h8000fw as only soundcard and interaction with DAW

[midihooker]

hi people,  just got a bunch of money and the first i came to think of to buy is a h8000fw. i have a few external soundsources like drum machines and synerziers but do all the "hardwork" in my ableton live DAW and like this way to work. so i want to use the h8000fw as a kind of vst device via firewire but also of course as a fx for my external effects, i have read a bunch of negative information about this setup with this device.. like really bad latency..? how do you guys kope with that? i mean in live there is ways to go around that, "plug-in compensation", but thats for vst:s!

i have to get this right before i buy such a expensive device.. and can the device be used also as a system soundcard??

peace out from sweden.peter

[ThreeFingersOfLove]

Hello,

I already own the H8000-FW and I am using it with synthesizers and drum machines. Yes, the H8000-FW can function as a soundcard, I have used it with Cubase but the setup is unstable because of the Firewire controller. If you have a Ricoh controller AND you use a laptop, you are probably going to have problems. In my desktop, where I have a Texas Instruments controller, the setup is much more stable and never had any problems.

Before forking out the green I suggest that you download the Routing application 2.8 and take a look at the various routings. This will give you a very good idea of what you can do with it. For instance, do you want to process both external sources AND VSTs at the same time? If so, how are you going to monitor the result? Will the H8000-FW be your only interface?

Regarding VST support. We have been begging and bugging Eventide for quite some time to give us VST support. It would be wonderful to click on an send/insert FX in Cubase, select the H8000-FW, it adjusts the latency accordingly and you have the FX on that channel. It can still be done in Cubase, but it's not as elegant.

I hope this helps,

Regards,

Yannis

[midihooker]

"For instance, do you want to process both external sources AND VSTs at
the same time? If so, how are you going to monitor the result? Will the
H8000-FW be your only interface?"

that was the main idea yes! but i could record audio trogh my other souncard and put effetcs on after as well if this is not possible. the most importent thing thoe, is to be able to use it on allready recorded stuff in my DAW. and if this is not working ok on FW i could just buy the H7600 and use the SPDIF in/out right? i really dont need 8channels of effects anyway. the way i work o bounce, and bounce, and .. that has some positive side effetcs. my drives et filled with nice processed sounds:)

i can do on the H7600 the same stuff like on the H8000 right? of course on less channels.

thanx for your reply it helped me a lot..

[ThreeFingersOfLove]

Hi again,

to be able to record audio through another interface and have the H8000-FW function as a soundcard as well, you need to use a Mac with OSX. OSX supports driver aggregation, so within Live, you can have 2 different interfaces, i.e. the H8000-FW and your other interface, be seen as one big interface. You need to name the channels appropriately of course, in order to avoid confusion, and then you can route things as you want.

If you are not using a Mac/OSX you cannot use both interfaces at once. It's one or the other. You can record your sources through the other interface and once all audio is inside the DAW, you can select the H8000-FW and have the audio sent through Firewire to be processed and return back to the DAW.

Another solution is to have the other interface connected to the DAW and at the same time, you can send some of its outputs to the H8000-FW to be processed and return back. In this case, you will have a small latency. Measure how much the latency is, and you can shift the processed audio accordingly in the DAW.

To be able to process already recorded audio… you can do this of course, it all depends on how many channels and what your other interface is. If it has SPDIF, then you can use it as a soundcard, send the channels through SPDIF to the H8000-FW, process them and have them return back. But you can also use ADAT or AES/EBU or Firewire or even the Analog IOs. Anything is possible as long as something can be sent to the H8000-FW and return back. The most "direct" solution would be Firewire of course.

In case you decide to use Firewire, I strongly suggest to get something with a TI Firewire controller as I had problems with FW controllers from Ricoh. In my setup the Ricoh, just doesn't work. Especially under Windows 7. A friend of mine has a similar laptop to mine, with a Ricoh controller under Windows XP and his own system is stable.:-(

If you decide to get the H7600, which has 2 channels, things are much easier to setup. It only has Analog IOs, so you make sure that you have 2 free Analog outputs on your other interface as well as 2 free analog inputs. Again, there will be a small latency, depending on the sampling rate, you can always measure this and adjust things accordingly.

Regards,

Yannis

[midihooker]

ok thanx! i also use xp, to mouch freeware apps for this system to not use it!

ye the 7600, but it also got spdif! the thing is 7600 is all over ebay cheap, so there will be a 2,5k diffrence in price.. and thats a lot..

would be cool to here something that you have done where your eventide is present!

peace..

peter

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