How is everyone's luck using outboard reverbs and processors with Sonar X2?  I have a Lexicon PCM 60 I wanted to try and compare to a few of the VSTs..  going out of my Motu 2408, into the PCM60, out of the PCM back into the Motu.
 
Are there any issues people have come across?  (Latency, etc)
 

Hi Cali,
 
I use and external reverb/delay TC Electronics M1 XL and an Art VLA II compressor as insert and mastering plugins. In my setup (Allen and Heath R16 mixer interface)I have no issues with latency. I can apply the via channel inserts or user the master insert points for application.  This particular setup allows a great deal of versatility and combined with the internal effects is extremely powerful..

Works great - patch it in! The latency can be your "pre-delay" and you can use nudge to line up any audio that is too delayed.

Hi Californiamusic,
I use outboard gear all the time. Usually I just use the External Insert effect. Add it to your effects bin, set ins and outs, measure latency and you're done.

A couple notes:
1. If you put the EI effect on a bus it won't measure latency until you have signal routed to the bus.
2. It can cause some issues with metronome pre-count.
3. Sonar considers any ins and outs used in an EI as a stereo pair, even if you're only using one of the ins and outs. So if you use in 3 and out 3, Sonar will consider both 3 and 4 as in use and unavailable for use in other places.

Good luck,
Dean

Another ZED-R16 user with outboard gear if I feel like it. Works well and hassle free whenever I use that method either via inserts on a channel or using the ZEDs channel sends and then routing the processor returns back to Sonar via a couple of the ZEDs spare channels.

Are there any issues people have come across?  (Latency, etc) 

I don't have any issues or latency problems when using outboard gear. 

It basically depends on how you are using it and how your running it out and back into your PC and sonar. There are some ays where you will have latency and some ways where you wont.

CJ

I use the External Insert plugin quite a bit with Sonar and it works great.  In my experience the automatic function to compensate for latency results in a sample accurate insert.  By that I mean - if you do a loop through (bypassed) external equipment there is no shift (aka delay, latency) at all in the signal.  This will remove the latency associated with the D/A and D/A conversion give you a time accurate insert path that is at least as good as you would see on a real analog console. 

I always put ANY hardware in bypass when having the External Insert plugin calculate the latency so as to remove the converter latency from the timing calculation of the insert but for most things it isn't critical.   However, when using a hardware reverb unit on the insert - unless you want to use the latency as predelay - it is more important.  The nature of what a reverb does to the signal makes it very difficult for the autocalculation of the latency by the External Insert plugin to be done accurately.  Depending on the reverb characteristics you may find that the timing can be off by a fairly significant amount.  This will sound like predelay unless you setup the hardware to allow some of the dry signal pass through the hardware unit back to the DAW.  In that case you may introduce a unwanted audio changes as a result of the mixing of the original signal with the delayed dry signal which will be slightly out of phase.  This may or may not be audible depending on the level of the dry signal and the amount of latency.  It's easier to just do the External Insert automatic latency calculation with hardware in bypass and not have to worry about it.

Don