Another dumb question. Can I use my i/o interface with Win Media Player?

You can't annoy anyone. Its not in your makeup.

You can use it for anything you want. I don't recommend using a great audio interface for it but you can. Many do.

I have my on-board realtech chip hooked up to its own set of speakers. It is the default for windows.

You go to audio devices in the control panel and select it as your default audio device. Remember if its not on you wont hear anything. This means it and your good monitors will need to be on all the time when ever your computer is on.

WMP uses what ever is the default audio device.

So it seems the Layla is already the default in that menu but it's saying "analog out 1-8" so I'm not sure if I can just hook up to analog 1 and 2 and get a stereo signal from WMP. Might just have to get into the Layla mixer and set output to those channels if not (those are my outputs in sonar)... or perhaps it'll be weirder than that. I do see "digital out 1-2" but that's probably for the optical out or whatever so I don't think that's the right option. I also have some Realtek outputs listed. Interesting stuff anyway. I'll see what I can get happening tonight. One thing that would be REALLY cool IMO is if Cakewalk had a Winamp style player that could work with X1 or at least default to its settings so we could create libraries and stuff to playback without having to mess around with our set up. Maybe something like that already exists. If it does... I would be interested in plonking some dough for it.

where have you found these recommendations to disable the onboard audio device?
..you should of course have them disabled in sonar and in other audio editing software, but you don't need to disable it completely (in windows, i mean)

a) Is this possible (to use i/o interface) with WMP? 
    yes, absolutely. (what audio interface do you have?)          

b) Is this a really bad idea? 
    the thing is that you can get problems, for example if you start sonar and have
    WMP open at the same time. you can set sonar to share the drivers with other
    programs, but it's better to only let sonar (or any serius audio program) have
    access to your "real" audio interface, and let media-programs play around with,
    for example, the motherboard's onboard audio device.

    if you're still using  Layla 3G, you can let the onboard audio device playback
    through Layla by connecting the onboard output to, for example, Layla's line input 7-8.
    by doing this you can have WMP (windows default playback device) set to the onboard
     audio interface and still listen to it, via the monitors connected to Layla.

c) Where would I find those settings?
    the settings for the default audio device in windows 7 (that WMP uses)
    you'll find if you right click the speaker in the status bar and choose "playback devices"

d) Although I'd rather not introduce another program to the system, if it is absolutely necessary what, preferably free, music players should I look at?
    it's not MWP that's the problem, so you can keep it :)


e) Am I annoying you guys yet? :-p
     you're not even close.. :)

Its on sale for $20.

It very may have come with Pro Suite. Don't know though.

Oh yeah... 20 bones is nothin'. I'm gonna poke around and see if it was included in the Suite though before I start trying to rip stuff to WMP or buying Pyro. Have any of you guys used Pyro?

Loptec your answer should be a sticky. Its that good!

I wanted to add that stuff but I didn't want to confuse the situation any more than I already have. Nor could I have been as complete in trying to be that informative.

Well done. I concur with every point you made.

Bah! It's gonna be a pain paying for the download. I think I'm just gonna work with WMP for now and see if my retailer has a boxed version of Pyro.

Oh and I'm sure if I just crammed the monitors into 7/8 I'd get signal... just a weird thingy.

Hi, mudgel. How are ya? I'll check the driver/bit/samplerate stuff next time I open X1 to make sure nothing wacky happened. Thanks for bringing it up. Also once I get the new i/o and make sure everything is working properly for what this system was built for (recording with X1) I'll take a look at maybe getting back to my old set up of listening to tunes through the onboard (it really did work flawlessly on the old system). This does seem to be working rather well as it is though. I probably shouldn't be hunched over the computer for much longer (don't want to twist my body up again) so I'll spare the gory details until tomorrow but I've got a few very hi-fi/noisy CDs ripped into the library to bash in the new monitors. Still wanna toss a few other reference albums in there but today has been a success IMO. Optimization done, WMP playing through the Echo, digital reference library started, cleared an easy access storage space for my monitors when they are not in use (if you saw my workspace you would understand) and I have my entire CD collection out so I can load this puppy up with reference tunes (I'm realizing I have a lack of super low frequency type music but I have everything else from mid-low to high-highs). Yes... today was much better than yesterday. I try not to swear on this forum because it isn't very professional but F**K yesterday!

Good on ya!

John

Loptec your answer should be a sticky. Its that good! 

I wanted to add that stuff but I didn't want to confuse the
situation any more than I already have. Nor could I have been
as complete in trying to be that informative. 

Well done. I concur with every point you made. 

Wow! Thanks, man! I really appreciate it! =)

mudgel

I always leave my on oars card active and allow Windows, consequently
WMP to use it thus acting as a kind of decoy leaving my DAW software
free to stay in ASIO driver mode and not be interrupted by Windows issues.

yeah, for sure! ASIO's the way to go, for exactly this reason and also
because it (for me anyway) always has been the most stable and reliable driver
protocol available , since it was introduced! :)

Lance:
You must be using WDM driver mode. Windows wont use ASIO driver mode