Moody Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 Guys, Needs some help with something I have 0% experience of. I recently purchased a Line 6 BASS Pod XT Live from a fellow BC'er and very, very happy with it. Anyway, after chatting with my tutor and stuff, I decided it might be an idea to start recording myself as part of my practise regime. So, I've got a copy of Tracktion 3 and USB'd the Line 6 to my Laptop (It's a HP NC8430 Dual Core Jobby with 1GB RAM). Within Tracktion I have the Wave device set as ASIO Bass PODxt Live as both Output 1+2 and Input 1 and Input 2. So, I can load in an MP3 to jam along too fine and I can then record myself over the top. However, I seem to be getting issues with Latency, which is set to 46.4 milliseconds. As when I play back it seems "out", now, this could of course be due to the fact that I'm actually "out" and the software is fine. Which is cool, I can work on that, but I need to be sure the setup I've got is correct. Is there a better way of doing this or some alternative software I should consider? I like traction is its fairly straightforward. I'm not interested in producing top notch edits or anything, just want a simple method for reviewing my practise. I'm a little out of my depth - so go easy!! Many thanks, John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ped Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 Hi John, inside your recording programme there should be a 'settings' button for your ASIO driver. This will bring up a little line6 menu where you can change things like the sampling rate and so on. Here is a pic of the settings that worked for me: I found that sometimes when I moved the sliders the whole bloody system would crash and my computer would restart! It was fine from them on though! Cheers ped Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ped Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 P.s there is probably a better/proper way of fixing your problem but I found this through trial and error - I hate computers sometimes! ped Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moody Posted December 17, 2008 Author Share Posted December 17, 2008 Ped, many thanks for the reply, I'll give it a bash in a sec. Had a right nightmare with it last night, found if I set the buffer really low, the whole thing just died. I love this stuff, and I work in IT!! right, I need to retrieve the POD from the end of the garden and repair the window! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 Beofre I bought a decent soundcard I used to get a lot of latency. I just moved the waveforms back a few ms until they were in time, it's dead easy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ped Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 [quote name='Moody' post='356746' date='Dec 17 2008, 10:51 AM']Ped, many thanks for the reply, I'll give it a bash in a sec. Had a right nightmare with it last night, found if I set the buffer really low, the whole thing just died. I love this stuff, and I work in IT!! right, I need to retrieve the POD from the end of the garden and repair the window![/quote] hehe cool no problem. Probably worth mentioning that I was plugging into a standard spec laptop. I am not sure if the sound card in the computer makes any difference because the pod becomes the input and output device and handles all the audio, effectively bypassing the sound card. I think. Once set up and sorted it sounded amazing! Cheers ped Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalMan Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 I have horrible problems with latency using either the BOD or POD, and I also run Tracktion 3 though I don't think that is the problem. I have tried changing settings as Ped says, switching off everything I don't need (like the internet connection, firewalls & virus checkers) to no avail. When I am recording using the USB I normally set the input in Tracktion and then mute the output of the track the POD/BOD is going into. With headphones on from the POD you get the live sound of the POD, with no latency, and the track for monitoring, and you will probably find you do not need to set any offset on the track. Once you have recorded you can then unmute the POD track output to hear the mixed playback (and if there is any offset to the backing you are playing along to just zoom in on the view in tracktion and slide your bass track back as necessary. I am thinking of getting a UX2 to get around other problems experienced recording with the POD that I cannot make go away - like short white noise blasts. I can then use the optical out on that, which I have used sucessfully with the BOD Pro. Of course what I really need is a Mac with a big HD and loads of memory that I can dedicate to recording and not clutter up with all the other Office / Virus checker / Internet detritus!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bassbloke Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 The interface on a POD is USB 1.1 not USB 2.0, so there's no way on god's earth it'll handle duplex audio (i.e. recording and playback at the same time) even with the best quality low latency drivers. One workaround would be to use your onboard soundcard for playback and monitoring and invest in a simple mixer. Take the stereo audio output from your laptop and mono output from the POD into the mixer and monitor yourself through that. Should work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dood Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 [quote name='WalMan' post='356935' date='Dec 17 2008, 01:44 PM']I have tried changing settings as Ped says, switching off everything I don't need (like the internet connection, firewalls & virus checkers) to no avail. When I am recording using the USB I normally set the input in Tracktion and then mute the output of the track the POD/BOD is going into. With headphones on from the POD you get the live sound of the POD, with no latency, and the track for monitoring, and you will probably find you do not need to set any offset on the track. Once you have recorded you can then unmute the POD track output to hear the mixed playback (and if there is any offset to the backing you are playing along to just zoom in on the view in tracktion and slide your bass track back as necessary. I am thinking of getting a UX2 to get around other problems experienced recording ......[/quote] The UX2 comes highly recommended from me! - I'm using it on *gasp* a laptop with Vista 64bit ultimate and it is excellent. The tone direct monitoring allows latency free recording and the quality of the recording is fantastic. I am currently using Reaper 64bit as my DAW, along with Cubase and Superior 2 and all but Cubase seems to be fine.. though it maybe down to the fact that my version of Cubase *shouldnt* work with Vista lol ;o) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dood Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 p.s. - as has been mentioned already, on a laptop, do yourself a favour and disable any communications hardware that you aren't using, especially WIFI. (Not just the software!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bozzbass Posted December 17, 2008 Share Posted December 17, 2008 (edited) I don't know the POD or Tracktion very well but what WalMan said sounds about right. Set it up so you are monitoring your live bass in your headphones rather than the bass that comes from your Tracktion track?? I do use an Edirol FA-66, a general audio interface, into a laptop with Ableton Live and when I record live stuff, I set the monitor for the recording track in Ableton to off, have all the other tracks monitoring as normal, and then use the live/direct monitor on the Edirol box to listen to my bass. As WalMan says, I've never had to offset tracks afterwards to get them in sync. IIRC you had the latency down to 40ms or so, which isn't too bad for your computer. As I say, I think if you can figure out how to monitor your live/direct bass rather than the "ASIO"-ed bass, all will be good. Bozz Edited December 17, 2008 by bozzbass Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalMan Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 Moody, another thing I have only just realised when going through the Line6 setup/ optimisation notes while trying to cure blasts of white noise while recording is that the latencey setting in Tracktion and Line6 should be the same. Tracktion seems to default to a latency setting of 4096 samples. Changing it to 512 in my setup fixed the problem and I don't have to mute the track when recording now. DOH!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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