MIDI MAPPING D8B & HUI

[kjeneson]

Hi all,
my first post on the forum and im looking for some help.

I have owned my mackie d8b for about 3 months now it runs 5.1 has 3x apogee ADAT cards, apogee adat clock card as well as original clock and midi breakout cable. Im running this alongside a presonus light pipe so i can get the full I/O through Logic 9. Bought for £650 which i thought was a bargain but I have problems........

1> I have setup midi time code so the display and transport works correctly on the D8B (woop woop) However i cannot get the jog wheel to function... any advice?

2> Im trying to MIDI map the console so I can control fader, solo, rec ready mute and pan functions on my tape in layer.
so for example im trying to get fader 25 to control fader 1 in logic and so on. However when i try and MIDI learn in logic my fader seems to control the pan level no matter what I do on the D8B or Logic?

3> Clocking. I have a apogee card in the D8B with clock cable running to the presonus and everything appears to work record and playback fine. However my D8B is set to internal clock and so is my presonus. This cannot be right surely... I thought the Presonus would be the slave to the apogee card in the d8b? If i change either to external i get burst of static and meters going crazy any advice?

Reaching my the end of frustration with the board which is a shame as i love it.

My objective is to run all signals back out from logic after plugins etc...... into whatever grouping on my tape in layer and setup the mix levels i.e pan and faders on D8B board and have this reflected in logic. Does this make sence.

Any advice on other possible workflows much appreciated.

Kris

[Badbass780]

I got the d8b with the same thing in mind. Evidently, Mackie did not plan for the d8b to function this way. You can't do what to you intend to yet for a few reasons.
1) You can setup a custom controller for Logic to read your MIDI messages sent from the d8b when you're in the "Tape" bank, but no messages will be sent back to the mixer moving the faders, encoders, etc. This is because it requires the "feedback" checkbox to be checked in control surface setup for your custom device, which Apple has conveniently deactivated.

2) It also can't work in HUI mode because the d8b brain deactivates the first 16 channel strips, so they don't send MIDI messages.

3) Even though HUI mode let you control everything in Logic, the d8b doesn't let you custom map every function thru every controller.

It seems that both Mackie and Apple have gone through the extra trouble of creating limitations on the compatibility and expansion of these two devices. Why? Your guess is good as mine. All the hardware is there, all it requires is a programming update. Perhaps a good enough programmer could hack the software of the d8b and Logic, but it would require the source code (knowledge of C+ and Objective C+).

Meanwhile, go to the thread by Marc Girard (24 fader controller w/o midi), he's figured out another way.

As for th clocking, I use the d8b clock as the master and slave the Mac to it thru the preferences (I use an M-Audio Lightbridge).

Questions?

[kjeneson]

thanks for reply,
I guess i will have to forget about that plan..........
So im not sure if the d8b will benefit my workflow now - after recording i was planning to use fader levels panning etc from the tape returns for the final mix..... is there a way i can still do this by routing the master output back to logic ???
I can then use this stereo mixdown for my mastering???
any workflow advice much appreciated.

[NigelC]

I will just chime in here. If you ONLY want to use a control surface with Logic then until Marc has finished his D8B MKII project you are out of luck. MIDI Mapping is possible but its fraught with issues.

I run Logic, a D8B with 5.1 using HUI and it does actually work quite well. Yes its only 8 channels at a time but you can easily access more by banking or using the down arrow in the Logic Arrange window to view a selected channel.

Here is what I have done. I bought an RME RayDat card http://www.rme-audio.de/en_products_hdspe_raydat.php for my Mac. It adds 36 ADAT I/O to the Mac and I have connected the 24 Tape faders on the D8B to run out of my Audio tracks in Logic and use plugins and EQ on them before they go back into the D8B which just sets fader and pan.

I use my 1-24 faders for external hardware such as sound modules etc and HUI for my VIs. Everything is mastered to a 2 channel output that I feed back to Logic via an SPDIF from the D8B to my audio interface (incidentally the RayDat has MIDI I/O and SPDIF as well).

[kjeneson]

Thanks for the insight.

I would really like to stick with the gear ive got

one question i have a presonus light pipe 32 channel ADAT only and the d8b is fully expanded with apogee adat x4 , so cannot use spdif unfortunately as you described. to get round this can i :

A> route the stereo bus within the mixer (post d8b fader levels, d8b eq etc..........) back to logic using exsisting I/O?

or

b> buy a SPDIF interface??? And do what you described.

This is what im after essentially using the desk to mix the signals and bounce down to logic for mastering......

: >

[NigelC]

I asked this question a while ago and Casey Pittman and Dan Worley gave this answer: Assign all the tracks in the mix to a buss output pair (there's a handy feature for that in v5.1) and assign those busses directly to a pair of tape outputs (making sure this is routed to one of the ADAT cards.

Alternatively seeing as you have a spare ADAT on your presonus you could use an M-Audio CO2 http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/CO2.html which can convert between optical and coax S/PDIF (I suspect it will read channels 1-2 of the 8 available only as optical S/PDIF is a stereo signal only whereas ADAT is 8 channel).

On your clock woes, you can clock from ADAT. I suspect your lightpipe can be set to read its clock from one of the ADAT connections between it and the D8B. Also make sure its got the same clock rate as the D8B.

[Guido]

Hi,
Sorry to get here so late..train across path!^^

First let me say thanks to whoever is responible for this great resource,this site, dedicated to a great board.imho^^

I have my d8b now since V2^^ {i use to lurk on the old d8b board} and have been on a mission from God to intergrate it with my DAW. not from a audio perspective {all cool on that front} but since V5.1 hui as a hui controller. My daw at the time was logic 6.4.3 and then 7.1 and then i went to Reaper.No laughing!^^

Anywho my prob at the time was trying to use the learn in logic with d8b..no go as u guys have noted...since 2007 i have been trying off and on .....well now there is hope!

I purchased midi translator pro and in 24 hrs i had almost all my d8b buttons mapped. The thing with the hui spec is that there are multiple midi commands..usually 2... for every button press/release. All daws I i have used..Logic mac and Reaper PC cant deal with it. Since MTPro vers1.6.3 [i think}, it has had the ability to learn a multiple message ..say CC#x ..CC#vv for one button push and send..get this...a midi message {one that logic,or any daw for that matter,can understand} or a key command...like u pressed ur computer keyboard...mouse position...more..YAY!

Now i have nothing to do with bomes,and was pissed i had to shell out 59 euros..but for me totally worth it. I would be happy to share my MTP preset , although its dead simple for anyone to do straight translations of midi to..whatever!^^

I look forward to learn more about khorus d8bmkII project also..just wanted to say hi..and..look what I found!!!^^ And Im sorry if i have broken any etiquette with how big the pic is..I am sorry , Im an old guy with crappy internet skillz^^

Guido