The ProTools Firewire 400 Oxford 911 Chipset

[musiqkid]

Hello everybody
I was thinking abut the Firewire 400 Hard drive, what does it mean by record/playback, how could you record if its a hard drive? Does it open ProTools can you mix and edit your work? Does it need an Mbox device to get it to run, can it be compared to the an Mbox 2, Mini, etc....?

Thank you for reading Digidesign Firewire 400 Oxford 911 Chipset

[Obsidian Dragon]

Hello everybody
I was thinking abut the Firewire 400 Hard drive, what does it mean by record/playback, how could you record if its a hard drive? Does it open ProTools can you mix and edit your work? Does it need an Mbox device to get it to run, can it be compared to the an Mbox 2, Mini, etc....?

Thank you for reading Digidesign Firewire 400 Oxford 911 Chipset

The hard drive does not handle the analog audio in and audio out portion of the recording chain. It is the storage portion of a computer to support the reccording process. As you use something like the Digidesign Mbox 2 or Mbox 2 Mini for audio input the analog signal to be recorded is converted via an Analog Digital Converter (ADC)to a digital format (.wav) that can be stored on the firewire hard drive. Likewise digital audio can be played from the hard drive through the Digital Analog Converter (DAC) on the audio interface to play through an amplified speaker (monitor). Welcome to the DUC. It sound like you have a lot of learning about Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) like Protools and the associated digital audio interfaces. This is a great place to read and learn.

[spkguitar]

As with your other post, you are confusing a computer equipment requirement with what is required to run Pro Tools.

To Run Pro Tools LE, you need a Pro Tools audio hardware device. This is pretty easy because no Pro Tools audio device is sold without the Pro Tools software, and the software (Pro Tools LE) isn't sold without the hardware. It's a package deal. You buy the hardware, you get the software.

However, the Pro Tools hardware has some specific requirements when it comes to which computer equipment you are using, including needing a separate hard drive to store your audio sessions to. Pro Tools will record to this drive, read from this drive, playback from this drive, etc, but you need to have the Pro Tools hardware/software first. Understand?

THe Firewire 400 requirement that you posted a link to is only if you choose to use an external firewire drive to store your Pro Tools sessions. You can also choose an internal drive instead if yo uso choose. The hard drive is just part of the computer. It one of the things that Pro Tools need the computer to have to function properly. Understand?

Edit:
Once again, I'm typing slow this evening, but I totally agree with OD on this one:

It sound like you have a lot of learning about Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) like Protools and the associated digital audio interfaces. This is a great place to read and learn.

[musiqkid]

Thank you for the support everybody, which is better protools LE or M Audio?

[spkguitar]

"Better"??

The word "better" is always a subjective thing; better for what?

The two programs, Pro Tools LE and Pro Tools MPowered are almost exactly identical. There are some extra limitations when using MPowered, but most of them involve what other things you can use with the software, and have nothing at all to do with the normal functionality, so "better" when it comes to the software is really moot (unless you need to use the other pieces of gear/software that MPowered is limited against, one of which might be changing very soon ).

Now the hardware that the programs can use, that's a different story altogether. IMHO, the Digidesign pres are better than the MAudio stuff. That is just my opinion, though. Some may disagree with me. However, I think they are all capable of giving you quality audio; just at differing levels of the word "quality".

[musiqkid]

Ok i decided to go with the Mbox 2 Mini because it's the cheapest, and comes with a lot more stuff than the M-audio one, but i just found out that it doesn't have MIDI. Would it recognize a usb powered MIDI keyboard and sync with protools.

[spkguitar]

Would it recognize a usb powered MIDI keyboard and sync with protools.

Yes. Any MIDI device that is properly installed and hooked up to your computer will be recognized by Pro Tools. This is only the case with MIDI interfaces, not audio interfaces.