Audio tracks out of synch

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maff23uk

Post by maff23uk » Wed Nov 12, 2003 12:23 pm

Hi,

I'm completely new to this and have little clue at all!

I've got one song i wrote that I want to record so I found a copy of Homestudio 2002 and had a go. The problem is that when I record the first guitar part then record the vocals, the vocals are out of synch. I presume this is due to the latency of my system but I can't get it below 30ms any which way!

Is there a way to cancel out the latency or shift subsequent tracks backwards by 30ms so that all the tracks are synched?

It's sounds like I have seriously bad timing at the moment!

Cheers for any help. :D


GretscGuy
Posts: 434
Joined: Sat Oct 18, 2003 1:26 pm
Location: Massachusetts USA

Post by GretscGuy » Fri Nov 28, 2003 8:50 pm

Can you provide the details of your system?

Here are some qucik things to check in the meantime:
1- Update your soundcard drivers. This solves a lot of problems

2- Change buffer size. Smaller buffer size give you less stable opperation, but better performance. It sounds like you are set at about 512. Try getting down to 64 if possible. I run low latency without any issues, again without your system details it's hard to call.

3- Use ASIO drives if availible for your soundcard. They are much faster.

Just some quick ideas, Good Luck!

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Sun Dec 14, 2003 3:09 pm

i am having the same problem.

system details:

AMD athlong XP 1700
1.47 GHz
512 MB RAM

cakewalk details (directshow audio):

aux busses: 2
audio driver bit depth: 16
sampling rate: 44100 Hz
file bit depth: 16
buffers in playback: 4
buffer size: 92 msec
I/O buffer size (KB): 64
synchronization: full chase lock

anything i can do? i'm trying to add some rhythm guitar to an existing project and its just a quick step off beat.

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Sun Dec 14, 2003 3:14 pm

i have a soundblaster soundcard, and i found this when researching ASIO drives:
Creative, the manufacturers of the Soundblaster Live card push the soundcard as being excellent for music(as any soundcard manufacturer would). One of the most popular, if not THE most popular professional audio sequencer there is (Cubase)uses a standard of driver called ASIO to minimise latency.

However Creative will not write an ASIO driver for their Soundblaster Live soundcard. This is a very poor effort on Creative's part.

GretscGuy
Posts: 434
Joined: Sat Oct 18, 2003 1:26 pm
Location: Massachusetts USA

Post by GretscGuy » Sun Dec 14, 2003 5:32 pm

Sounds like a definite latency situation. The one thing you could do would be upgading your soundcard.

Creative is a cool gaming soundcard, but you can't expect to find a pro soundcard at BestBuy (regardless of what the guy there tells you).

Look into some of the better cards or a Firewire or MLAN solutions (MOTU, Yamaha, Presonus, etc...)

You could try reducing your buffer size to 64, I don't know how much msmaller you cxan go though.

Goog Luck!

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Sun Dec 14, 2003 6:00 pm

well, i just recently bought this soundcard.

:(

am i SOL?

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Sun Dec 14, 2003 6:11 pm

want to say thanks for your replies...ive done some searching on this forum for related problems and it seems you've always made time to help out. its appreciated.

i checked out some tuning sites and tweaked my settings a lot to try and compensate, but still no luck.

any other tricks?

Special-K
Posts: 52
Joined: Wed Jul 30, 2003 3:44 pm
Location: UK

Post by Special-K » Sun Dec 14, 2003 6:54 pm

Close down non-essential background tasks, virus checkers, firewalls etc
(obviously close your internet connection while this is down too)
download managers (GetRight etc)

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Sun Dec 14, 2003 11:29 pm

it says here that sound blaster audigy 2zs has ASIO drivers recording at 16-bit/48kHz.

is this driver something that i have to manually switch to or is it automatic upon installation?

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Sun Dec 14, 2003 11:34 pm

also, it might be worth noting that im recording into a microphone and playing along with a track that had been previously recorded.

the guitar i am playing is NOT directly connected to the soundcard.

GretscGuy
Posts: 434
Joined: Sat Oct 18, 2003 1:26 pm
Location: Massachusetts USA

Post by GretscGuy » Mon Dec 15, 2003 3:40 pm

Make sure you are using the ASIO drivers.

Options

Audio (click drivers tab)

Make sure ASIO drivers are installed.

If this solves the problem, great. If you can't get ASIO drivers to work, try uninstalling the card,deleting all registry keys and installing the card and software again (using the newest drivers).

You may want to try reducing your 'Buffers in Playback Que' as well. Depending on your card/system this could help. It's located directley above the latency slider. Mine is set at '2' with no issues, but it's really system dependent.

Hopefully this will help. If not, get rid of the card while it's still worth something and get something different.


Good Luck

drumshanbo

Post by drumshanbo » Mon Dec 15, 2003 3:49 pm

its using sb audigy drivers.

there's no option to change these to ASIO.

is that possible to do some other way?

GretscGuy
Posts: 434
Joined: Sat Oct 18, 2003 1:26 pm
Location: Massachusetts USA

Post by GretscGuy » Mon Dec 15, 2003 6:41 pm

If Asio drivers are availible I would try installing them and rebooting.

Run wave profiler and see if your system finds them. If so, select them, exit sonar, restart sonar and see if that solves the problem.

If not, I would guess the asio drivers are not being recognized becasue the new install is not working properly. Try uninstalling the drivers and registry entries and removing the card.

Remove all traces of install (including registry)
Shut down
Remove Card
Start Up and install ASIO drivers
Shut down
Insert Card
Restart
Install card.

The new drivers should now be there.
Hopefully this helps!
Good Luck!

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