I recently outfitted my XF7 with the FW16e expansion board, and am quite pumped up about getting it to work for me.  I have to admit that I had been under the wrong assumption, about proper operation with it, until I recently read a response - from Bad_Mister - to another poster.  Previously (when I had the mLAN16e2 in my XS6)I had thought that getting audio tracks into one’s DAW was as simple as integrating the synth with computer, and setting up DAW tracks for recording.  I could never understand the whys & wherefores of my battles, until I recently read what ‘BM’ had to reveal to the mentioned poster.  I now see that there is a bit more to be setup, in order to achieve one’s aim at recording audio from the synth’s sequencer into the DAW.

The FW16e is supposed to allow for 16-tracks of digital audio to be streamed into the computer, but it now seems that the sequenced data stays in the MIDI domain, and has to be ‘CONVERTED’ to audio.  I have searched everywhere that I could think, in an effort to find some information on how to go about doing this, but have been (thus far) unsuccessful. 

Could anyone direct me to some helpful info on this issue?

Advanced thanks.

Think of MIDI as the modern equivalent of a piano roll for a player piano. The roll itself makes no sound. But put that roll into any player piano and the piano will play back the note information stored in the roll.

At some point you still have to record audio from the XF into the DAW because the actual sound always comes from the XF itself. Recording MIDI into your DAW yields no sound, it’s just data that can be played back to an external MIDI device (i.e. the XF). Just because the FW16E passes both MIDI and audio over a single cable doesn’t mean that the two get merged somehow.

meatballfulton - 01 April 2011 06:06 PM

At some point you still have to record audio from the XF into the DAW because the actual sound always comes from the XF itself.

And this is the process that I am trying to find out how to go about doing.

OK, you have an FW16E.  What is your DAW, Cubase or something else? Windows or Mac computer?

The physical part is easy: Firewire cable from the FW16E to your computer. Done.

The rest is programming the XF and the DAW...that’s why I asked what DAW you are using.

meatballfulton - 01 April 2011 07:54 PM

OK, you have an FW16E.  What is your DAW, Cubase or something else? Windows or Mac computer?

The physical part is easy: Firewire cable from the FW16E to your computer. Done.

The rest is programming the XF and the DAW...that’s why I asked what DAW you are using.

Thanks for trying to help me out with this, and I apologize for not having the presence of mind to leave the requested information, earlier.

My DAW is Cubase5, and I am running it on a Vista64 PC.

The FW16e is supposed to allow for 16-tracks of digital audio to be streamed into the computer, but it now seems that the sequenced data stays in the MIDI domain, and has to be ‘CONVERTED’ to audio.  I have searched everywhere that I could think, in an effort to find some information on how to go about doing this, but have been (thus far) unsuccessful

A basic understanding of what MIDI is and what Audio is, is fundamental before beginning.

The SEQUENCER in the Motif records MIDI data and MIDI data only. In layman’s terms, MIDI data cannot be a finished product. You cannot take the MIDI data you recorded in the Motif XS sequencer over to your friend’s house and play them your song, UNLESS, of course, they also have a Motif XS.

This is fundamental to understand. MIDI data is a series of coded messages that represent the musical performance. When played back to your Motif XS, or any other Motif XS, will instruct it on what Voices to select, what volumes to set, what effects to choose, etc., etc.

MIDI data (the coded messages) cause the Motif’s tone engine to ‘convert’ the data to audio. Audio is something you can hear. A .WAV file is a file that contains AUDIO data. When played back - all by itself, you can hear the musical performance - that you can take to a friend’s house and play on their computer (no Motif XS necessary).

Your first statement above “The FW16E is supposed to allow for 16-tracks of digital audio to be streamed into the computer” while true is troublesome because a MIDI Track does not equal an AUDIO Track.

Ponder this for a minute: “The FW16E allows for 16 audio buses of digital audio to be streamed to the computer...” This is a more correct statement. Because the word “track” is what is troublesome… when audio buses is what the FW16E provides (it has no ‘tracks’).

A bus - you know what a bus is, the word is clear enough in English, musicians try and make it more complicated when it comes to audio signal, but it is still simple: A Bus is vehicle that can carry multiple passengers on a specific route from point A to point B.

When it comes to audio signal, you can put multiple audio signals on a bus and route it from your Motif XS to your computer (via firewire).  When mixing a project, I might have 3 separate tracks: Trumpet 1, Trumpet 2 and Trombone… I could route all three tracks (together) on a single MONO bus to Cubase. I might have 3 sax tracks: Alto, Tenor and Bari… I could route all three tracks on a single MONO bus to Cubase.

It is possible to route all of the tracks on a single MONO bus - or I could take all tracks and send them on a STEREO bus (this is the default condition when all PARTS are set to L/R out). The difference between a MONO bus and a STEREO bus is more than it takes 2 connections to make a stereo… because you can certainly have 2 MONO buses side-by-side that are not stereo.

A bus is a Stereo bus when the signal in each of the two connectors is related to the signal in the other. You know this from the PANORAMA POTENTIOMETER… or Pan Pot, or “Pan”, for short… this is a control that adds electrical resistance to the signal path - as you increase the resistance to the flow of electrons on the LEFT channel, more signal travels to the RIGHT channel. So panning something to the RIGHT is actually increasing the RESISTANCE to it flowing to the left. The farther you pan it RIGHT, the less of that signal travels through the LEFT bus, and the more that travels through the RIGHT bus. STEREO pairs of channels have a relationship with what is in the other channel.

Now when we say the FW16E has 16 buses, you can create 14 mono channels plus 1 stereo (main) channel. You can see these when you call up the OUTPUT SELECT parameter. 14 mono + 1 stereo = 16 audio buses

We don’t talk about 16 “tracks” of audio, because any number of MIDI track’s audio data can be put on any bus. The buses can be mono or can be setup in ODD/EVEN pairs as you might require to accomplish your goal.

A MIDI track can trigger a MONO signal or it can trigger a STEREO signal… it all depends on what sound you select.  If your MIDI track is routed to a BASS guitar sound, typically a MONO sound, that is one thing. But what if your MIDI track is routed to the Full Concert Grand sound, this is a Voice that is definitely recorded in STEREO… you have to decide do you want to maintain the STEREO sound of this VOICE when you create an AUDIO Track in Cubase?

Or how about an Organ sound, the organ Voice is mono, but the Rotary Speaker (Insertion Effect) is stereo… do you want to capture the Rotary Speaker effect? Of course you do… so you would allocate a Sterero bus for the B3 sound! Make sense?

The productions decisions necessary when working with a DAW like Cubase are many. There is no one way to work. Some folks take the time to separate each of the MIDI PARTS to separate Tracks in their DAW because they think they are “supposed to” - that is not true. It is up to what you want to do with it when you get it there.

We have posted a few comprehensive tutorials here on Motfator that take you through some of the production decisions (just as an example) - but in general, the only reason to separate a PART to a separate AUDIO TRACK in your DAW is if you want to treat it or process it somehow differently when you get it there.

In one of the examples, we record a 5 PART composition in the Motif XS, then we show how you can route the Guitar part on a separate audio bus to Cubase and process it with a Dynamic limiter

In another example, we use the buses to isolate individual Drums - it is possible to use all the available buses just to transfer the drum sounds. Separate KICK, SNARE, HIhats, Toms, etc., etc., etc.  This is accomplished in one pass, then on the next pass you can do the musical instruments sounds.

16 MIDI tracks does not always turn into an equivalent number of audio tracks. Sometimes it can be more, sometimes it can be less. But if you enter this thinking MIDI = AUDIO you go into this NOT knowing how it works.

In the drum transfer: KICK drum is mono (it would not benefit from being stereo). The SNARE drum is mono, but the TOMS (say there are four of them) might benefit from being routed on a stereo pair… why? because you can have them panned out so that when the roll occurs they move right to left in the stereo panorama. In the tutorial file there is a lot of percussion - rather than record each percussion part on a separate bus, I created a stereo pair for percussion (pre-mixing)

So recording is a series of decisions - often you are committing to a pre-mix of data, it is rarely necessary to record everything to separate audio track - unless you plan on tons of processing in your DAW. After all you have very powerful Insertion Effects and EQ built-into the Motif XS itself. Many are far better than what you find as plug-ins in software (I will not argue the point, but in my opinion I feel this to be the case).

I finish this discussion by saying, I try, very hard, not to allow someone to think that getting an FW16E is going to SAVE them time… Yes, you can transfer multiple parts simultaneously, but I cannot guarantee that once you discover all of what you can do, that you will not wind up wanting to use it. And “using” it to its fullest potential means you now have the ability to be creative - and creative is not always “fast”.  Once you realize you can take individual drums from a single MIDI DRUM TRACK and create individual AUDIO tracks from each drum… whose to say.... you might want to do that.

If you think you are always going to transfer all your 16 MIDI tracks in one pass, you are (IMHO) naive… once you see the power that you have with an FW16E, you might wind up doing more than you first thought!

It opens the door to a bigger world of possibilities. And you cannot even see the possibilities until you OPEN that DOOR.

Hi,

I want to do what NLAIston asked. Basically, I want to swap (or replace) the Midi Data in my Cubase 5 with Audio. I heard this is called “Bouncing”.

So as Bad_Mister stated above, when I finish my production, I want to be able to take only the music in my cubase to my friends house without taking My XF8.

Im running Cubase 5 on Mac OSX
which is connected to my Motif XF8 via Fw16e firewire.

Best regards,

Blue_Shade_Me.

I want to be able to take only the music in my cubase to my friends house without taking My XF8.

If all you want to do is play the finished mix… then it is really simple:

Place a USB drive that you know works with your Motif XF in the TO DEVICE port.
Call up your SONG
Press [FILE]
Press [F4] AUDIO
Press [SF1] REC
Give the FILE a Name
Press [ENTER]
Set the TRIGGER LEVEL = 1
Press [ENTER] to arm the recorder

Press PLAY to begin playback and recording of the file.
When the song is complete press [ENTER] to end recording.

You now have a stereo .WAV file you can take to your friend’s house (16-bit, 44.1kHz)

What if you have a recorded midi track using a voice from the Motif as part of a 4 track song in Logic.  How do I get that midi track to turn into an audio track and combine all the tracks for a song in logic?

Bad_Mister thanks in advance… you can just point me to threads or articles if they provide the info.

I’m new (had the Motif XF8 about a month) , tonight I put the FW16E in and installed the Steinberg driver (v 1.6, Windows 7 64-bit) and Cubase 6.  I have Sonar X1 Producer (expanded) , Coda Finale, and Sibelius 7.1

I was able to record and playback (midi) with Sonar and Sibelius, made my day, encouraging.

My first goal is to transcribe (notation to a score, probably using Sibelius) the many songs I’ve created most using various Performances. I need to route to the midi channels.

For example, I have a song with 4 parts based on Traumzeit.
1. Chill out kit
2. Dark Bass
3. Heavens Door
4. Full Concert Grand

I would like to send each part (with arps) to a different midi channel (1,2,3,4)

or even better split out the drum kit (1,2,3,4,5 whatever it can break out) then bass 6 and piano 7 (don’t really need the Heavens door)!

I found the tracks window and TxCh (is that transmit channel?)

Is there a more detailed document on the FW16E than the Owner’s Manual that came with it?
thanks

First I would recommend Cubase 6 for your notation (as well as your recording) - it allows you to QUANTIZE how your music LOOKS without having to change how it sounds. Honestly, when I found this out it becomes exactly what you really want when playing and then creating notation from your playing. Nothing is worse then having you quantize your playing just to make it look good.

In many so-called notation programs they seem to have forgotten that musicians play with FEEL, and how it looks on the page is devoid of that feel. So quantizing how it looks without changing what you played is worth it (at least for me)… Just wanted to pass that on since you have choice of software to use.

My first goal is to transcribe (notation to a score, probably using Sibelius) the many songs I’ve created most using various Performances. I need to route to the midi channels.

For example, I have a song with 4 parts based on Traumzeit.
1. Chill out kit
2. Dark Bass
3. Heavens Door
4. Full Concert Grand

I would like to send each part (with arps) to a different midi channel (1,2,3,4)

I highly recommend that you use the Motif XF’s DIRECT PERFORMANCE RECORD to initially record yourself playing the PERFORMANCE (record to the internal XF sequencer).

It is designed to allow you to record from PERFORMANCE mode sending each PART to a separate MIDI Track and it does so with no muss, and no fuss.

Once you have the data in the Motif XF sequencer it is a simple matter to move it to whichever of the software programs you wish to use.

If you elect to use Sonar, or Finale or Sibelius you will need to save your SONG as a SMF (Standard MIDI File) and then load it into those programs.

If you elect to use Cubase you can simply have Cubase IMPORT your MOTIF XF SONG. You do so by STORING your SONG in the XF, then create an ALL Data file (.X3A)
Cubase can open a Motif XF File and extract the SONG data by placing each XF MIDI track on a MIDI Track of Cubase, and each XF “Audio Track” and place it on an Audio Track of Cubase. Again no muss, no fuss.

Motif XF SONG IMPORT

Hi.
I’m just getting back to my XF8, my cubase 6 trail has expired.

I’m on amazon.com looking to buy it , not sure what version I need for the XF8?

Cubase Artist 6 ? but I don’t see any mention features for the XF8 .
Steinberg’s website adds more confusion than help on the many various products..

ZenMusic - 23 July 2012 01:57 AM

not sure what version I need for the XF8? Cubase Artist 6 ?

All versions of Cubase 6 integrate the same way with the XF8. They differ in other ways like track counts, included plugins, score notation, support for complex monitor mixes, etc. If you’ve read the comparison chart it details them all, you get to choose which suits your needs.

For the average hobbyist, Cubase Elements has everything you’ll need. The “full” Cubase 6 is suited for full professional applications, Cubase Artist lies between the two.