In fact, as described below, I used two PC systems, a P4 desktop and a relatively new Dell laptop — the latter obviously of interest if the Rack is to be used as part of a mobile Pro Tools system. Pro Tools software is based around two main windows: this is the Edit window.
Summary specifications of the Rack are provided in the ' Numbers Game ' box. However, if you compare the photographs of the Digi from the December review with those of the Rack here, the parentage of the Rack hardware is easy to see. With the exception of a slight repositioning of the power supply, the rear-panel connectivity of the Rack would appear to be identical to that of the Digi , in terms of both specification and layout.
To the right are inputs , on both XLRs and quarter-inch balanced jacks. The upper left of the rear panel features all the analogue outputs: the Monitor Output pair, eight analogue outputs and an Alt Mon RCA pair for sending the main output to a cassette deck, for example. As the supplied Pro Tools LE does not support surround sound mixing which is a great shame , perhaps the most obvious application of the multiple outputs is as sends for integrating external hardware processors into a session.
The Getting Started manual is perhaps a little vague about the best sequence of daisy-chaining the Rack with other Firewire devices for data pass-through — but the hint is that any Firewire drive used for audio ought to be connected directly to the host computer, so presumably the Rack might have to be at the end of a chain on computers with only one Firewire port. The layout of the controls on the front panel of the Rack is very similar to those found along the top strip of the Digi To the left, this features four large Gain knobs used for inputs The right-hand side is dominated by output level controls for the main outputs and a headphone output — the only jack socket on the front panel.
Usefully, there are also Mute and Mono switches for the outputs. The Mono switch is an excellent touch, given how important mono compatibility still is in audio for broadcast. Simon Price reviewed version 6 of Pro Tools in both its full and LE incarnations in the SOS May issue, so there is little point in revisiting that ground in too much detail here.
Usefully, version 6 now allows up to audio tracks to be opened in an LE session, using a voicing system for selecting which 32 tracks are actually audible. Other key features that appeared with v6 include some of the Digibase functions, providing improved project management facilities, and Groove Quantise for MIDI. As Simon mentioned in his review, Rewire support was promised and, for music production, is perhaps the most significant addition to v6. While LE retains all the elegance of the Pro Tools user interface it does, of course, have some limitations when compared to a top-of-the-range Pro Tools system.
Aside from reduced audio track counts, one obvious limitation is the lack of surround sound support. Given that the likes of Logic and Cubase SX both now include good software support for surround sound mixing, I do wonder how much longer Digidesign will be able to leave this out of LE. It would certainly make the multiple outputs of both the Digi and Rack desirable to a wider group of potential users.
While LE installed and ran first time, it was soon pretty clear that something was not as it should be. I received a regular supply of errors with both the supplied demo Sessions and new Sessions created from scratch. This card is a couple of years old it was one of the early IEEE PCI add-on cards available and it is certainly not on the fairly limited 'approved' list given on Digidesign's web site. I tried moving the card to a different PCI slot but this did not seem to improve matters.
Fortunately, I happened to have available a relatively new, Firewire-equipped Dell laptop. This specific model the Inspiron , while not as well-specified as my desktop PC in terms of pure hardware grunt, did happen to be a model that Digidesign had tested and approved for use with the Rack.
Repeating the install process with the Dell gave instant and trouble-free operation. Even the busiest of the demo Sessions containing some 20 audio tracks, a few MIDI tracks and a dozen or so plug-ins played back without the machine breaking into a sweat.
Unfortunately, I was not able to get hold of an alternative PCI Firewire card for the desktop PC, to confirm if this was the actual source of the problem. Clearly the review unit itself was in perfect working order — but given how careful Digidesign are in publishing lists of 'approved' computer hardware for use with their systems and they are to be commended for doing so , it would perhaps be advisable for anyone whose hardware includes different components to try and arrange a suitable demo.
I did all further testing on the laptop. Potential purchasers of the Rack will probably be most interested in four key areas of performance. In looking at the first of these issues, I can only reinforce the views of Derek Johnson and Debbie Poyser when they looked at the Digi in December Within this area of the market, I cannot see why anyone would have serious complaints about the audio quality of the Rack. While I'm not a regular Pro Tools user, whenever I have used either Free, LE or the full version, I've always been impressed by the elegance of the interface.
In one sense, the lack of clutter in terms of MIDI functionality contributes to this feeling. With almost all editing and mixing jobs being done in either the Edit or Mix windows, the workflow never seems to get obstructed. This is useful if, for example, a particular pair is being used as a send to an external effects processor.
Routing audio into or out of a particular Pro Tools track is most easily achieved via the Input and Output buttons above the Pan control in each channel of the Mixer window. My only qualifier to that would be that the PC plug-in bundle supplied with the review unit was not as extensive as that described by Derek and Debbie for the more expensive Digi The main thing 'missing' now is a score editor, which may be on the cards for a future update.
Some critics have wondered why Digi still limit the number of tracks available in PTLE, when most other audio sequencers offer practically unlimited MIDI and audio tracks — the practical limitation being your computer, of course.
Digi say that they limit tracks because they like to guarantee systems to run properly on all 'qualified' computers, and they feel that 32 tracks is perfect for LE. This is a fair response, and we probably wouldn't use more than 32 at the moment, but if you're recording a band with a drummer, for example, you can eat up lots of tracks just recording main parts and a couple of overdubs each. It might well be useful to have the freedom, especially during early stages of a project, of as many audio tracks as your computer can deliver.
Of course, surround is supported by the full professional version of Pro Tools that comes with TDM systems. Aside from the standard Digi plug-ins mentioned above, comes with extra plug-ins you'd normally have to buy separately. A set of third-party plug-ins is headed up by Waves' Renaissance EQ in two-, four- and six-band variations , Renaissance Compressor, and Renaissance Reverberator. These Waves devices are great, with the reverb especially being most welcome.
Native Instruments contribute the excellent, authentic Pro 52 virtual analogue synth. If you want more, there are upgrade paths for all the supplied plug-ins, in some cases to full third-party bundles such as the Waves Gold bundle of audio tools.
The only one we were a little disappointed with was Sampletank SE, which sounds good but is limited. Still, it provides a handful of useful drum kits and other instruments. Switching the into stand-alone mode turns it into an assignable desk with a useful feature set.
Each of the eight inputs is equipped with a fader, pan pot, mute and solo buttons, onboard three-band EQ with swept mid , a send each to the built-in reverb and delay effects processors, two further sends routed to outputs 7 and 8 for external effects or basic submixing for alternative headphone mixes, for example , and an onboard compressor for each of the four mic-amp-equipped inputs.
Should you use the two extra sends for effects processing, returns would occupy some of the eight inputs. A basic snapshot memory has 24 slots for storing stand-alone settings, but these cannot be accessed via MIDI. They're really only for saving particular setups, for manual recall, and can't be chained to produce an automated mix. The onboard effects are basic but good quality; the delay maxes out at ms, and the reverb is limited to three basic algorithms and a compact parameter set.
Compressors offer control over ratio, attack and release, with soft- and hard-knee options, and they work rather well. We wish they could be used within Pro Tools! Although it's a pity that the ADAT inputs cannot be used alongside the analogue inputs in stand-alone mode it's one or the other in this mode , the ADAT outs can be used.
Any audio routed through the inputs can be automatically passed to the ADAT output, on a track-to-track basis, pre-fader and pre-effects. Thus the desk could be used in a basic live situation with an ADAT-equipped tape or hard-disk multitrack. The 's hardware resembles a compact digital mixer, featuring the familiar faders, knobs and buttons, plus a set of displays, which make the necessary assignability of the controls much easier to deal with.
On the rear panel are the connections that in other digital recording systems including the would reside on a rackmount recording interface or breakout box and possibly on a card inside the computer.
Aside from the control surface aspect, the big departure for the 's hardware side is that there is no longer any need for an interface card inside the computer, as the FireWire connection is used for high-speed, bi-directional MIDI, audio and control data transfer.
The 's mic amps, which are apparently the same as those on Digidesign's recent pro eight-way preamp, the Pre, sound even better than the pretty decent ones on the Guitars can be plugged into these inputs, which each have a gain control and switchable low-pass filter, without the need for a preamp. In addition to those eight inputs, there's a useful pair of Alt Source phono inputs, which take the place of inputs 7 and 8 if used, and allow audio inputs from CD players or cassette decks, for example, to be brought into a Session.
The hardware is thus basically an input desk that will potentially allow you to record up to 18 tracks at once. All the necessary FireWire drivers and the core Digidesign extensions were put where required automatically. All that was needed was to make the FireWire connection, power up the hardware and boot the software. Technically, there should be an authorisation routine, but it seems that if the software finds a valid authorisation on your computer for another version of PTLE we're users , it's happy.
The bundled plug-ins do need to be authorised. Note that PTLE v5. There are also two FireWire ports, and though you may read suggestions to the contrary, neither can be used for the connection of a FireWire hard drive.
If your computer has just a single FireWire port, and you want to use a FireWire hard drive, the best solution is to connect the drive to your computer and the hardware to the drive's 'pass through' port. Although there are two FireWire ports, the cannot be used in a chain between a computer and a FireWire hard drive.
Plug-in dynamics are alternatively available if the controller is being used with LE and there are onboard dynamics on inputs in stand-alone mode — very useful. Monitoring is simply implemented, though quite well thought-out. There are separate controls for the main stereo monitor output and the headphone socket, with a Mono switch for checking mono compatibility of the stereo mix.
The main monitor can also be muted, leaving the headphones operational. Curiously, the Alt Source stereo phono input can also be routed to the monitor and headphone output. This could be useful in a live situation, with the in stand-alone mode to route pre-set music over the house PA, for example. In the studio, with a simple external mixer you could create a separate monitor mix for overdubbing musicians and feed it back into the Alt Source inputs, leaving the main mix untouched.
The system doesn't offer a 'monitor at source' option, to get around the latency inherent in computer-based audio systems. Luckily, PTLE has settings that can help. The hardware buffer parameter offers five levels, between 64 samples virtually undetectable latency and samples a handy slapback echo.
The level you can achieve depends on CPU speed, how many simultaneous tracks you want to record and how many plug-ins you're using. An alternative to adjusting the hardware buffer is enabling Low Latency Monitoring from the Operations menu. This makes latency almost undetectable, even when recording many inputs at once. However, no effects can be applied to tracks being recorded with Low Latency Monitoring, and it only works with inputs routed directly to audio tracks: audio can't pass through an Aux track first as you would to add processing during recording.
The current situation regarding the addressing of hardware by other software is as yet unclear. It can be set up to be the audio output for Apple's Sound Manager, making it compatible with any app that has Sound Manager support, and Digidesign's WaveDriver allows a similar option for Windows.
The main feature of the front panel is the bank of eight motorised faders, which are quiet, smooth, inch touch-sensitive units made by ALPS. Their space-age, silvery moulded caps initially look a bit on the plasticky side, but they're actually very pleasing to the fingertip. As you would expect, the faders are easily assignable, on a bank system, to control the 32 audio tracks of PTLE, plus as many MIDI and Aux tracks as you have, eight at a time.
Also in this main central section above the faders are corresponding Mute and Solo buttons, each with built-in status lamp like all the buttons. On the review unit, a couple of these were duller than the rest. A bit higher again are eight 'Sel' buttons, used to select channels for editing, arm them for recording, and so on, and eight rotary encoders, each with a green LED ring above as a value readout.
The LED rings can also be switched to provide channel output metering, so although it initially looks as though you don't get level metering, in fact you can choose to have it. It's pretty effective and responsive too, though there is no three-colour system — only the last LED in the ring flashes red if an overload is occurring. A slight niggle is that, depending on where you're sitting in relation to the , the rotaries can obscure parts of the LED rings.
Lining up exactly with the channel 'strips' are eight very clear LCD 'scribble-strips', one per channel, offering labels abbreviated from LE track names. The rotary encoders can be assigned to control a variety of parameters, including pan, aux send levels for PTLE's five sends per channel A-E , and the parameters of plug-ins, via named assignment buttons. Values for these parameters show in the scribble-strip displays momentarily as the parameter is altered, and can also be 'fixed' there with a key-press combination if you need to examine them more closely.
Parameters that might be more suited to fader control than rotary control, such as send levels, can even be assigned to the faders instead, via a 'Flip' button. Several different parameter 'Views' help you keep tabs on your mix. The Views are divided into two types: Console Views show the status of one parameter pan, send or insert for all eight channels in a bank and assigns each rotary encoder and channel select button to their own mixer channel, while Channel Views give you access to the status of several parameters for a single selected channel.
For example, to see the status of eight channels of pan positions, you select the Pan Console View. The LED rings now show pan position for these channels. Choosing the Insert Console View makes the scribble strips display the abbreviated name of any processors assigned to insert A of each of the current eight channels. To see what's assigned to inserts B to D, you use the lettered buttons to the left.
Pressing any channel select button then makes the parameters of the assigned insert processor currently showing for that channel appear in the displays, where they're available for editing with the rotaries. Pressing, for example, the Insert button, followed by Channel 1's select button, causes the names of all the insert processors inserts A-E currently assigned to Channel 1 to be shown across the first five scribble strips. Again, you can get to them for editing by pressing the channel Sel button that lines up with the desired processor.
You can see from this that it's possible to get the same end result via two different routes, but the types of overview given are different and both useful, and the method of assignability used is clear and easy to comprehend. Any time there are too many labels or parameters for the eight scribble-strips, page left and right keys can scroll through the spillover.
The two displays in the top-right corner of the unit help by identifying what is being shown in the scribble-strips — showing, for example, 'LR Pan' if you're in Pan View. You can get straight to the end of a Song by using the Shift 'modifier' key more later plus Fast Forward.
We've seen one or two mentions on Digi forums of people finding the transport keys 'sticky', but the review unit showed no evidence of this. Dedicated controls above the transport activate loop playback and loop recording modes, and access QuickPunch punch-in mode. Once a selection is made, you press Stop and Play again to hear it loop. Incidentally, an option for owners who would like to stick with the but get some dedicated hands-on control would be to add the CM Labs Motormix.
As well as switching fader banks when the Bank button above this array is active, the left-right buttons can move through the channels one at a time when the neighbouring Nudge button has been pressed. Nudge is a useful facility: imagine that the first 10 tracks of your Session comprise a guitar part, a lead vocal, then eight parts of backing vocals. If you could only switch faders in banks of eight, you couldn't balance the eight tracks of BVs at the same time using the 's faders — the first bank of eight would control guitar, lead vocal and six tracks of BVs, while the next bank would access two tracks of BVs and six tracks of whatever else you'd recorded.
However, Nudging along two tracks while in the first fader bank puts all eight BV tracks on the faders. Thus you can usually have your preferred section of the LE mixer projected onto the hardware.
The hidden tracks still operate as normal in the background, but you're presented with a focussed section of the mixer. Activating the Zoom button above the Navigation array makes the cursor keys operate as horizontal and vertical zoom controls for the software, and when you have the desired track selected and are at the required zoom level in the Edit window, you can move the cursor in Grid mode in bar-length steps to approximately where you may want to start making an edit, via the transport winding keys.
That's as far as the controller will take you 'into' your actual tracks, though, and the mouse has to come back into play for all editing operations.
Digi say that they preferred to spend the money on better-quality faders. To the right of the Navigation array is a column of five function keys, F1-F5. You might expect these to be customisable, but at present they are not. Other controllers have function keys that users can assign to common operations. Digi say the ones on the might become assignable in the future, and we hope they do. At the moment they each have a fixed function, three relating only to stand-alone mode.
All that remains in this area are the Flip button discussed earlier and a Master Fader button. This gives instant access to all the Master faders in your Pro Tools mixer, saving you paging through banks just to get to the mix fader or other Master faders. We've now touched upon much of the 's control-surface furniture, with the notable exception of the group of buttons and indicators in its top right-hand corner.
The Enter button can be clicked to 'OK', or close, any on-screen dialogue and the tells you whenever such a dialogue is waiting for a response, showing the message "Pro Tools has a dialogue on screen" across its displays!
This button also enables memory locations markers to be entered on the fly during playback; unfortunately, you can't jump to markers from the hardware. The Escape button in some instances moves up a level of OS, such as returning to a Console from a Channel View, and also selects Cancel in on-screen dialogues.
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