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  #1  
Old 01-02-2021, 05:03 PM
jponhudson jponhudson is offline
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Default Pro Tools First and M-Audio DRAMA

I bought M-Audio 192 and downloaded Pro Tools First that came with it and nothing is working right. The issues are static noise when recording my guitar plugged directly into the interface. Enabling recording almost never works. Sometimes it seems OK, the meters and moving but becomes unresponsive (the application is not frozen but the transport and the input/output is unresponsive). M-Audio tech support is totally worthless BTW. (One BS response extremely late and vague comment with no follow up).
I want to troubleshoot the whole system to see what is wrong but I don't know where to start.
I am running Windows 10 pro with 33GB free space. Processor info below.
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8265U CPU @ 1.60GHz 1.80 GHz.
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  #2  
Old 01-02-2021, 05:50 PM
Darryl Ramm Darryl Ramm is online now
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Default Re: Pro Tools First and M-Audio DRAMA

You don't need to "troubleshoot the whole system", well not yet. You need to start by doing basic troubleshooting steps and providing more of the information expected here. Start at the "Help Us Help You" link up the top of every DUC web page and provide more information about what you are doing. And a SiSoft Sandra report on your computer, all described there.

I'm, assuming you are a compete DAW beginner. If not speak up.

"Enabling Recoding almost never works"... I'm still lost from the description... does anything every get recorded OK? that you can play back?

Can you play back anything at all? If you are not sure create a new empty session at 44.1kHz or 48 kHz and drag and drop a know good commercially recorded audio file onto the Pro Tools edit window. Pro Tools should create stereo audio tracks for that recoding and if you press play on the transport it should play back. Does that work OK? Without static of glitches?

We cannot guess what you are doing. What guitar? What exact guitar, if electric what exact pickups? If acoustic what exact pickups or mic are you using?
plugged in where/how? What exact cable end plugged into what exact connection on the interface? Any pedals or preamps or other things in the signal path?
Are you are trying to record the guitar to an audio or instrument track? Watch out for the common beginner mistake... it needs to be to a mono audio (not instrument) track.

What exact driver version did you install for the interface?
What Setup>Playback Engine is selected in Pro Tools? (what are all the options in the Playback Engine selector pulldown list?)
What sample rate are you trying to work at (should be 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz).
What Setup>IO Buffer size is set?. Set that to the largest size available, likely 1024 samples. Does that fix things (but will have a large latency, just get it working at all for now).
Trash prefs. (Instructions are found in....) Does that fix things?

You complained in a duplicate thread about MAudio support for First, well I have bad news for you about Avid's support for First. And it's just is not a product I would trust my work to or waste my time with. You should look though all the issues beginners and others have with it on DUC and other forums. I especially would not risk my work to Avid cloud storage. If you want Pro Tools (which can be great if you need the compatibility and/or want to develop career skills) then buy or subscribe to the real thing (Pro Tools Standard or Ultimate) and work with local sessions on disk, or look at any number of other great DAWs, starting with Reaper (but the choice depends on what you are doing, and especially on what folks you can get help from or might collaborate with are using).
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  #3  
Old 01-03-2021, 06:07 AM
jponhudson jponhudson is offline
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Default Re: Pro Tools First and M-Audio DRAMA

Thanks a million for you reply. I am a DAW newbie but a stubborn one:)

does anything every get recorded OK? that you can play back?

I was able to record a guitar track on some of my attempts but the playback was noisy although the the levels were below peak. Than short after that, the software became unresponsive

Can you play back anything at all? If you are not sure create a new empty session at 44.1kHz or 48 kHz and drag and drop a know good commercially recorded audio file onto the Pro Tools edit window. Pro Tools should create stereo audio tracks for that recoding and if you press play on the transport it should play back. Does that work OK? Without static of glitches?

Done. I imported some stock audio which played with similar noise. Fun fact, even when I was playing those samples before downloading them (with my M-Audio used as the sound engine and headphones) I heard the same static noise.

We cannot guess what you are doing. What guitar? What exact guitar, if electric what exact pickups? If acoustic what exact pickups or mic are you using?
plugged in where/how? What exact cable end plugged into what exact connection on the interface? Any pedals or preamps or other things in the signal path?
Are you are trying to record the guitar to an audio or instrument track? Watch out for the common beginner mistake... it needs to be to a mono audio (not instrument) track.

I plugged my Strat directly into the guitar input in my interface with nothing else inserted. Just clean guitar sound with no effects.

What exact driver version did you install for the interface?

I just went to their site and downloaded the only driver they had for Windows 10 "AIR 192|6 Window Driver v1.0.3"


What Setup>Playback Engine is selected in Pro Tools? (what are all the options in the Playback Engine selector pulldown list?)

I used to have ASIO for All as one of the options which I ditched (uninstalled) because the computer seemed to get confused with what I was selecting. Now the only option is M-Audio Air 192/6.

What sample rate are you trying to work at (should be 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz).

44.1

What Setup>IO Buffer size is set?. Set that to the largest size available, likely 1024 samples. Does that fix things (but will have a large latency, just get it working at all for now).

I set in to the maximum but it didn't make any difference.

Trash prefs. (Instructions are found in....) Does that fix things?

Tell me more

Switching from the First to the real thing occurred to me but I was thinking that I want to make sure that I have everything else in order before committing (although I might just do it before you read this:). I am a former (read it no longer playing for money) jazz musician (guitar player) who wants to be able to record some instrumental tracks (bass, guitars) as well as add some synth pads and drum loops to make simple soundtracks for tube videos, perhaps play some midi guitar into the edit window and build compositions in this manner (and adding Sibelius to the equation)

Thank you for your suggestions. So.....what should I do next?
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  #4  
Old 01-03-2021, 08:13 AM
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albee1952 albee1952 is offline
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Default Re: Pro Tools First and M-Audio DRAMA

Great info above^^^, and here are a couple of common goofs:
1-No signal is often because you have not designated what "audio engine" that you want Pro Tools to use("audio engine" meaning the audio device). Open Pro Tools>Setup>Hardware and make sure the M-Audio is selected.
2-Newbies often try recording an instrument(like guitar or bass) to an "Instrument" track. This is not how it works Guitar, bass, etc should be recorded to an AUDIO track, just as you would do for vocals, drums, or anything that creates sound out in the real world. An Instrument track is for VI's(Virtual Instruments) like MiniGrand or Xpand2. An Instrument track hosts the VI plugin and has a "piano roll"(like a midi track) where midi note info can be recorded(from an external midi controller) and entered with mouse clicks.
3-System tweaks. Darryl touched on this, but it gets a lot deeper as some are crucial. #1(for me) is to disable Power Management on all USB ports(assuming the M-Audio DRAMA connects via USB, power management could be shutting it down.
4-Last thing is system specs, and your computer is short in a few ways. At 1.6GHz, its slow. Then there's RAM(memory) which you didn't mention. 8GB is minimum and really only enough for the OS. 16GB is the usual minimum for recording work(and 32GB is highly recommended). Next is hard drive speed and space. If you're only running a single drive, is it a Solid State Drive(SSD)? If it IS, then that's probably okay(given enough free space). If its a spinning drive, that's another performance hit. As for free space, 33GB is not a lot, and you should always keep around 15% free(so maybe you should get a bigger drive, or add an external drive).

If all else fails, you could try Reaper(free to try and cheap to buy) as it has more modest needs(but is still a very capable DAW).
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  #5  
Old 01-03-2021, 08:15 PM
Darryl Ramm Darryl Ramm is online now
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Default Re: Pro Tools First and M-Audio DRAMA

Wow thanks for the detailed reply. I know this is frustrating, but lets see what I can add to Dave.

Quote:
Originally Posted by jponhudson View Post
Thanks a million for you reply. I am a DAW newbie but a stubborn one:)

does anything every get recorded OK? that you can play back?

I was able to record a guitar track on some of my attempts but the playback was noisy although the the levels were below peak. Than short after that, the software became unresponsive
First levels "were below peak"... lots of layers of detail here.

General comment on levels: even when recording say vocals into a microphone you are fine being well below clipping, maybe -12 dbFS or even -20dbFS, for many folks it's better to record at lower input levels and avoid any chance of clipping. Most low cost interfaces simple solid state preamps just do not sound good as they are driven hard. You can make up for volume of that input later with fader gain, the TRIM plugin, and other plugins. Losing few bits of precision just does not make as much difference as how bad clipping or driving many preamps sound.

Normally when recoding you set the meter to pre-fader metering mode. So you see the raw level from the preamp going to the converter. And put meters in legacy mode (can't what meter types First provides) so you can see the levels in dbFS

And you did not mention using an amp sim plugin.... so:

All the discussion of levels changes with recording a guitar DI (direct input), which is at a very low level and you usually use an amp simulator plugin on that audio track to boost the level and produce the sounds of a guitar though an amp. One of the several unfathomable product decisions with Pro Tools First was not to include any amp sim plugins... even though guitar and bass players are frequent users of simple DAWs for recording themselves.... you can purchase the Eleven Plugins... and while good they only run on Pro Tools. You can't install any other third party amp sim plugins on First. It's so badly crippled. Again, for this and other reasons I would look at what other DAW options are available before spending a lot of time on First. If you want to go with Pro Tools I would recommend you look at the Avid Complete Plugin Bundle Subscription, which includes all the Eleven II guitar amp sims and more and is now included with Pro Tools (Standard and Ultimate) subscriptions.

You won't know where to put the interface DI/preamp gain setting until you experiment, but start with it about half to three quarters turne up. Do not turn it up all the way trying to maximize the low input level. It's meant to be low.

Quote:
What exact driver version did you install for the interface?

I just went to their site and downloaded the only driver they had for Windows 10 "AIR 192|6 Window Driver v1.0.3"


What Setup>Playback Engine is selected in Pro Tools? (what are all the options in the Playback Engine selector pulldown list?)

I used to have ASIO for All as one of the options which I ditched (uninstalled) because the computer seemed to get confused with what I was selecting. Now the only option is M-Audio Air 192/6.
Good. The Air 192|6 driver should provide the needed ASIO compatible interface for Pro Tools. You should *not* need to install or use ASIO4ALL. ASIO4ALL is a hack/work around for devices with no ASIO driver, and it's frequently unreliable/causes problems.

Quote:
What sample rate are you trying to work at (should be 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz).

44.1

What Setup>IO Buffer size is set?. Set that to the largest size available, likely 1024 samples. Does that fix things (but will have a large latency, just get it working at all for now).

I set in to the maximum but it didn't make any difference.
Leave it set to maximum for now. Make sure "ignore errors " is not checked.

Quote:

Trash prefs. (Instructions are found in....) Does that fix things?

Tell me more
Yes. Always start trouble shooting by trashing prefs, I am not sure if the third party Pro Tools preference trashing tool on Windows are updated for Pro Tools First... so follow the instructions manually as you trash prefs.

Quote:

Switching from the First to the real thing occurred to me but I was thinking that I want to make sure that I have everything else in order before committing (although I might just do it before you read this:). I am a former (read it no longer playing for money) jazz musician (guitar player) who wants to be able to record some instrumental tracks (bass, guitars) as well as add some synth pads and drum loops to make simple soundtracks for tube videos, perhaps play some midi guitar into the edit window and build compositions in this manner (and adding Sibelius to the equation)
I can only say this a dozen or so times... I would not waste time with First. Just not worth any time doing stuff that may be to be lost with Avid's unreliable cloud storage. You can get a free one month trial of Pro Tools Ultimate... you can try that out and then buy a subscription to Pro Tools standard (you leave the same software installed the features between standard and ultimate are just a license key difference, unlike First which is a separate crippled binary). If you don't want to pay the ~$300 annual for Pro Tools Standard, and for many hobbyists that is priced too high, then I'd look at other DAWs. I think the number one decider should be what do your bandmates/friends/other folks you know use.. and get the same DAW.

Quote:
Thank you for your suggestions. So.....what should I do next?

1. Stop wasting your time with First.
2. Work out if you want to try an Ultimate Trial, or switch to a different DAW, like Reaper.
3. If going with the Pro Tools Ultimate trial. Uninstall First. Install Ultimate. Redo/check all optimizations. Test. Report back if there are problems - you might well have a messed up system that needs a clean Windows install, or might have PC hardware that is messed up. But you will get better help here if trying to troubleshoot problems not on First... most of us here don't want to/would not/can not run First on out systems along with real Pro Tools.

I don't think the Ultimate Trial will get you the complete plugin collection... but it will at least get you Eleven Free and Sansamp, which are really basic amp sims. And since it's not crippled like First you can install any third party AAX amp sim plugins on the trial version.

Last edited by Darryl Ramm; 01-03-2021 at 09:08 PM.
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