious reasons, but that's another story!)

Hope this helps!

[illution1]

I'm still using PT12 Win7 because I've heard that it's a safe version of windows and PT for the most part. Someone can tell me if there is a more stable version please?

I've found great success with:

-Install ASIO4all
- set the sample rate in mixcontrol first.
- Open the "Sound" option in the windows control panel (small icons view), find your sound card and right click on it. You can go into properties>advanced and check you are using the right sample rate and bit depth.
- I keep the two boxes underneath ticked.
- now that your sample rate and bit depth are set, switch off your focusrite unit. I know this advised against but personally I don't mind. (EDIT: My system seems to load up fine when in 44.1k, without needing to power off the sound card, so don't switch it off unless you are attempting to switch to 48k)
- Open PT as administrator
- If you are set for 44.1k and you did not switch off your sound card, you should be able to create/open a session without problems, and you are done. Congrats.

If you are trying to switch into 48k, follow the steps above, then continue with these steps:

- Create/Open 48k session (hopefully the playback engine will default to ASIO4all)
- Now switch on your focusrite product (Saffire56 in my case)
- In PT go to Setup>Playback Engine and change it to your focusrite product (Saffire in my case)
- Click yes to save and close your session. It should reboot your session with the correct sample rate.

The main problems with switching into 48k:

-- The sound card must be switched off when PT is loaded (if you are trying switch into 48k). It seems that PT loading up is what trips the soundcard into confusion.
-as long as you can load up a session in ASIO4all, you can turn the saffire back on and switch the playback engine back to the saffire.



Hope this helps!