Delay Compensation value with UAD

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by saspro

H----
Similar question here....I just received a free UAD-2 QuadCore PCIe card and my first UA plugs with my purchase of the outboard UAD 4-ch tube preamp. I run an HDX system, so when live tracking I like to use some channel strip plugs. I have to use DSP plugs as Native plugs are unavailable when recording. But the only DSP plugs I own are the stock Digi stuff and some Metric Halo, which are serviceable but not special.
I was eager to see if somehow my new UA plugs could be used in UA’s LiveTrack Mode, in hopes they could replace my DSP plugs. But, there’s really no way, is there, as all these UA plugs are Native, and any Native plug is forced into bypass when in record mode?

MacPro 5,1 OS 10.12
PT 12.8.3 HDX 16ch A/D interface

You can force a native plugin to be available by inserting it after any HDX/DSP plugin.

But oh why are you trying to do any of this? You have a low-latency HDX system and you are adding inherently high-latency UAD hardware to it (the complete opposite of HDX) and want to replace the HDX plugins with UAD plugins for tracking, this makes no sense. Use the UAD plugins for mixing.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by Becharax

How do we adjust the ADC in Pro Tools to make up for the latency in the UAD Plugins ?

You turn ADC on, it works. The A stands for Automatic, there should be nothing to adjust. If things are not working for you need to troubleshoot, and if after help on DUC need to describe what is happening. Starting with the ADC latency on relevant tracks that is reported by Pro Tools and the latency you measure. Most “problems” with ADC are likely users getting themselves confused with complex signal paths, ADC just not being turned on, or very rarely plugins reporting incorrect latency. And occasionally folks confusing what ADC does, e.g. vs. record pass correction in Pro Tools Ultimate.

If you have incorrect plugin ADC correction on a track you use the +/- adjustment described in the section on ADC in the Pro Tools Reference Guide,

[Becharax]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

You turn ADC on, it works. The A stands for Automatic, there should be nothing to adjust. If things are not working for you need to troubleshoot, and if after help on DUC need to describe what is happening. Starting with the ADC latency on relevant tracks that is reported by Pro Tools and the latency you measure. Most “problems” with ADC are likely users getting themselves confused with complex signal paths, ADC just not being turned on, or very rarely plugins reporting incorrect latency. And occasionally folks confusing what ADC does, e.g. vs. record pass correction in Pro Tools Ultimate.

If you have incorrect plugin ADC correction on a track you use the +/- adjustment described in the section on ADC in the Pro Tools Reference Guide,

Darryl ... ADC is ON ... I am having issues with UAD Plugins only when it comes to delay compensation in Pro Tools ... say for example when i insert a distressor plugin on any channel this specific channel will become out of sync compared to the rest of the project ... I don't know how to compensate by adding +- ... why should i do it manually ? shouldn't it be AUTOMATIC ?
When I work in Logic i just throw any plugin on any channel and i don't even bother to look or adjust anything to keep the track in sync with the project .. can you elaborate ?

[danyg]

Becharax,
I work in Logic and PT. ADC behaves basically the same.

...in hopes they could replace my DSP plugs. But, there’s really no way, is there, as all these UA plugs are Native, and any Native plug is forced into bypass when in record mode

UAD has always been for mixing. Now they want to sell their interfaces ... where you can use the plugins for tracking

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by Becharax

Darryl ... ADC is ON ... I am having issues with UAD Plugins only when it comes to delay compensation in Pro Tools ... say for example when i insert a distressor plugin on any channel this specific channel will become out of sync compared to the rest of the project ... I don't know how to compensate by adding +- ... why should i do it manually ? shouldn't it be AUTOMATIC ?
When I work in Logic i just throw any plugin on any channel and i don't even bother to look or adjust anything to keep the track in sync with the project .. can you elaborate ?

Yes I get it’s not working for you. Just saying that over and over here is not going to have somebody else magically guess what is going on/what you are doing in this session. You need to troubleshoot and/or describe what you are doing in much more detail (starting with what are the ADC numbers displayed by Pro Tools, does the ADC number color coding tell you Pro Tools even thinks it is compensating OK for the delays). I already mentioned routing issues can cause problems (just as they can in Logic and all other DAWs)... having a signal routing path that is just logically impossible to compensate for. Start with a trivial session and play and see if ADC does what it should.

Why manually adjust stuff? I already said plugins might possibly report incorrect latency (the distressor plugin should report correctly). And manually adjusting things can be a useful trobleshooting tool to work out what is going on. If you are saying you don’t know how to actually adjust the latency you need to read the Pro Tools ADC documentation, it’s pretty worrying that you have not done that already. UAD also has good documentation on their plugin latency, you should see ADC comp numbers that match the sample delay numbers they give. (Plus the IO buffer latency, already well mentioned in this thread).

The distressor is not a high latency plugin, it should have 55-88 sample delay depending on sample rate, in addition to IO buffer latency... you should be comparing those specs to what you see, starting in a simple test sessions.