Axe Fx II Direct with USB to Mac/PC: The right way to set up everything?

TheTrooper

TheTrooper

Inspired
It's a question that's been picking my mind a lot.
What are the parameteres (both on the Axe Fx I/O page and on whatever DAW) to look for and how to set them up the best way?
Running direct into my Macbook with Cubase, I get 2.6ms input latency and 2.9ms output latency (enough to throw me off when playing) wih buffer size to 32 (lowest possible)
How to get near-to-zero latency? (It is actually possible?)

What is for You guys the right way to record with No latency?
I'm open to any advice
 
1ms delay is roughly the time it takes sound to travel 1 foot in air. So you have a latency delay equivalent to standing 6 foot from a speaker. Does that really throw you off playing? It's a pretty low latency for a DAW setup.
 
What blaggers said. If 6 ms of latency throws you off, you'll never be able to play a live gig, even with a traditional tube amp.
 
Ok, i wrote that completely wrong, i just realized.
What i was trying to say is:
I Have my Axe going Direct with xlr to my monitors, and it works perfectly when not recording; when recording direct with usb i Have the Axe set up both ad inputs and outputs ( what i'm playing in the DAW fora back to the Axe and i can controll the overall volume with the Axe output knob, but that creates latency obviously, and I'm not reamping and Have no use for that) but i want what i am playing with the guitar going out of the Axe to the monitors without going to the daw and back again to the Axe.
The question is how do i do that?
Can't i plug my monitors into the Mac with the 3,5mm jack and play the backing track in the daw so i can play along with it and muting the track in recording with the Axe so the sound goes straight from the Axe to the monitors without regoing again to the Axe?
 
Have set my buffer size to 256 in Logic Pro X. When I record I activate the low latency mode which really works great for me...no noticeable latency. For mixing and mastering I then turn off the low latency mode.
Don't know whether cubase has a similar feature...
Sorry, am not at home right now so I can't provide information on my actual latency.
 
At home I use a small pa for monitoring. the axe fx xlr conecters are connected to a mixer. When recording through usb using the axe fx as a sound card, I mute the level of the track I am recording and only monitor this track from the axe fx through the pa while playing along with the recorded tracks and never notice the latency. If you try to monitor the currently recording track you will.
 
TheTrooper said:
Ok, i wrote that completely wrong, i just realized.
What i was trying to say is:
I Have my Axe going Direct with xlr to my monitors, and it works perfectly when not recording; when recording direct with usb i Have the Axe set up both ad inputs and outputs ( what i'm playing in the DAW fora back to the Axe and i can controll the overall volume with the Axe output knob, but that creates latency obviously, and I'm not reamping and Have no use for that) but i want what i am playing with the guitar going out of the Axe to the monitors without going to the daw and back again to the Axe.
The question is how do i do that?
Can't i plug my monitors into the Mac with the 3,5mm jack and play the backing track in the daw so i can play along with it and muting the track in recording with the Axe so the sound goes straight from the Axe to the monitors without regoing again to the Axe?
Click to expand...
Ahh ...I think I got your question now...you will have to set up an aggregate device in your Mac...google for instructions how to set up an aggregate device for the Mac. Tried this and you can achieve the desired set-up with that.
 
paranoid said:
At home I use a small pa for monitoring. the axe fx xlr conecters are connected to a mixer. When recording through usb using the axe fx as a sound card, I mute the level of the track I am recording and only monitor this track from the axe fx through the pa while playing along with the recorded tracks and never notice the latency. If you try to monitor the currently recording track you will.
Click to expand...
Ok, but You are using and external mixer.
I have Axe--->Monitors (thru XLRs)
Axe----> Mac (Thru USB)
The thing with the USB is that the Axe is both input and output, so what the DAW is recording (both the backing track in it ant the actual sound from the Axe) is feeding again back to the Axe, and that let me adjust the overall volume with the Output 1 knob, but that creates real latency, not displayed in any menu. The latency i was talking before isn't the one that give me problems.
Wolfenstein98k said:
Yeah, you're being too academic about it. You cannot hear 3ms.
Click to expand...
I'm not being too academic, I just wrote wrong what I was trying to say.
lj045637 said:
Ahh ...I think I got your question now...you will have to set up an aggregate device in your Mac...google for instructions how to set up an aggregate device for the Mac. Tried this and you can achieve the desired set-up with that.
Click to expand...
Ok, that's cool, but what aggregate device should I pick?
Axe Fx (not likely) or just the direct audio of the Mac (3,5mm jack, or whaterver name is displayed)?
 
You should be able to setup the aggregate device in your Mac, and then select this as your audio device in Cubase, then hopefully Cubase will let you select the ins/outs from that. Well, that's how Logic works so I am not sure if it will work for Cubase. Try to google on this subject and I am sure you will find some useful advice how to set it up.
 
lj045637 said:
You should be able to setup the aggregate device in your Mac, and then select this as your audio device in Cubase, then hopefully Cubase will let you select the ins/outs from that. Well, that's how Logic works so I am not sure if it will work for Cubase. Try to google on this subject and I am sure you will find some useful advice how to set it up.
Click to expand...
Actually I think is that what i'm trying to achieve: "When the Axe-Fx II is connected to a DAW through USB, you're using monitors connected to the Axe-Fx and you're recording, you may want to monitor just the DAW signal, not the signal from the Axe-Fx. To accomplish this, turn down the preset level. Or set USB/Digi Out Source to Out 2, then route the guitar to FXL only."

How do I route the guitar to FXL only?
 
Aggregate device is not helping in any way, could someone that use the Axe Fx direct with USB share his parameters in I/O settings?
 
Ok, what I ended up thinking was "I'm just paranoied on that thing" but, hey, I'm not.
Whatever You say, whatever They say, If You go direct with USB into whatever MAC/PC, thru the DAW, back to the Axe Fx and then out to the monitors, even if You go direct Axe----> Monitors (with XLRs) You get some kind of latency; deal with it.
Anybody who says it's not the case, doesn't know what he's talking about.
I'm getting and audio interface, and if You want No Latency (for real) You should too, instead of going direct USB.
;)
 
There will still be latency with an Interface. if you listen to the live playing and the recording at the same time it will be there. I do use a mixer but that is only being fed from the axe xlr's just as you. my mixer is feeding a pa system. if you stand very far from your speakers you will hear latency, all you can do is try to limit it to an amount you wont notice.
 
paranoid said:
There will still be latency with an Interface. if you listen to the live playing and the recording at the same time it will be there. I do use a mixer but that is only being fed from the axe xlr's just as you. my mixer is feeding a pa system. if you stand very far from your speakers you will hear latency, all you can do is try to limit it to an amount you wont notice.
Click to expand...
Yes, but I'm aiming at audio interfaces with direct monitoring ;)
 
Something like the UAD Apollo let's you monitor from the hardware vs. the DAW in realtime with zero latency.

What I do in Pro Tools 12.5 is setup for input monitoring and mute the track. That way I'm only hearing the live input and not both the live input and the track output. Works great.
 
barhrecords said:
Something like the UAD Apollo let's you monitor from the hardware vs. the DAW in realtime with zero latency.

What I do in Pro Tools 12.5 is setup for input monitoring and mute the track. That way I'm only hearing the live input and not both the live input and the track output. Works great.
Click to expand...
Yeah exactly!
But to do that You need an external interface with direct monitoring (Focusrite, Zoom, M.Audio, Universal Audio....)
Doing it USB with the Axe it's not the best way, for me at least, because even with a super PC/Mac (laptop) it's still not as good as using and external interface.
 
TheTrooper said:
Yeah exactly!
But to do that You need an external interface with direct monitoring (Focusrite, Zoom, M.Audio, Universal Audio....)
Doing it USB with the Axe it's not the best way, for me at least, because even with a super PC/Mac (laptop) it's still not as good as using and external interface.
Click to expand...

I get very very little latency recording via USB this way in Pro Tools. Very usable with the Fractal as the audio interface.
 
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