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Asio

Started by ogs, July 18, 2011, 09:28:57 PM

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ogs

I use a Sound Devices USBPre2 to transfer vinyl to my PC. Sound Devices has released Asio drivers to enable recording/playback up to 24/192 in Windows (max 24/48 without Asio), bypassing much of Windows' sound degrading audio code. Is Asio support in VinylStudio "moving up" on the list of new features to be added soon?

Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)

Moving up, I guess.  However, it is wrong to say that the standard Windows USB audio drivers degrade the incoming audio.  That is simply not true.  The only problem is that the sample rate is limited.

ogs

I have not had the opportunity to compare asio vs non-asio recordings with the same setup so my claim for the built in drivers may certainly be wrong! The transfers I have done so far sounds very nice indeed. The USBPre2 is a audio class 2.0 device. MAC OS from 10.5.8 can address it up to 24/192. I would like to record at higher rates also in Windows and hope asio support is not too far away.

Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)

OK, we'll bump it up the list.

ogs


Jos van Eekelen

I'm relatively new to VS but the discussion is not quite clear to me. I'm using a Cakewalk UA1G with a Packard Bell netbook for recording, ASIO drivers installed. VS version 8.0.2. I set the recording options to FLAC/48 kHz/24 bits per sample since this seemed to be the best setting until I read about ASIO not being supported (yet). Nonetheless everything seems to work quite well. My question is how the UA1G settings and these in VS relate to each other?

ogs

24/48 is also the best I can get for my USBPre 2 with VS in Windows at the moment. This means that VS is talking to the sound card via Windows' drivers. 24/48 is the max supported resolution for the USB driver in Windows.

Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)

#7
Yes, I think that's right.  The manufacturers could probably provide their own, higher resolution driver but they don't seem to bother.

Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)

Hi folks,

There's now a beta-test version of VinylStudio which supports ASIO.  If you'd like to try it we'd be grateful.  You can get it from here:

http://www.alpinesoft.co.uk/VinylStudio/VSInstall_V8_20B1.exe

Please let us know how it goes.

ogs

Hi,

my USBPre 2 with Asio drivers is working fine for both recording with monitoring and playback. Sample rate switching is also working. I have not recorded a complete album with the beta version yet. I'll report back after that.
I need to have the usb device connected and running before I start VS. If I plug the USBPre while VS is running and then try to change device, VS will hang. I guess this is to be expected. I attach a screen shot of the USBPre 2 Asio applet.

Olav


Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)

Excellent, thank you.  I would not expect VinylStudio to hang under the conditions you describe.  It might be a shortcoming of the ASIO driver you are using.

ogs

Quote from: Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft) on October 12, 2011, 09:40:02 AM
Excellent, thank you.  I would not expect VinylStudio to hang under the conditions you describe. 

You are right, it does not hang any more. I can not reproduce the error, so VinylStudio and the USBPre 2 asio driver seems to be best of friends.  :)

Jos van Eekelen

Just tried it on a test system (UA-1G + Vista 32 bit, Toshiba laptop, recording @96 kHz/32 bits). Recording was ok but I did not get a signal back on the UA-1G, no playback signal. I'll do some more testing on the regular system later and report back.
BTW, thanks for implementing ASIO.

Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)

OK, thanks very much.  Please keep me posted.

Jos van Eekelen

I did some further testing on my regular system (Packard Bell netbook, W7 starter/32 bits, Cakewalk UA-1G, BS beta). Everything seems to work fine. Tried both 48 kHz and 96 kHz, both 24 bits and everything workes as expected. Same comment as ogs, Cakewalk/Roland advises to unplug/plugin the device after changing setting, this caused VS to hang but that's to be expected. A restart of VS cured that. Unplugging/plugging in of devices is not regular practice so I'm not surprised it causes some inconvenience.
BTW, the labeling of inputs of Asio device (IN and IN(R) could be a bit more unambiguous. I assume it means left and right respectively. Perhaps something for the final version.