PT 11 with UAD Plugins - Need right information!

[aylavid]

Hello Professional engineers,

We have been having issue that using Universal audio plugins shows "Native" instead of DSP with PT 11. UA says it is not right. It should shows DSP and they can't figure out why our UAD plugins shows Native and working in CPU instead in DSP. Since UA couldn't figure out, we decided to ask here, other professional guys.

Please let us know what it should be and how we can fix it.

Info -
Mac OSX 10.8.5
Apollo QUAD2
PT 11.
Delay compensation is ON.

Appreciate your help,

A.Y.L

[mesaone]

Wait. So the plug-ins are actually being handled by the CPU, not by the Apollo?

I didn't realize this was even possible.

[Sam C]

Edit.....

[Southsidemusic]

Originally Posted by Sam C

I'm under the impression that if you turn off Console, at mix down for example, that Apollo no longer handles the plug ins.

I'm reading that wrong?

That can't be done here atleast. We can not turn off DSP from our Apollo Quad and Apollo 16 interfaces, the console have nothing to do with this and we only use the UA Console when we track Vocals, otherwise we use the plugins in PTHD11. You can see the DSP used by the plugins in the second app that installs with UA and that is usually 50-65% used DSP when we have 20+ UA plugins running

Christopher

[aylavid]

Thank you everyone.

We have been speaking to UA supporter, creating new empty project with UAD plugins and sent it them, but still result come same. Plugins upper right side, under the BYPASS says "Native". Doesn't this meaning working as Native/CPU?
We attached screen shot from this empty project on this post.

We have called Avid too. But as all know, basically they don't give you support except you pay. Even their own customers. We experienced Avid support is worst among many companies we deal with.
We believe that they should consider their own responsibility and moral concept in this society.
We never had this struggle getting just this basic information of usage using other DAWs and companies.

Is there anyone truly know what it is and give us answer instead of Avid company??

We are working on PT 11, project is 96 & 24bit. Right now buffer size is 2040 to not to overload CPU right now.

Appreciate your help,

A.Y.L

[Drew Mazurek]

Originally Posted by aylavid

Thank you everyone.

We have been speaking to UA supporter, creating new empty project with UAD plugins and sent it them, but still result come same. Plugins upper right side, under the BYPASS says "Native". Doesn't this meaning working as Native/CPU?
We attached screen shot from this empty project on this post.

We have called Avid too. But as all know, basically they don't give you support except you pay. Even their own customers. We experienced Avid support is worst among many companies we deal with.
We believe that they should consider their own responsibility and moral concept in this society.
We never had this struggle getting just this basic information of usage using other DAWs and companies.

Is there anyone truly know what it is and give us answer instead of Avid company??

We are working on PT 11, project is 96 & 24bit. Right now buffer size is 2040 to not to overload CPU right now.

Appreciate your help,

A.Y.L

UA's plugs are Native AAX "shells" that control UA's DSP on their cards (look in your plugin folder---all UA plugs are exactly the same size because the algorithm isn't really there). They have always been listed as Native in the GUI as they should be.

Not sure what the issue/question is??

[Cliffy_Boy]

They say Native because they don't use the Avid HDX card. They use the UAD chipset on the Apollo or UAD card. So pro tools doesn't see them as DSP but UAD does within their own framework.

This is the way it should be.

[Bill Denton]

Originally Posted by aylavid

Thank you everyone.

We have been speaking to UA supporter, creating new empty project with UAD plugins and sent it them, but still result come same. Plugins upper right side, under the BYPASS says "Native". Doesn't this meaning working as Native/CPU?
We attached screen shot from this empty project on this post.

We have called Avid too. But as all know, basically they don't give you support except you pay. Even their own customers. We experienced Avid support is worst among many companies we deal with.
We believe that they should consider their own responsibility and moral concept in this society.
We never had this struggle getting just this basic information of usage using other DAWs and companies.

Is there anyone truly know what it is and give us answer instead of Avid company??

We are working on PT 11, project is 96 & 24bit. Right now buffer size is 2040 to not to overload CPU right now.

Appreciate your help,

A.Y.L

First, there are no bugs...nothing is broken. I'll try to help you understand what's going on. You asked:

Doesn't this meaning working as Native/CPU?

The answer is No.

(This explanation is going to be simplified quite a bit)

First, let's take a look at the Pro Tools side of things. Pro Tools 11 only knows about two types of plugins:

• AAX DSP - Where the processing is done on HDX DSP cards. This is the only DSP that Pro Tools can be aware of.
• AAX Native - Where the processing is done with the computer's processor(s).

When Pro Tools scans your plugins at startup, among other things it is looking for an "indicator" in the plugin's code that tells PT if the plugin has AAX DSP code in it and if it has AAX Non-DSP code in it (some plugins can be DSP Only). Among other things, this information is used to build the plugin menus, where a plugin can be DSP, Native, or both.

When you add a plugin to a track, the track's audio is sent to the plugin, the plugin does its processing, and the plugin returns the audio. Also, when you instantiate a plugin, Pro Tools tells the plugin how you want it instantiated: DSP or Native.

When the plugin starts its processing, it determines if DSP was requested. If DSP was requested, the plugin determines if there is an HDX DSP card available. If an HDX DSP card is available, the plugin sends the audio to the HDX DSP card for processing. If there is not an HDX DSP card available and if the plugin contains Native code, the plugin will then send the audio to the Native code for processing using the computer's CPU; if it does not contain Native code, the plugin is simply bypassed.

Obviously, if an AAX Native plugin was selected, the audio is sent straight to the Native code for processing.

Recapping the Pro Tools stuff, only two types of plugins are recognized...AAX DSP, where the plugin's processing is done on the HDX card, and AAX Native for processing using the computer's CPU.

Now, let's look at the Universal Audio (UAD) stuff. First, some important facts...

• All of UAD's hardware for use with their software contains DSP chips, just as do the Pro Tools HDX cards.
• UAD's plugins require one or more pieces of UAD hardware to run on...a card, a Satellite, or an interface (Apollo, etc.).
• UAD's plugins use a proprietary format, they are not AAX or VST. They are in a format that will only run on UAD hardware.

Now, let's tie it all together...

• Pro Tools can only use AAX DSP or AAX Native plugins.
• UAD's plugins are not AAX DSP or AAX Native, they use UAD's proprietary plugin format.

So, how can we use UAD plugins with Pro Tools? Simple...UAD provides a "wrapper"* that looks like an AAX Native plugin to Pro Tools and that can also communicate with UAD's plugins.

But UAD's plugins are DSP plugins, so why doesn't the wrapper look like an AAX DSP plugin to Pro Tools?

Because the UAD plugins will not be using the HDX card for their DSP processing...the required UAD hardware will be doing the DSP processing.

Since Pro Tools only recognizes AAX HD and AAX Native plugins, and the UAD plugins will not be using any HDX hardware, the wrapper can only "present itself" as an AAX Native plugin. Which is why UAD plugins show up as AAX Native in Pro Tools.

Hope this clarifies things for you...

*UAD also provides a "wrapper" that will make UAD plugins look like VST plugins to DAWs that support that format, such as Cubase, Reaper, etc. And when a new plugin format comes along, UAD only needs to rewrite the "wrappers" instead of having to rewrite all of their plugins.

[huzzam]

You're confused by overlapping terms. The plugins are Native in the sense that they don't run on an HDX box, and instead their interface is handled like a Native AAX plugin. So ProTools shows it as a Native plugin, because in ProTools' "mind," the only choices are AAX Native or AAX HDX DSP. But the processing is done on the Apollo.

They shouldn't use any significant CPU power, just enough for the on-screen drawing of the plugin window.

~peter in Istanbul

[mesaone]

It's strange that UA support would be unaware of this.