I just bought a MultiMix 16 and set it up with Sonar 4 on an older 1 GHz Compaq Presario. I downloaded the latest drivers (two nights ago), and everything is working pretty well. When I listen to the audio coming back trough the stereo mix via the mixer's headphone output, I hear some occasional pops, but they don't appear to be on the recorded tracks.

I recorded for two hours while we practiced, and at some point (near the end), the driver must have gotten confused, as I stopped getting signals on any of the tracks, even though the mixer appeared to be operating, and I didn't get any driver, system or Sonar error messages.

Overall, I'm very happy with the solution. This is incredible technology for the price, and to be able to record 12 channels (4 vocals, 4 drum mics, 2 direct guitars, direct keys and direct bass) is awesome! I think the sound quality is very good for our purposes (live recordings and demos). If you're interested in hearing the results, here are a few tracks (we're a new rock cover band and haven't been together that long, so please don't judge the performaces!). The only post-production I did was to adjust the levels a little and added some panning. No effects have been added yet.

http://www.pozzy.com/90proof/audio/2006-01-04/Jumpin_Jack_Flash.mp3
http://www.pozzy.com/90proof/audio/2006-01-04/When_I_Come_Around.mp3
http://www.pozzy.com/90proof/audio/2006-01-04/Takin_Care_of_Business.mp3

Theo Pozzy
"90 Proof"

hiya all -- i can't really help any (as i'm noob) but i'm in the market for firewire interface and laptop(i did have a post re:??'s about hercules 1612 firewire- and didn't get any hits--anyone take the plunge on the hercules yet??.also from what i gather from you guys- are sound card embedded in laptops so you can't diable them?? sorry for sneakin in on the alesis talk but i crave answers! thanx

tpozzy,
You can disable the on board sound in the Device Manger if you can't find it in the BIOS.

Hi Jim, great to hear you have things working better. I think that I am going to install the Alesis 16 F/W on my desktop and do some mixing with it. The next time I get a chance I will use it for a live recording and see how it works out with the new drivers and a laptop.

Can you explane what this firmware update is for, what does it do for the mixer or is it for the computer?

randy

ORIGINAL: randy
Can you explane what this firmware update is for, what does it do for the mixer or is it for the computer?
randy

I don't know what the firmware update did versus the driver update, they had a lot of work to do so I was just glad they did both.

It is working much better but not perfect. Using WDM drivers I still can't get rid of occassional clicking no matter where I set everything, and I would prefer to use that mode because then I can output it to my audigy2 without changing anything. But with the ASIO mode it will record all the channels if I set the latency up high enough, but I would like to cut that down.

I wanted to be mobile but I think the problems with off the shelf laptops are generally they are made to use less power so they have much slower CPU's than comparable desktops, and use a hard drive that is only 5400 RPM's and it looks like from the specs I could get an external USB hard drive that runs at 7200 RPM's and will transfer data up to 480 MB/sec. that is a ton of band width and I am guessing it will help me run a lower latency without so many dropouts. I found that with ASIO drivers it will dropout and stop recording, and with the WDM drivers it will pop or click but keep going.

I should just haul my desktop out to the "practice studio" and give it a try and see how much different it performs.

to jimarter:

I'm curious - how many simultaneous tracks you recorded in asio mode and what latency setting did you have to use to do so?

For comparison, I've been using the MOTU896HD with a slightly faster (2ghz Pentium M) laptop and can record 8 tracks simultaneously with about 2.2 latency if I set the buffers to 96K (remove unnecessary background programs!). However, the MOTU is more expensive and it isn't easy to get above the 8 tracks due to the more professoinal AES/EBU digital inputs or ADAT interface for additional inputs, whereas it looks like this Alesis can do 12 pretty easily. I still have some time left to return the MOTU, and I didn't get the Alesis partly due to reviews posted here. I'm also thinking latency isn't such a big deal for live recording, though it would be an important consideration for using the laptop as a synth brain for DX instruments.

There is a driver update for January 2006. Don't know what it is about yet, think I will write Alesis and find out. Will post back the info.

randy

Driver info update for Alesis MultiMix FireWire.


The latest firewire driver release dealt with problems of pops and clicks that could be heard within Sonar when using the ASIO drivers. This has been addressed and with the PDF document on the website shows how to configure Sonar for best results.

Justin Baro

First impressions of MultiMix16 with the new firmware and drivers:
sounds good and works fine with the dell inspiron 6000 laptop.

Latency so far is 5.8 in asio. Haven't tweaked it to see about lower latency yet, but the mixer is fun to work with, add reverb for home recording headphone inspiration, but it records the tracks dry so you can use lexicon verb later or whatever.

I'll test out the live 8 track recording later today and report

Hi, a question from a prospective buyer, may be a rather basic one, but your assistance will be greatly appreciated. Say you record 8 channels of audio and assign each one to an individual track on Sonar. Then say you keep adding a few more tracks and end up having 22 different and POTENTIALLY simultaneous (at certain points) audio tracks.

Can you assign them all to sound via the Multimix's "digital INPUT" (I understand they are sent via Firewire, routed through the Track 2 IN and merged with any external audio you could have also hooked there)? Will the unit do the audio merging accurately? If you pan them independently on SONAR, will the Multimix play them back in the same fashion? It's the one thing that I don't fully understand yet, whether the Multimix can handle multiple audio tracks back from the computer. If so, is there any limitation or potentially just bandwidth?

Thanks a bunch in advance.

ORIGINAL: Gusfmm

Hi, a question from a prospective buyer, may be a rather basic one, but your assistance will be greatly appreciated. Say you record 8 channels of audio and assign each one to an individual track on Sonar. Then say you keep adding a few more tracks and end up having 22 different and POTENTIALLY simultaneous (at certain points) audio tracks.

Can you assign them all to sound via the Multimix's "digital INPUT" (I understand they are sent via Firewire, routed through the Track 2 IN and merged with any external audio you could have also hooked there)? Will the unit do the audio merging accurately? If you pan them independently on SONAR, will the Multimix play them back in the same fashion? It's the one thing that I don't fully understand yet, whether the Multimix can handle multiple audio tracks back from the computer. If so, is there any limitation or potentially just bandwidth?

Thanks a bunch in advance.

The way I understand it all the mixing of tracks already recorded is done in Sonar (pan, level, effects, etc.). So it's already a stereo mix before it goes back to the Alesis. You don't do any hardware mixing of pre-recorded tracks other then setting the stereo level.

So, it would not matter how many tracks were in Sonar, you could have 30 tracks in Sonar and they would still all get mixed down to two before they go back to the Alesis.