FOCUSRITE LIQUID MIX with PRO TOOLS

[southboundloco]

hey guys!

has anybody tried using the liquid mix with pro tools? how do u use it with pro tools and how about latency, at the website it says that it can be used as an RTAS plugin but how bout latency?... anyweyz any input is appreciated.

cheers

[dillon99999]

you will have latency - due to the firewire and the time it takes to travel back and forth to the device.

the UAD-1 has the same issue.

the TC Powercore will also experience the same problem.

Pro Tools M-Powered does not have ADC (Automatic Delay Compensation) - and that is why there is no real solution at this point regarding the latency issue.

if use the Liquid Mix for MIXDOWN (or MASTERING) only, you won't have to worry about latency.

it is only a concern when you are "tracking", as the latency of the device is prohibitive for doing vocals and guitar tracks, etc.

hope this helps.

[southboundloco]

i was reading about it on the net and i read somewhere that each instance of the plug has 1000+ samples of latency...so during mixdown i guess the solution would be to nudge things around so as to keep all the regions in time. am lookin at purchasing UAD-1 but i guess it still gonna be the same issue...

[dillon99999]

for the UAD-1, you use the "Delay Compensation" plugin on EVERY TRACK that DOESN'T HAVE a UAD plugin on it.

this keeps the tracks aligned correctly without having to nudge them.

i don't know what the liquid mix or powercore uses to do this task - but i imagine they have the same thing for them.

[Brent1515]

1056 sample firewire delay. Leaves it out for tracking as was said here.
I run Liquid Mix all the way across just as if PT were a traditional mixer. LM runs from its own processor, so 32 channels of EQ/compression and the CPU hardly blinks. In a way, it becomes its own delay compensation and you can leave LM switched out on specific channels while inserting native plugins behind it, too.
And, of course if there's channels where LM isn't inserted, those can be sent via a bus as a stereo sub mix. That way you can get away with using far fewer PT delay compensation plugs.

Brent

[southboundloco]

i am leaning towards buying the UAD-1 coz its got reverb included in it but i was just wondering if i use for example a liquid mix plugin wich has delay (obviously) on an auxilliary bus when submixing for example the kick...do u have to nudge all the kick track? so as to compensate for the delay or is it all right as long as its on an auxilliary? the main reason for this question is, i want the DSP card(if i finally decide to buy one)to handle all of my reverb needs(send /return style of mixing)to take the load off of my CPU(my 4.2 AMD dual core can easily handle compressors and EQ's but when i have 3-4 instances of convolution reverbs+couple of normal reverbs it struggles). but if i have to manually nudge all the tracks that i send to the reverb unit then i'd rather invest on buying a more powerful CPU like a 4.8 dual core or something.

anyweyz, what do u guys reckon?

[Brent1515]

Humm, if I understand what you'd like to do; If you use a single instance of LM on your kick persay, aux, insert, where ever, you'll have a 1056 sample delay on it. Used like this, since the kick would be delayed, all other tracks would have to be nudged ahead by 1056 samples to get them back in line with the kick.
Brent

[southboundloco]

oh ok...just as i thought, damn not having delay compensation really really sux, i wonder when digi's gonna wake up and have this feature put on, its what their customers want and need for ages now why cant they hear us out...i guess i'll just have to get myself a more powerful processor

[EvilElfBoy]

Actually brent has it a bit confused, you have a few different options. If per your example there is a 1054 sample delay on a track, you can either nudge the track that the plug-in is on AHEAD by that amount, so it will line up with the rest of the tracks. OR use a time adjuster on all the other tracks and delay them by that amount, or nudge them that sample length BEHIND, so then they all play at the same time. It's really not as hard as you might think.

[southboundloco]

yeah that could be done, but imagine this scenario...i usually mix like 30-40 audio tracks and heaps if not all of my auxilliaries in a session, then u have about lets say 4 instances of different reverbs right(lets say those reverbs are UAD's which have 1000+ samples of delay)? all my fx are done via send return style of mixing. if i have 3 kick tracks and am gonna use 1 for triggering the gate(digi gate) on the kick submix bus which induces 88 samples of delay, so i have to nudge it +88 +80 (80 because am using that kick track to trigger the gate on the kick submix bus 80 samples in advance to let the transients in)then i have to nudge the remaining 2 kick tracks by 88 samples... but then i'd send the kick submix to a long plate reverb(lets say a UAD1 reverb) so then i have to nudge it again by 1000+ samples. so thats for the kick, thats easy enough...but then the snares come along and am gonna use 2-3 kinds of reverb on it so how many times do i nudge it...then comes the guitars which is sent to a delay unit but then the delays are send to a reverb unit then the backing vocals comes along then vocals then all the extra stuff so it becomes a nudging nightmare don't u think? u'll proly spend more time calculating how many samples u have to nudge tracks than mixing and u have 32 upwards of tracks to nudge ti get evrything in time...