DM3200 + HUI banking question

[Gerk]

Hi folks, so I'm using my DM3200 via HUI to control Pro Tools mixing and I have a question. According to all the docs I've read on the Tascam HUI emulation it is supposed to always bank in sets of 8 (which makes perfect sense given the 8 channels per HUI controller), but ... if there's not a full 8 more channels it does some strange banking. Let me give you an example:

Let's say I have 17 tracks in Pro Tools. When I load the remote layer it shows the first 16 channels as expected. According to everything I've read when I hit the Bank button it should then go to the next set of 8 channels, so I would expect to see channels 9-24 of protools showing on the console (with everything from 18-24 being nothing). But what actually happens is I end up seeing channels 2-17 on the remote layer -- meaning that it only bumps the bank over 1 channel instead of the 8 it's supposed to do.

While this is not the end of the world and I've found a bit of a workaround (I added a bunch of blank channels in PT to pad the output to where it's expected) I was hoping that there might be some other way of dealing with it either on the DM3200 or in Pro Tools itself -- but to date I have not found a way to do this.

Figured it would be worth asking here in case anyone has run into this before and found a way to deal with it.

 

[cmaffia]

Sounds like banking is actually nudging instead. I suspect its a config in the PT setup that is causing this. In my Cubase it works as expected. I didn't need to do anything else in Cubase other than the typical Mackie remote setup to get the Remote Layer working (including nudging and banking). I'm not a PT user so maybe someone else can be of assistance. All I can suggest is to make sure your Mackie port assignments are correct in PT and that your Machine Control setup is correct on the DM. Other than that, I am of no use

EDIT: There was one thing I needed to do in Cubase starting from version 7.5 to get the Remote Layer working properly. Cubase implemented some sort of extended HUI implementation that didn't play nice with the Remote Layer so for each of the Mackie Remotes I would have to change the MIDI implementation from a setting called "Cubase" to "Compatibility". Maybe there's a similar setting in PT?

 

[Gerk]

Thanks cmaffia, will dig in further into PT, I suspect that's where the configuration needs tweaking as well. There's nothing like that in PT in terms of the midi setup, it's pretty straightforward. Select HUI midi port for each controller and that's about it.

Thanks!

 

[skier]

Hey Gerk,

I run ProTools v12.4 with a DM4800. Banking does not operate the way you have surmised, at least mine doesn't. When in the REMOTE layer and using Bank 1, my DM channels (faders, solo buttons, mute buttons, etc.) and that displayed on the monitor, are the first 24 channels (1 - 24). When I press the bank button to advance, I then see channels 25 - 48 of Pro Tools. It DOES NOT change 8 channels at a time, it changes 24, and that's the way I want it because I don't want to spend lots of time climbing up and down banks to get to the one I want. The display, faders, and all other DM channel controls advance 24 channels. I had presumed that the DM3200 moves ahead 16 channels at a time, but perhaps I'm wrong. Regardless, the above describes my system's behavior.

I did not make any setting changes in PT to achieve this behavior — I have always had this behavior since purchasing the DM. Here are some screen shots showing my HUI settings for a song using 25 tracks; perhaps they will be of help to you:

 

[Gerk]

Thanks for posting this. Hmm very interesting, that's exactly how I was hoping it would work (but in my case it's 16 instead of 24). If I load up a full 32 tracks then it works as I expected, first bank shows 1-16, second shows 17-32, but if I have 17 tracks after I bank I see tracks 2-17. I can't image there's much difference between the 16 HUI emulate and 24 HUI emulate ... I also haven't changed any settings in PT and I'm using 12.7.

In the first-bank shot PT is at 1-16 (when I first load remote layer), in the second-bank shot this is what I get when I press the bank button right.

Strange that we are seeing different behaviour. I think there's something buried somewhere in the PT preferences that maybe I just can't find.

 

[Gerk]

GOT IT!

In Pro Tools preferences, under Mixing->Controllers->always fill channel strip when banking. I needed to turn that off. My Raven MTI2 turned that on for it's setup stuff which is why mine wasn't set at the default, now it works perfectly and as I had expected.

Figured I would include this here in case anyone else runs into this in the future and they find it via search.

Thanks for the replies folks.

 

[skier]

I appreciate you posting this! I didn't realize that there was any such setting in PT. Now, if I start experiencing the behavior you first reported, I'll know that something changed it and where to look to resolve it. I can see why the option might be appealing in certain situations, not the least of which is that it keeps the mixer accessing as many tracks as possible. Perhaps I'll even try it.

Thanks much!

 

[Gerk]

No problem, that makes two of us

 

[skier]

Well, we have to give @cmaffia credit, he called it as a probable PT setting.

 

[cmaffia]

If you have a DM4800, it makes sense that it banks 24 tracks as my DM3200 banks 16 tracks at time (actually it banks 56 tracks at a time because I have 2 cascaded DM3200's plus the US-2400 controller so I rarely have to ever bank!).

 

[skier]

That's cool to never have to bank. It's not bad with 24 tracks at a time. I've not used 48 tracks as of yet, so I usually just have to switch between Banks 1 and 2. Most of the music I do runs from around 16, 18 tracks into the mid 30s or so. (Hmmm, if I got another DM 48, that'd be 48 tracks per Bank and 96 with 2 Banks....Hmmm...) Nope, don't need that many tracks; not doing sound for pic or recording orchestras; and not layering that heavy. Even as is, as layering gets heavier and heavier even with the number of tracks I do use, you really have to thin out the frequency spectrum of each instrument to make room, unless some come and go.

 

[Gerk]

Yes indeed. It's quite shocking to get a project that you have to mix for a 3 piece band only to open it up and find out it's > 100 tracks! (not kidding, had this happen last week). It was a fun mix but wow there was a lot of layers and they insisted that they all needed to be there! Definitely changes the decision making process when 40 of those tracks need to be up front and center!

 

[Peter Batah]

I really never verified how my bank selection behaved until this evening. Would someone be kind enough to tell me if my DM-3200 is banking correctly or not.

I setup a Cubase v.5.5 session (1 Stereo and 30 mono tracks) - When I select the very first bank I can control channels 1-16. Mackie Remote (USB Audio Device 6) - Mackie Remote 2 (USB Audio Device 5)

When I arrow right to select the next bank the very first fader furthest to the left of course ends up as track number 9. Shouldn't this be track 17? My setup is similar to what we see in the images that @skier provided (except he appears to be using a DM-4800) a few posts up. Thank you. Peter

 

[cmaffia]

This is only half the story. Where are you screenshots of Cubase configurations. What are the Mackie Remote Midi setup as? Cubase or Compatibility? I forget if pre 7.5 had these options and if so, if it made a difference.

http://www.tascamforums.com/threads/remote-control-dm3200-with-cubase-9.4702/#post-22565

 

[Gerk]

As posted above you should check your Cubase config to make sure you're setup to use 2 HUI devices -- it sounds like it's only setup for a single one but when you're using 16 tracks it's 2 devices, one device on port 5 and one on port 6 (one device per each 8 channels). If you were on a DM4800 then it would be 3 devices for 24 channels ... each HUI 'device' only does 8 channels.

 

[Peter Batah]

@Gerk Thanks for chiming in. Please refer to the last line of my earlier post which reads:

I setup a Cubase v.5.5 session (1 Stereo and 30 mono tracks) - When I select the very first bank I can control channels 1-16. Mackie Remote (USB Audio Device 6) - Mackie Remote 2 (USB Audio Device 5)

I'm on my way out but will post screenshots later this afternoon.

 

[Gerk]

Then at that point I would think this is a cubase issue. Check through your preferences and make sure that it is indeed capable of banking 2 HUI banks at a time (since it seems that it's only banking 1 right now). Other than that sorry, I have nothing else to add except maybe trying with a newer version or cubase if you can or maybe trying the generic HUI instead of the cubase specific one ... honestly not sure what the differences are for them as I haven't used Cubase in a long, long time.

 

[Peter Batah]

@Gerk I'll do that. Thanks again for your time and assistance. @cmaffia eluded to the fact that it may have something to do with the fact that I am using an older version of cubase (5.1) Back to the drawing board. Have a safe and wonderful weekend. I have attached 2 screenshots. I could be wrong but things seems to be setup properly. Nothing in Preferences related to fader banking. No "Cubase or Compatibility settings" either.

 

[Gerk]

It might be obvious but just in case you haven't tried it yet, have you swapped the ports, i.e. try port 5 for mackie control and port 6 for mackie control 2?

 

[cmaffia]

Has nothing to do with using an older version of cubase. If you read the link I posted I noted that post 7.0 there was a new MIDI implementation and you need to set the device to compatibility mode. I believe the issue has to do with Cubase and the way you configured the Mackie Devices.