_Angus_
Thanks for the reply. I'll deal with the points you raised in sequence. Disabling the other soundcards completely? Sounds like a good idea, but can one do that in software? BTW I have tried making the UX2 the default soundcard but with no benefit.
Hi Angus
I've disabled the onboard soundcard on all three PCs I've used my UX2 with (XP; Vista; Win7-64) and it's run perfectly. With the XP and Vista machines, there were some conflicts but with my newer Win7 computer, I disabled it anyway before I installed the UX2 drivers.
I think in your situation, it might be worth a try - even if it doesn't solve the problem, it's completely reversible.
To disable your onboard card, open
Control Panel and then click on
Device Manager to open it. Click on the arrow next to the
Sound, video and game controllers icon to expand it and you should see your Audiophile in the list that opens. Here you can see my onboard Realtek card:
Double click on the name of your card to open its
Properties window. When the Properties window opens, select the
Drivers tab and then click on the
Disable button:
If you receive a message asking you to confirm this action, select
Yes.
Now, close Device Manager, and if you are prompted to restart your computer, do so.
I'm using the UX2 ASIO drivers that come with it, I tried ASIO4all but it was no better.
The ASIO drivers for the UX2 are well written and are purpose-built for audio recording. ASIO4All is just a 'wrapper' used to make cheaper/slower soundcards work a little more efficiently - you certainly don't need it with your UX2 that has its own ASIO drivers.
Incidentally, you
have to use ASIO drivers with both your UX2 and SONAR for you to be able to record two different sources simultaneously with your UX2 (e.g. Instrument + Mic1; Mic1 + Mic2 etc) - SONAR will 'see' the UX2 in the Input of a track as either
UX2 Send 1-2 or
UX2 Send 3-4.
I'm not quite sure what you mean here - I've not succeeded in getting the Pod Farm VST to be accessible from Sonar, I'm not clear if that's actually possible, I can see a Pod Farm .dll file but haven't managed to get Sonar to do anything with it...
Right, I understand. Basically, the POD Farm software comes in two different versions. The standalone version (that you're using) is the version that's accessible just like any other program on your PC. You can run it independently of any other program either from the Start menu or from a shortcut etc.
However, Line 6 also supply POD Farm as a series of 'Plug-Ins' which you can use
inside your DAW (= Digital Audio Workstation) software (i.e:
SONAR in your case) to use to process
recorded audio. In the case of SONAR, the plug-ins it can use are in the 'VST' format (you get the option during installation to install different formats).
If you've installed the POD Farm VST plug-ins, they (as you have seen) will appear with the filename extension
.dll The VSTs you should have are (note that mine are the 64bit versions):
I believe that if you didn't specify a different destination on installation, and you already had SONAR on your PC, they are placed by default inside this folder on your computer:
- Computer > OS(C) > Programs > Cakewalk > Vstplugins
They should be available to use inside the FX Bin (Effects Bin) of an audio track in SONAR.
To see if they're there, right click in the FX Bin of a track and hover the mouse pointer over
Audio FX.
If you don't see them in the list but they are located in the Cakewalk Vstplugins folder, you might need to run a VST scan.
If you placed them in a different folder, you will need to run the VST scanner and add this folder to those that it will scan.
I basically fire up Pod Farm on the pc, plug the guitar into the UX2 and run Sonar. Its not too bad playing guitar through the UX2 without Sonar. The odd click and crackle but not too much. I re-installed stuff from the Line 6 Monkey a couple of times yesterday. Thanks again.
Can you record anything from (the standalone version of) POD Farm in SONAR Angus?
If not, try following these steps:
- Disable your onboard soundcard as above (and make certain that your UX2 is enabled)
- Open a new (Blank) project in SONAR and select Edit > Preferences from the menu bar
- In the Audio section, click on Playback and Recording
- Check to see what is listed as the Driver Mode - if ASIO is displayed, that's fine. If it isn't, click on the drop-down arrow and select ASIO from the list. Click Apply and then close the Preferences window.
- Close SONAR and open POD Farm
- Plug your guitar into the NORM Instrument jack on your UX2 and make sure you have sound
- Open the POD Farm Mixer View and ensure you have a good signal in the Rec Send 1-2 meter:
- With POD Farm open, restart SONAR and open Preferences again. Check on the Driver Settings tab that SONAR has recognised your UX2 as both Playback Timing Master and Record Timing Master (mine is listed as the older TonePort UX2, yours will be listed as POD Studio UX2):
- To check SONAR is communicating perfectly with your UX2 in ASIO mode, click on the Record Timing Master drop-down arrow and you should see that both Send 1-2 and Send 3-4 are available:
If it is, all is good, but leave it set to Send 1-2 and close Preferences - Now, in the Track View, insert an Audio Track into your project (Insert > Audio Track) and arm it for recording
- Switch to the Console View and click on the Input selection drop-down arrow in the track's channel strip. You should see the following six options:
- Choose either Left ASIO Pod Studio UX2 Send 1-2 to record in mono, or Stereo ASIO Pod Studio UX2 Send 1-2 to record in stereo
Hope that all makes sense and gets you working OK Angus. Let us know if you need anything else explained.
Steve