Focusrite Scarlet 18i20

[DonaldM]

Originally Posted by mattskii

Hi.

Only just had my attention drawn to this.

I’ve got a Scarlett 18i20 interface. However, it’s not stable on PT11 in that -6001 errors occur when moving between sessions of different bit rates. This might be an issue related to W7 or USB2, but I’m still not sure as the Focusrite help wasn't very helpful.

I eventually concluded that the cause was with the Focusrite drivers. The earlier version confines me to a 44.1. I can get above that with the current version (in scarlett-mixcontrol-1.8), but - as I've said - it's unstable. Their beta (in Scarlett MixControl-1.9b4) is dangerous. When it fails you need to do a complete deinstall of PT to make things work again.

The interface is, however, stable with PT10. It's also stable with Reaper.

Cheers,
Matthew.

Do you mean bit rate or sample rate? I think you're talking about sample rates. When switching sessions with different sample rates...44.1k to 48k, for example...there will be a hangup with Pro Tools. It is actually not a hardware issue per se, but has more to do with how PT "sees" the sample rates. It'd be nice if the sample rate would just adjust automatically to whatever the session rate happens to be, but, unfortunately that is not the case with most of the Focusrite interfaces.

Are you on Windows or Mac?

[StanleyAlexander]

Will this interface work by itself (no other hardware, Avid or otherwise) with Pro Tools 12?

(Mac OSX 10 Yosemite)

[Christian.Focusrite]

Hi Stanley,

Yes the Scarlett 18i20 will work with the standard version of Pro Tools 12 without any other hardware needed.

[StanleyAlexander]

Thanks!

[Amack]

The control panel for my Scarlett 6i6 (Scarlett MixContol 1.8.128.0) and its Windows Driver (2.5.1 API 3.0) aren't really compatible with Pro Tools 12. Pro Tools requires audio buffer sizes of 32,64,128,256,512,1024, or 2048 Samples. The 6i6's only options are 1,2,...,20 ms (milliseconds).

I've been very happy with my Roland Studio Capture. It's performance likely meets or exceeds that of Avid's HD IO at <1/5 the cost. As you can see from my post #26 on http://duc.avid.com/showthread.php?t=365403&page=3, Pro Tools can even correct for its loop back recording latencies to within 1 sample! I think you'd be much better off with it, the OctaCapture, or similar device from that family of products.

Originally Posted by StanleyAlexander

Thanks!

[mesaone]

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/...-interface-pc/

[Amack]

Too bad that doesn't work!

Originally Posted by mesaone

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/...-interface-pc/

[Amack]

mesaone,

When you learn of bugs/inadequacies in Pro Tools, do you notify appropriate people at Avid to get them properly addressed/corrected? If not, how does one go about doing so?

Respectfully,
Amack

Originally Posted by mesaone

http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/...-interface-pc/

[mesaone]

Originally Posted by Amack

mesaone,

When you learn of bugs/inadequacies in Pro Tools, do you notify appropriate people at Avid to get them properly addressed/corrected? If not, how does one go about doing so?

Respectfully,
Amack

Email and IdeaScale. But the problem you're experiencing with buffer sizes in your interface control panel is a Focusrite problem, so you should contact them.

[Amack]

Mesaone,

So you don’t ever forward information to Avid regarding potential problems or suggested improvements? Email to whom? This IdeaScale https://ideascale.com/ ?

You don’t think that Pro Tools’ supported buffer size limitations are antiquated, overly restrictive, and preclude proper operation with numerous ASIO devices (Focusrite and Roland TD-15 in particular)? In addition, you think this in spite of the fact that other much less expensive DAWs properly support all of those devices and buffer sizes? Note that Roland’s Studio Capture offers buffer sizes of 32, 48, 64, 96, 128, 192, 256, 384, 512, 768, 1024, 1536, 2048, 4096, and 8192 samples. Unfortunately, their TD-15 only offers buffer sizes of 96, 144, 192, 288, 384, 432, 576, 864, 960, and 1440 samples – none of which are supported by Pro Tools – which may be why it won’t work with Pro Tools.

If you believe all this, don’t you think that Avid should at least inform audio interface device manufacturers that they need to offer buffer sizes consistent with those supported by Pro Tools (32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, and 2048 samples)? You don’t think that all of the problems associated with software crashes/hangs, as well as switching audio devices, sample rates, and buffer sizes in Pro Tools (all virtually non-existent in the other DAWs I’ve tried) warrants improvement?

Do you feel that you are in a position to make these determinations for Avid? Why are you making this so hard for me?

FYI - the attachment provides a comparison of the audio preferences displays from Reason8, Ableton Lite 9 Live, and Pro Tools.

Amack

Originally Posted by mesaone

Email and IdeaScale. But the problem you're experiencing with buffer sizes in your interface control panel is a Focusrite problem, so you should contact them.