Question regarding MOTU ASIO drivers...

[lebem]

I'm not sure if this is a glitch with SCS, the MOTU drivers, or simply expected behavior and was hoping someone could point me in the right direction.

I recently bought and started using a MOTU Ultralite (mk3). SCS recognizes the ASIO drivers and I have no problems there. The Ultralite has a total of 12 analogue outputs, 10 in the form of balanced 1/4" jacks on the rear, and two via the headphone jack on the front. I only care about the 10 on the rear panel.

Now, I do seem to be able to address them all, just not as I expect. Selecting the L/R outputs addresses the "Main L/R" outs on the Ultralite. However selecting outputs 1/2 also address the "Main L/R" outputs. The result being that outputs 3/4 in SCS address physical outputs 1/2 on the MOTU and thus everything is off by two when I do my speaker assignments.

Has anyone else experienced this? Is this normal? Is this a bug? In SCS? In MOTU's drivers? I'd appreciate it if someone could set me straight on this matter.

Thanks,

Matt Lebe

[Mike Daniell]

Selecting the L/R outputs addresses the "Main L/R" outs on the Ultralite. However selecting outputs 1/2 also address the "Main L/R" outputs. The result being that outputs 3/4 in SCS address physical outputs 1/2 on the MOTU and thus everything is off by two when I do my speaker assignments.

In SCS the L/R outputs are the same as 1/2 - the 1/2 is just a more convenient naming convention for multi-output devices. I don't have a MOTU Ultralite but I've just looked at the picture of the Ultralite's rear panel on the MOTU web site. I see there are outputs labelled Main Outs L and R (which seem to double for In 1 and 2), and then Out 1-8. This all looks similar to the mixer concept of Master Outputs and Group Outputs, but from your explanation it seems that the MOTU is treating all 10 outputs as individual channels.

It seems to me that SCS is doing the right thing. If you do not want to use the Main Outs of the Ultralite, is there a way you can configure the Ultralite to ignore them and to route audio channel 1 to Out 1?

[lebem]

I'll have to look into that... I believe there may be, but I didn't have much time to get everything configured before going into tech for my current show and as things are working I'm not going to play around until the run is over (a few weeks).

BTW, despite how it appears from images of the back panel, the Main L/R outs do not double as inputs... Inputs 1/2 are XLR (one of the front, one on the rear) and are not present in the row of 1/4" jacks. I took me a moment the first time I saw that as well.

It sounds like this is all expected behavior (though perhaps a configurable one from the MOTU angle) and not something I need to be concerned about indicating a potential problem.

Thanks again,
-Matt Lebe

[danbaird]

Hey guys,
Just thought I'd chime in and say that I experience this exact same issue. I have the original Ultralite. I can affirm, that every input and output (including the headphone out) are discrete on the Ultralite...there is no sharing. I believe that the problem lies in the Motu ASIO driver. Mike, please correct me if I am wrong, but I am guessing that when an ASIO driver is written, there is an absolute input or output "number" assigned to each physical input or output...this number cannot be changed. The issue then, is that the Motu ASIO is configured such that the Main Outs (L+R) are actually absolute outputs 1 and 2. The analog outputs 1-8 on the back of the Motu are then absolute outputs 3-10, respectively. This makes sense, because if you assign Analog 3 and 4 in SCS when using the ASIO driver, the audio actually comes out of Analog 1+2. It is very strange. This does present a major issue when trying to play a multichannel sound file. If you simply select 5.1 Surround as your output type, the physical routing out of the Motu is not correct.

It seems as though SCS does not inherit the Output configuration from the ASIO driver...rather, SCS has its own built in list of predefined Output confgurations. For example, when selecting the 5.1 Surround configurtaion, SCS assumes that the audio should be routed to absolute outputs 1-6. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the Ultralite, this doesn't route the audio to the correct physical outs.

Perhaps there is a way that SCS can inherit this inforation from the ASIO driver. In Sony Vegas, it actually lists all of the outputs on the Ultralite based on their actual name (ie Main Outs, Analong 1-8, SPDIF 1-2, etc). If this isn't possible, maybe there is some way to create a "patch screen" that will allow one to patch the templates (ie 5.1 Surround) to any absolute output that is desired.

I hope I have explained this well, this is all based on observations I have made while using the Motu ASIO within SCS. Let me know if I can be of any further assistance.

[Mike Daniell]

It seems as though SCS does not inherit the Output configuration from the ASIO driver...rather, SCS has its own built in list of predefined Output confgurations. For example, when selecting the 5.1 Surround configurtaion, SCS assumes that the audio should be routed to absolute outputs 1-6. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the Ultralite, this doesn't route the audio to the correct physical outs.

Perhaps there is a way that SCS can inherit this inforation from the ASIO driver. In Sony Vegas, it actually lists all of the outputs on the Ultralite based on their actual name (ie Main Outs, Analong 1-8, SPDIF 1-2, etc). If this isn't possible, maybe there is some way to create a "patch screen" that will allow one to patch the templates (ie 5.1 Surround) to any absolute output that is desired.

From the trace files you sent me, Dan, the device types and names published by the MOTU driver are:

Type: ASIO
MOTU Audio ASIO

Type: WDM
MOTU Main Outs
MOTU Phones
MOTU Analog
MOTU SPDIF

So in SCS you should see the above names listed in the drop-down lists under Physical Device in the Production Properties. (The MOTU Audio ASIO device will only be available for users with SCS Professional or higher.) So the first question is: for each one of the above devices, if you leave the Speakers/Outputs field blank (or set it to Left and Right or Front or Outputs 1/2, which all mean the same thing) then which physical outputs on the MOTU receive the Test Tone?

[lebem]

Sorry, I haven't had time to check the forums lately. I'll now tag along onto what's been happening here with Dan and volunteer to "map" the test tone output at some point this week.

I will however add this in advance, I can't speak for other ASIO devices as I don't own any, but, with the Ultralite, Left and Right/Front do not mean the same thing as Outputs 1/2 which appears to be where the discrepancy Dan and I have encountered. While I cannot test the ASIO drivers behavior in other software (I haven't gotten around to updating my editing software to a newer version supporting ASIO yet,) I can tell you from the MOTU control software packaged with the drivers that the "Main L/R" outs are a discrete buss and are independent of the "Analog 1/2," (and 3-8) busses. Phrased another way and borrowing from the nomenclature of the WDM drivers represented in Dan's trace files, the device contains 2 channels of "Main Outs", 2 channels of "Phones", 8 channels of "Analog", and 2 channels of "SPDIF," all of which can be independently routed to.

-Matt L