M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Took the leap and bought a brand new M1 Mac Mini (Big Sur), installed iLok License Manager, installed Ravenna driver, and installed Dolby Atmos Renderer 3.7.0 and happy to report that all is working smoothly from ProTools to Renderer and back!

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Good to hear. I also have a fully loaded Apple Silicon Mac Mini and the only real culprits so far are video engine not working and sonnox pro codec not working in any format or standalone. Other minor annoyances with AIR virtual instruments and SoundToys AU plugins, but that is something I can live with for now.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Just a quick question. How are you connecting the renderer to PT? How many channels are you getting in and out of the renderer?

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

If you’re running PT and DAPS on the same machine then the Dolby Audio Bridge is the most efficient way to get audio to the Renderer. 130 channels. It’s a one way path only from PT to Renderer

Audio out from the Renderer is through your audio hardware interface. At least 12 channels minimum for 7.1.4.

If using headphones as well for Binaural monitoring or using any live re-renders then you’ll need more hardware outputs.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

I'm using Ravenna connecting 32 channels from my main PT system (on a 5,1 MacPro) over to the M1 running Production Suite, and then routing the main 7.1.4 output plus a live 2.0 re-render, and a binaural re-render over to Anubis (monitor controller) and then routed over to HORUS to feed main 7.1.4 speakers (Neumann KH120A), 2.1 monitors (ATC SCM20ASL) and headphones for Binaural.

I found out (although have not tested), after-the-fact, that you can only route 32 channels to the Production Suite version of the renderer. At some point, I'll upgrade Mastering Suite, but this is fine for now... I'm not doing crazy amounts of object stuff...

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Do some testing. It is possible to run a full 128 channels of audio into Dolby Atmos Production Suite, unless they changed something in 3.7. Pro Tools has also increased the coreaudio I/O coint to 64 channels in 2021.6 or later.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Are you using Dolby Audio Bridge as your playback engine in Pro Tools?

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

It wouldn’t be possible in his setup with a 5.1 Mac Pro running pro tools and an external renderer running on an M1 Mac mini.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Well, I'm running an external machine to run the renderer because I kinda hate the Dolby Bridge. Using it, means that you're unable to use any hardware inserts, can't do a last minute overdub, you have to make a substantial change in terms of IO when you go between tracking mode and mix mode, you have very limited ability to route audio around your system (of course ProTools will only support ONE playback engine device, meaning that you cannot choose one source for inputs and another for outputs unless you use a super-flaky aggregate setup), and if you're monitoring through the Dolby Bridge, it's very painful to do regular editing & mixing tasks with the round-trip path of the renderer to your monitoring system.. It's fine for learning, etc., but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find a single pro facility running the bridge in their Atmos mix room (unless it's a small suite...)


Anyhow, happy to report that M1 is rockin' for this task!

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

I would have thought the vast majority of Dolby Atmos content created in Pro Tools comes from DAPS and DAB. DAB certainly isn't perfect... but then again, either is the prospect of spending $14,000 on hardware to achieve pretty much an identical result in many cases.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

That sounds really exciting! May I ask how much ram and storage you decided that you needed to run DAPS on your M1 Mini?

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

I'm running the entry-level M1 Mac Mini, 8GB Ram, 256GB SSD... The thing is literally yawning... I might have to find more things for this computer to do around here...

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Just for clarification, the ONLY way you can get 128 channels into DAPS is using the DAB. If you want to work in an eco-system that is more pro audio friendly, unfortunately, you have to upgrade to the DAMS license - and apparently, it is NOT upgradable... (you have to buy DAMS from scratch) I'm using Ravenna network, with Merging Anubis as monitor controller, HORUS is my DA, and all of the routing is via ANeMan. Right now, I'm happy with 32 channels feeding the renderer, but eventually, I'll bump up my license...

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Can you clarify if you have tried selecting a 128 channel coreaudio device in DAPS? Unfortunately I only have a DAMS license on hand. A colleague has my DAPS license so I can't test it.

In versions previous to 3.7, there has been ZERO difference in the way DAMS and DAPS handles coreaudio I/O. They are exactly the same piece of software, and you could access the full 128 channels of Coreaudio I/O in both, regardless of whether it is the virtual DAB coreaudio sound card, an RME Madi FX, Dante PCIe-R card, or even an aggregate device with 128 channels of I/O. The only real difference between a DAMS and DAPS license has been that a DAMS license unlocks more of the speaker and control room functionality (Room EQ, speaker arrays, etc, etc) in the software. Other than that, DAMS and DAPS is exactly the same piece of software. They use exactly the same installer.

The limiting factor to hardware I/O has never been DAMS or DAPS. It has been Pro Tools. Versions prior to 2021.6 have a 32 channel limit on coreaudio I/O. You need HDX1 or HDN to get 64 physical I/O out of it. For 128 channels, you need HDX2. From version 2021.6 onwards, Avid increased the Coreaudio I/O limit to 64 channels, but you still need HDX2 minimum for 128 channels.

Like I said, I suspect a lot of people are delivering content using DAPS and DAB. Particularly if it is film work being done in the box. That is because of the hardware requirements for 128 channels in Pro Tools. Doing it through hardware becomes a $10,000+ investment just to access stuff like video sync peripherals...

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Well, if you already have Merging hardware (Hapi or Horus as DA) you just need Anubis ($2.5K monitor controller) there's zero cost other than a good QOS switch... The Ravenna/AES67 protocol is open, and at 48kHz you've got more than enough channels to do a full-on RMU-on-separate-machine setup.

I'll try yet again, but I'm quite sure than DAPS is ignoring incoming audio above 32 channels. I can see that the object metadata paths are connecting, but audio is not coming through above 32...

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

What version of Pro Tools are you using?

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

Really, it would be great if Avid could either make it possible to author Atmos content without DAMS (this seems to be the case with Nuendo, no?), or allowed Dolby Audio Bridge to be used in conjunction with the HD (native) playback engine.

Having to use a separate CoreAudio interface in order to be able to use hardware inserts and DSP in Pro Tools seems like a kludge.

I suppose there are the send/return plugins but from memory these had some issues with delay compensation?

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

It sounds like you're not running the current version of PT that allows 64 I/O through CoreAudio? The older versions will only use the first 32 channels even if your interface shows more available.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

It would be nice! I think Nuendo and Resolve only allow ADM creation directly within the DAW. For anything else it still needs a renderer.

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

You can export ADM from Pro Tools now though right? But you still need DAPS for monitoring. Does Nuendo handle monitoring as well?

Re: M1 Mac Mini running Atmos Renderer 3.7.0
 

I assume so. The Atmos panel in Nuendo looks pretty similar to DAPS. I've never used it though. I routinely use DAPS/DAMS standalone with .atmos files though, particularly now that it supports mp4 video encoding.