Hello I am trying to figure out if it is possible to route
each track of a 16 track song to a different Fireware audio channel. I want to make 16 tracks in the software sequencer to be able to hit record once and it puts each track in the Motif on its own designated audio track in the software.

My other question is: Does anyone have any insight to give me.
I already had a PreSonus FireStudio Mobile Interface and I am trying to figure out what ways I could benefit from having the FW16E. Is it just overkill to have both an interface and the FW16E ??

Also, has anyone successfully gotten the remote feature to work in studio one yet by presonus??? I got the transport controls from using the yamaha XS map, but only the knobs work aside from that.

Thanks in advance..

The answer to the first question is, yes you can transfer 16 tracks out of the Motif XF at once, but mostly that is not how you would necessarily want to do it.

It is important when discussing audio to understand the concept of 16 audio buses. Then determine how you want to transfer your data. A ‘bus’ can carry multiple signals. You can for example route all 16 tracks plus the AD input Part on a single bus… A single bus, by definition is mono. You can route all 16 tracks plus the AD Part on pair of buses - this is what defines stereo.

This may sound basic but is important to mention, because your question seems to conclude that because you have 16 MIDI tracks you are going to wind up with 16 audio tracks. And this is simply not the case. Why wouldn’t you want to record a Motif sound that is clearly a stereo sound in stereo. The Full Concert Grand, for example is a stereo Voice. Recording it as audio to your DAW would best be handled by allocating it a stereo bus.

Just because there are 16 MIDI tracks does not mean you will wind up with 16 audio tracks - of course you could but it would not be utilizing the potential of the FW16E to it’s capabilities.

It all depends on your goal. You can route individual drums on mono buses from within a drum kit Voice. This allows separate tracks for your principal drums, kick, snare, hihats, etc. You may find that multiple passes are necessary to accomplish your goal - it all depends on what you are going for in terms of mixing your project.

You may find that most of your MIDI tracks when rendered as audio survive just fine as mono audio but you will find others don’t seem to come alive in mono. That B3 sound in the stereo Rotary Speaker effect, for example. Or that Electric piano that uses Auto Pan, and a stereo Phaser.

Don’t make your busing decisions based on speed, base them on what you want the finished product to sound like. You may find that just to transfer your drums to audio may use up the 16 buses… So if your only reason to get an FW16E is you think it is going to make things faster - well it certainly can but it opens the doors to possibilities you have not yet thought about… There is greater artistic and creative potential because of the options it gives you.

Hope that helps.

Techman09 - 08 February 2011 05:24 AM

I already had a PreSonus FireStudio Mobile Interface and I am trying to figure out what ways I could benefit from having the FW16E. Is it just overkill to have both an interface and the FW16E ??

Consider this:

--> The PreSonus has mike preamps with XLR inputs and phantom power, the XF does not.

--> The PreSonus can record 6 line inputs at once, the XF can only record 2.

--> The PreSonus has zero latency monitoring in the hardware, with the XF you have to make changes to your DAW track settings.

--> The PreSonus has a stereo SPDIF (digital) input, the XF does not.

--> The PreSonus supports sample rates up to 96KHz, the XF is fixed at 44.1KHz

Now ask yourself how many of the PreSonus features are important to you.

I appreciate the insight from both of you.
I understand the benefit of having the Presonus interface I already have, I was trying to get some info o. How to best utilize the two together now that I have invested in the FW16E.

I was searching the manual to try And figure out how to send a single or a group of tracks to a certai audio bus, but I found myself stuck at having to send the whole mix through L & R Main ( I think that is what it is called).

The sequence I have been following has been: Pattern ---> Mix ---> Edit and when I go to S4 I think it opens me up to the output options bit it seems to be only referring tothe entire pattern mix.

I want to know how to isolate a track or 2 or three and send them to a certain bus. From Bad_Mister’s post, this appears to be very possible.

I don’t know how it is done in Studio One natively but I use the Motif XF VST to accomplish the goal of multiple output busses in Cubase.  Have you tried running the VST in Studio One?

Also, from what I understand I can’t run a second ASIO driver in Cubase so I ended up dumping my MOTU Ultralite MK3.  I don’t record entire bands so I didn’t need that many physical inputs anyway.  The only way around this is to get another interface that uses the same Yamaha FireWire driver such as the Yamaha mixers or Steinberg hardware products.

Maybe I need to just become the guinea pig to see how far you can push studio one in the direction of Cubase AI.
I also have Sonar but it does not let you use the VST editor. I am not familiar with Cubase so I might it to see if I like it enough to use it instead of the others.
In any case I think my way of lookin at the FW16E was somewhat limited or inaccurate, one or the other. I was looking for a way to get all the parts into the sequencer on separate tracks all at once. I was also trying to use the VST editor like a softsynth, looks like I have a little bit of studying to do.

Techman09 - 08 February 2011 05:24 AM

has anyone successfully gotten the remote feature to work in studio one yet by presonus???

I emailed PreSonus support about this a few weeks ago and they told me there is no support for Mackie Control, so Remote Mode will not work with StudioOne.

Ouch on the Mackie Control.  Using the Remote mode with FW16E has been an absolute blast for me with Cubase.  Are you saying you can’t use the Motif VST in Studio One OR Sonar?

With Cubase I’ve had all the FW16E audio channels in 8 stereo busses flowing through the DAW.  That gives me 8 different effect inserts and 8 different EQs and 8 different effect sends.. etc.  This is what Bad Mister was talking about.  A lot of flexibility with the FW16E.  You can even go more crazy resampling with the returns, etc.

For a home studio user who primarily plays with MIDI you would be hard pressed to find a better setup.  As I said above, obviously if you are recording a band live or need more than 2 channels of real world instruments recording at once you will need something else such as the N8 or N12 Yamaha mixer which will allow you to utilize the FW16E in a chain since those mixers use the same driver as the FW16E.

Techman09 - 08 February 2011 02:07 PM

I want to know how to isolate a track or 2 or three and send them to a certain bus. From Bad_Mister’s post, this appears to be very possible.

See page 194 of the Reference Manual.

[SONG]/[PATTERN] -> [MIXING] ->[EDIT] -> Part[1] – [16] ->[F1] Voice ->[SF2] Output

From this display, you can set the Reverb/Chorus depth
and the Output jack assignment for each Part.

Jack assignments are shown on page 110:

L&R;OUTPUT L and R Stereo
asL&R;ASSIGNABLE OUTPUT L and R Stereo
FW1&2;FW OUTPUT 1 and 2 Stereo (1: L, 2: R)
FW3&4;FW OUTPUT 3 and 4 Stereo (3: L, 4: R)
FW5&6;FW OUTPUT 5 and 6 Stereo (5: L, 6: R)
FW7&8;FW OUTPUT 7 and 8 Stereo (7: L, 8: R)
FW9&10;FW OUTPUT 9 and 10 Stereo (9: L, 10: R)
FW11&12;FW OUTPUT 11 and 12 Stereo (11: L, 12: R)
FW13&14;FW OUTPUT 13 and 14 Stereo (13: L, 14: R)
asL
ASSIGNABLE OUTPUT L Mono
asR
ASSIGNABLE OUTPUT R Mono
FW1
FW OUTPUT 1 Mono
: : :
FW14
FW OUTPUT 14 Mono

Igglethorpe - 08 February 2011 05:32 PM

Are you saying you can’t use the Motif VST in Studio One OR Sonar?

Techman09 - 08 February 2011 04:04 PM

I was also trying to use the VST editor like a softsynth

The XF VST Editor is a VST3 plugin, currently only Cubase supports VST3 (why not, Steinberg invented VST). All other DAWs are still back at VST 2.x. It’s unclear when (if ever) other mfrs will move to VST3.

BTW, this has nothing to do with Remote mode! You can use Remote mode with Sonar but not with StudioOne.

I actually got the VST editor to work in studio one because they now support VST 3. I cannot get remote mode to work. Thank you very much for the instructions on the output configuration. It seems that EVERY solution is missing one critical piece....

Cubase ---> One ASIO driver allowed (is there a way around this?)
Studio One ----> No remote mode, VST 3 seems to work
Sonar -----> No VST3 But remote works beautiful

Again, thanks for all of the awesome help and suggestions.

I do have another question. I have been playing with the VST editor in S1, it seems like about all I can do is change the parameters in my mix. I heard that it is possible to play the motif like a softsynth. Maybe this is just a Cubase capability?

Studio One definitely supports VST3. I downloaded the DEMO version and was able to use the Motif XF Editor in Studio One. However, I’m not able to give you accurate information on how to configure it - to get the best results. You should be able to access your Motif XF as a VST Instrument - I got a little confused about Keyboard and Instrument setups. But what you need to do is have a MIDI track that is recording and echoing the MIDI data back to the XF, the XF will then send audio to your DAW where you monitor the audio.

I am able to access my Motif XF as a VST Instrument in Studio One.
HOWEVER, I’m not able to configure it properly.  I am connected via USB and have all the latest drivers/updaters/etc. downloaded from yamaha synth. 

Specifically, when I open the XF VST Editor I cannot configure the MIDI OUT (see screenshot).  Studio One is receiving input from the XF as I can see the keys in the VST Editor light up when I play the XF (see screenshot), but I get no audio out (nor I have any options in the VST editor to change it -see screenshot of VSTI setup).

You mentioned, “what you need to do is have a MIDI track that is recording and echoing the MIDI data back to the XF, the XF will then send audio to your DAW where you monitor the audio.” How do you do that in StudioOne?

Your help is greatly appreciated.

Click thumbnail to see full-size image

Sorry, I don’t know enough about STUDIO ONE to offer you any real assistance. You should contact their customer support - when you find out - please share it here for others. Thanks.

Will do. 

I have an XF and XS and they work flawlessly with Cubase.  But a lot of my colleagues are jumping ship to Studio One.

did u solved the problem with the vst in studio one?