MU-1000 Monitoring output levels. And, TC/Locate/Lock operation?

[myrideisa]

Hello Wizards. Just received the meter bridge today. Attached to the DM-4800 and is working. But...even studying up on the manual I'm not comprehending. I've done all the latest updates for Pro Tools (2018.4.0) and the Mac (10.13.4) and everything else is working great.

If it makes sense or not....I'd like to to be able to use the MU-1000 to meter channels (output) 1-24) and I also want to be able to have the time-code display current position. I've learned how to change the metering selections on the meter bride by using Tascam's encoder but having no success in having it meter output levels. And, zero success in selecting any of the three time-code selections. I've fiddled with different settings within the DM-4800 but to very limited success as far as the metering and zero success for Time-Code operation. I'm hoping that someone will have the knowledge...and then the mercy to share that knowledge here.
Thnx much in advance.
ds

 

[skier]

I have the meter bridge on my DM-4800 and it performs the very functions you desire, namely, displaying channels 1-24 and displaying time code. The meter fader screen will also display this information, and changing various options for one will affect the other.

The tabs of the Options screen will allow you to change the mixer's setup and preferences, some of which pertain to the meter screen and meter bridge — you want to set the mixer to display time code. You will also find settings for having the meter screen and bridge automatically follow the channel groups you select. For example, the "Meter Follows SEL key" preference means that, selecting faders 25-48 will also change the meter screen and bridge to display channels 25-48. Or, you can turn off this preference and you can view a different channel group than the ones you select to control with the faders, solo, mute buttons, etc., by selecting the group on the meter screen or on the meter bridge itself.

If you've had the mixer for a while, you likely know that it has much functionality and many options. Well, adding the bridge automatically receives some of that functionality. If you take a good look through the settings and options, you should find that several of them will control the meter bridge behavior, perhaps in concert with one or more screens.

I hope this helps. Let us know if you're still having problems.

 

[myrideisa]

THNX for the quick return. Yeah... I'm still not there yet. I can go to the meter/fader button on the mixer and then select the meter layer by using the #1 encoder. And within that same window in the mixer I can select the metering points and those too are reflected on the meter bridge. But the rest I'm not getting. Just so I know I'm on the same page as you, as tracks are playing back I would like to see their levels reflected on the meter bridge. I probably mis-stated that in my first post. My out 1-2 in Pro Tools are input channels 25-26 on the Tascam and those display the on the meter bridge (when channels 25-26 button is depressed). The stereo meters function as they should.

I still have no clue as how to get the clock display going. If I need to, how do I change the clock selections TC-LOCATE-LOCK? Are there any settings in Pro Tools that need to be adjusted? I set the mixer to "Display Time Code" but that didn't do anything. I've changed a lot of settings (and changed them back) with nothing changing on the meter bridge.

I have had this mixer for almost 5 years and the first six months or more I couldn't get it to work. I've been trying to get this meter bridge to work going on 8 hrs now. Like the mixer, I had no idea something could be so difficult to fire up and work. A healthy manual would have worked wonders in both cases. Frustrating and maddening. I really, really hope you can spread some patience along with your knowledge so that I'm able to get this meter bridge to work.

 

[skier]

If you want to see your tracks playing, you need to SEND THEM BACK to the DM from Pro Tools. Once you've got recorded tracks in PT, they're in PT and being mixed in PT and only the stereo mix is coming out of PT. Correspondingly, it sounds as if you're only sending back the stereo mix and that is going to channels 25 & 26.

Try this:

In Pro Tools, send track 1 to track 25 through the IF-FW/DMMKII. Similarly, send track 2 to track 26, 3 to 27, 4 to 28, etc. This approach will let you use tracks 1 - 24 of the DM to feed tracks 1 - 24 of PT during recording. During playback, you can view each track's output of PT on tracks 25 - 48 of the DM. It should feel natural because the signals will still fall in the same place on the meter bridge from left to right (when switching to the next bank of 24 tracks, track 25's output is displayed on the same meter ladder as track 1, and so on). Presuming that 24 tracks is enough for most of your songs, this will look like a typical 24 track studio, which is what it sounds like you want. It won't give you any more info, but it does look cool and will likely be enjoyed by the talent to see all those meters working while listening to playback. And you can easily re-route anything to address your needs on the fly.

 

[skier]

I forgot to mention that you must also create the routing in the DM from the FW card to channels 25-48. I just tried this on my mixer and it works well.

 

[myrideisa]

Man.....I'm sorry. I get exactly what you mean about Pro Tools having to send 24 channels to the mixer instead of 2 (for monitoring). But, where do I do that? I/O in PT?....change the output to all mono channels 1 thru 24? Do I change the Monitoring, Audition, PFl/AFL settings? Back in the day, after I got the mixer to the point where I could use it as I wanted to I stopped cold experimenting with other settings because I didn't want to screw up what was working. I DID just now try changing the output from stereo outs to (24) mono outs but of course that didn't do anything.

Do you suppose there's any hope of getting my clock working on the meterbridge or should I just forget that? Past being able to change the meter layer on the bridge via the mixer I haven't had any other successes. And I sure don't know what goes next.

Thanks for your help. You're throwing me a life-line here.

ds

 

[skier]

No apology necessary. You already have each track being output either directly to your stereo mix or to a sub buss that ultimately goes to the stereo mix. Once you have an initial destination selected as you do now with your existing tracks, you can output each of them to one or more additional destinations in Pro Tools by pressing the Windows' key and selecting that additional destination. In this case, try what I suggested earlier, such as sending track 1 of PT to track 1 on the FW output. Then, map track 1 coming into the DM on the FW card to track 25 in the DM. Do the same with track 2 in PT going out track 2 on FW into the DM onto track 26, and so on. Try doing this just with track 1 first to make sure you get the routing in PT and the DM correct. Once you do, you'll know what you have to do with each additional track.

If you find you want to limit the total tracks coming in to 24, such as 25-48 as I mentioned earlier, you can also combine some of your PT tracks by putting them out on the same track. For example, let's say you have 2 cymbals, one on track 13 and one of 14. You could send both of those onto the same output track to go into the DM. They'll both display on the same meter, but it's a way to consolidate sparsely used tracks. You can do the same if some of the percussion changes during the song, such as congas coming in for a section where the toms drop out, or anything else that makes sense. After all, you probably won't monitor and use the DM's meters to mix if you're actually doing most of that in the box — your initial question implied to me that you just wanted to display PT's tracks on the DM meter bridge. If you actually are mixing on the DM and your songs usually exceed 24 tracks, then there are better ways to think about doing this than limiting yourself to tracks 1 - 24 for recording and 25 - 48 for displaying them on the DM meter bridge. In that case, I would do bring the tracks back into the DM in the more conventional manner of flipping channels like you do on analog consoles — the DM supports that functionality also.

 

[Peter Batah]

Just my two cents. Perhaps someone with a 4800 could send @myrideisa an appropriate .tpl file to help him out. I would but I am using a 3200.

 

[myrideisa]

Hey. Thanks. I really am lost here. I don't like being a quitter but it's come to that. I thought you were describing the I/O window in the Setup tab. Do you mean the Mix window and those output assignments? I changed the Mix window channel outputs from the 1-2 stereo out to 1, 2, 3, and so on. You can output each of them to one or more additional destinations in Pro Tools by pressing the Windows' key and selecting that additional destination. You lost me on that one. I don't see a Windows key anywhere in the I/O window or the Mix window. Am I or am I not using the I/O under Setup? Or am I using the output destinations in the Mix window? I would think both but I don't know.

I guess it doesn't matter. I see no choice but to put this meter bridge up for sale and hope someone with a better understanding of the system can use it. Really, thank you so much for your help and attempts to get me going here but all of this frustration and maddening complexity of this system (to me) just isn't worth it. Like I said before, I've got the DM-4800 at an operating level where I can do all the things I want to do in my project studio and I'm very thankful for that. Jeez this is so darn frustrating. Dam.

 

[skier]

I'm sorry to hear that you're giving up. The "Windows" key is the key on your PC keyboard that has the Windows logo on it. It's usually between the Ctrl and the Alt keys. You press it down and while holding it, click on the additional destination to which you want to send the track's output.

 

[skier]

Just my two cents. Perhaps someone with a 4800 could send @myrideisa an appropriate .tpl file to help him out. I would but I am using a 3200.

Hey Peter, I'm not familiar with the TPL file type. Is that the type used on the DM's CF card?

 

[Peter Batah]

@skier Sorry about that. I meant *.TPI. My bad. Getting old. The eye sight must be going!

 

[skier]

We're all getting old. And I'm afraid that I could be older than you...ENOUGH!

I didn't know the TPI type either, but a quick search indicates it's used by the Tascam Mixer Companion app; I don't use the app. I installed it when I first got the mixer, found it just replicated screens/windows I already had in Pro Tools and/or on the mixer, and never went back to it. However, if myrideisa should decide to further pursue configuring PT to output to individual tracks, I'm happy to revisit TMC Companion and generating a config file for the DM side of things. But without getting PT properly set up to put out individual track data, there's no where to go.

Thanks for the suggestion!

 

[Arjan P]

@skier I think you should look into TMC, if only to back up your project files on the CF card as .tpi on the computer. Suppose your CF card goes bad - you'll at least have your mixer projects backed up to put on a 'new' CF card.

 

[skier]

Thanks Arjan! That's a very good suggestion! In fact, I believe you suggested this to me once before, perhaps 6 months or so ago and I didn't follow through — my bad. I've been saving my project files to 3 separate CF cards to assure I'd have a good copy in case I ever lose a card, but placing another copy on my computer would be a good idea as well as an extra bit of security.

At the risk of a slight, but quick, topic hijack, I've got one question: When I first started using the DM, I tried TMC as I previously mentioned, and it seemed to work better than it did later once I started using MIDI with the DM. Do you know if there is any conflict with TMC when the DM also communicates with MIDI devices?

 

[Peter Batah]

@skier Funny that you should mention the MIDI conflict. When my Axiom 61 is powered on and I startup TMC I usually get that error that claims that the companion cannot communicate with my DM. I am of the opinion that it could be a MIDI channel conflict. But, I could be wrong of course. So I usually turn off my MIDI keyboard when using TMC to perform backups which I do all of the time. And exactly how old are you if you don't mind me asking!

 

[Arjan P]

I wasn't aware of issues using TMC and MIDI - there shouldn't be, since the DMs MIDI channels go over its own USB connection, as do most other MIDI devices.

Apart from the DM USB, I've got an Akai LPK-25 keyboard, Akai MPX-8 sample player, Frontier Design Tranzport, Roli Seaboard Rise 25, M-Audio Midisport 8x8 and a Punchlight connected to the PC, all with their own MIDI implementation. No issues whatsoever..

 

[skier]

Arjan:
I get the same error about the TMC Companion not able to communicate with the DM as Peter mentions in post 16. It's interesting that he's experiencing what sounds like the same problem while you and others are not. I'm still going to follow your excellent suggestion of backing up my projects to my computer using TMC, but I wish it worked properly as it once did. I could be wrong about the cause being related to MIDI, but I do remember that it began immediately after I started expanding MIDI connections to several older sound modules that I have.

Peter:
Ohhhh! I don't think I can share my age and risk losing respect in the forum at this time. Let's say that I just started having grandchildren and leave it at that. HOWEVER, in the interest of assuaging my ego and all those insecurities, let's also note that I'm an aggressive skier, scuba diver, horse rider, and lots of other manly things...they are manly, aren't they? Please say they are!!!

 

[Peter Batah]

@skier. Glad to hear that you make a concerted effort to keep yourself fit. Doing all those manly things at "our" age is no easy task. I still think that I have you beat. I sincerely hope not though because then that would make me the oldest fart on the forum. (OFOF) Have yourself a safe and wonderful weekend. Don't break anything. Just kidding!

 

[skier]

@skier. Glad to hear that you make a concerted effort to keep yourself fit. Doing all those manly things at "our" age is no easy task. I still think that I have you beat. I sincerely hope not though because then that would make me the oldest fart on the forum. (OFOF) Have yourself a safe and wonderful weekend. Don't break anything. Just kidding!

"OFOF???" Yeah, that's definitely not a good thing and why we need to avoid too much info. Worse yet, I have all canuck ancestry. What can I say?