Monitoring Question for the Pros...

cosmo wrote on 5/10/2005, 7:32 AM

Maybe Pipeline or one of the other geniuses can help me here. With all of the talk I've seen about latency, I thought this may be a good place to pose this question. I have searched for an answer to no avail.

I'm a little confused about the buffer size number and then the 'ms' number. The reason for my confusion is that my audio interfaces have their setting in 'samples' - 56, 128, 256, 512 etc. I'm curious how many milleseconds of latency I'm getting if set to 512 or 256 or whatever.

Also confusing me is that if I monitor with my Tascam FW-1884 audio interface(as opposed to a pci card interface) - I get zero-latency no matter what setting I choose. Tascam info says if "you monitor through the board, you'll have zero latency". So that explains that. I didn't know it was possible to monitor through something besides the software???? So if I always use the 1884 interface, I can jack that setting up to 1024 samples and have my CPU load hit the floor, and have no latency???? Seems to good to be true...

I know this is elementary stuff but apparently I never really learned what the deal is and I can't find any good info about it online.

Thanks!

Comments

drbam wrote on 5/10/2005, 7:39 AM

I monitor with an analog console to avoid latency completely, and also to insert some outboard efx. Its also extremely fast if I want to check something out or experiment a bit.

drbam

James Young wrote on 5/10/2005, 8:23 AM

You are correct, monitor through your hardware/interface and you'll have no latency.

The buffer size has a relation to the latency, but it'll be different depending on your system and their components. If you've ever tried to monitor through Vegas's Input-Monitoring you'll likely notice a severe delay and that's partly due to Vegas not being up-to-date to today's standards (ASIO DM). For some of us it's a big deal, but if you are finding a way that works for you, stick to it, all is fine.

cosmo wrote on 5/10/2005, 9:02 AM

Thanks for the replies. Well, I've pulled off software monitoring before with low latency. I guess I just didn't know I could pull off the hardware monitoring with my setup.

Still no info on how the numbers I see as settings, correspong to the millisecond numbers people report for latency. Any light to be shed?

Wait...just found what looks to be a good article on this.
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/apr99/articles/letency.htm

MarkWWW wrote on 5/10/2005, 11:49 AM

The latency that corresponds to a particular buffer size depends on the sampling rate you are working at.

Say you are working at 44.1kHz and have a buffer size of 256 samples selected. Then the latency will be:

256/44100 sec = 5.8 ms (which would often be rounded to 6 ms).

The latency at 48kHz is very similar to the the latency at 44.1kHz:

256/48000 sec = 5.33 ms.

But if you are working at another sampling rate then the latency would be different. For example, using the same 256 sample buffer size, but working at 96kHz, the latency would be:

256/96000 sec = 2.67 ms (which would typically be rounded to 3 ms).

Mark

bgc wrote on 5/10/2005, 1:44 PM

I also monitor through a console so I get no latency issues.
Of course I can't monitor plugin effects in real time, but since not all plugins work well in real-time monitoring, I get by with external gear.
B.

cosmo wrote on 5/10/2005, 2:24 PM

Thanks Mark - that was what I was looking for.

PipelineAudio wrote on 5/10/2005, 5:03 PM

I monitor through RME's total mix, so I can have latency free monitoring. It sucks though, just as monitoring through a console, you need to make one mix in vegas, and another mix on your monitoring system, what a pain in the but!

Tomorrow I am going to set up 24 output busses in Vegas, and monitor through total mix with 1:1 input to output routing matrix, and also assign vegas output bues to the same numbers.

Then the digital outs of my RME cards will be going to 48 channels into the adat inputs of this Yamaha DM2000 here that I am trying to learn. Might work well we will see.

cosmo wrote on 5/10/2005, 9:29 PM

sweet. let us know how that goes.

wobblyboy wrote on 6/5/2005, 11:34 AM

I only monitor directly through mixing board when recording. I monitor directly from computer during mixing and add all effects etc. at that time. I only use outboard effects for studio monitor for musicians if they need it to be happy with monitor sound during recording. That way I never experience any latency.

PipelineAudio wrote on 6/5/2005, 12:45 PM

gave the DM2000 a try, running 24 busses ( 48 channels) out of vegas into the dm2000

Pretty cool!

Easy to insert other junk for mixing, but I really believe vegas' stock channel eq and comp are better than the yamaha ones. I need more time to futz with it to be sure

wobblyboy wrote on 7/6/2005, 10:05 AM

If you have a mixer then you don't have to worry about latency. Unless you are carrying around a laptop to record with and you have space, it is just a good idea to use a mixer. You can buy a Berringer 32 track with 8 sub out for about $600.