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Figuring out MIDI/auio roundtrip latency

(8 posts)
  • Started 1 year ago by Rogue Process
  • Latest reply from Rogue Process

  1. Okay, so I know there's a few people on this forum who work with both hardware and software, as do I. As of today, I've finally managed to get my Firepod back up and running and have been tooling around thoroughly with my old hardware.

    This has however resurrected the old bugbear of roundtrip latency (i.e. the time it takes for a MIDI note from my DAW to trigger a synth and the resultant sound to come out my computer's speakers). On Windows this was not much of an issue as you could see your ASIO buffer size/time in milliseconds and compensate accordingly, but not so on Mac.

    Does anybody have a foolproof way of calculating your audio latency, especially on OSX? Cheers for any help in advance :)

    Posted 1 year ago #
  2. SVII-5AM

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    try gearslutz.com

    Posted 1 year ago #
  3. You are experiencing a latency in the MIDI AND the Audio? Like if you hit your synth manually, is there a delay before you hear sound?

    What DAW are you using? I do not know shit about OSX, but I know people and will ask around.

    `michael

    Posted 1 year ago #
  4. db

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    hehe midi lantency!? if you have a big audio lantency is normal your when you bang a note you got lantency but this is not in midi just the audio (except if you are in daisy chain more them 4 synth )

    But like says Soilodge we need what DAW you use to help ;)

    Posted 1 year ago #
  5. @ Soillodge/db - Nah, no MIDI latency (although apparently it CAN add on an extra ms or two but fucked if I'm gonna quibble over that :P ). Mainly as db said, audio latency due to buffering.

    This is not a DAW-specific problem (though for the record I am using Reaper), as audio latency has very little to do with what software you're using unless you're running a shitload of effects plugins. Besides, most DAWs have pretty foolproof ways for offsetting tracks to compensate for said latency.

    What my problem is, is that unlike ASIO, CoreAudio does not give your buffer/latency time in milliseconds, only samples, frequency and bitrate, which makes it problematic trying to figure out how much time I need to compensate by to get my external synths running in time with my software.

    For instance I'm currently using my Firepod at 44.1khz/16 bit with a 512 sample buffer. How would I calculate my latency from this?

    Posted 1 year ago #
  6. Oh OK, so to be clear, it is not roundtrip latency, just audio latency. That is why I was confused. This problem is why I went through 5 soundcards before settling on one and now keeping it for nearly 10 years..lol

    I can't help you with CoreAudio unfortunately. I read some various posts and it seems to be a difficulty for many people. Odd they did not make it stupid proof like ASIO?

    I did find this thread on the Reaper forum? http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=22642 Talking about CoreAudio buffer sizes. Maybe that will help?

    `michael

    Posted 1 year ago #
  7. YADE

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    The basic formula for determining how much latency a particular I/O Buffer Size setting will contribute to overall audio monitoring latency is

    (I/O Buffer Size/Sample Rate)*2

    (source: apple.com Logic Support pages....I guess that the CoreAudio engine should not differ that much on Reaper under OSX)

    Generally I think that 512 is a huge value if you want to go the mixed route (hardware/software)I have around 32 Sample buffer and runs problemless with my RME and Protools 9 and Ableton 8...and Firewire uses afaik its own controller to calculate stuff so you should be pretty independent of huge CPU power and stuff...

    Posted 1 year ago #
  8. @ Michael and Jan - Cheers for the tips fellas! :) I've got some free time over the weekend so I shall give it a bash then and see if I can get the latency sorted at all!

    Posted 1 year ago #

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