VST Audio Bay

[Bitfiend]

Release ASIO Driver in the background
Direct Monitoring

should these be ticked or un-ticked in SX3?

[admin]

Release driver lets go of the asio driver when Cubase isn't the currently selected program. This allows other programs to access the driver. Most drivers are multi client though which means they can share without this being on. Unless you really need it keep it off.

Direct moniter means when you use the monitor enable in a track instead of hearing the signal from Cubase's mixer with the added latency you'll hear the signal direct from the soundcard. Not all soundcards support this but I believe if it shows the option at all then yours does. The disadvantage is that you don't hear any of the effects you might have on that channel since the signal is coming pre-Cubase.

[Bitfiend]

Direct moniter means when you use the monitor enable in a track instead of hearing the signal from Cubase's mixer with the added latency you'll hear the signal direct from the soundcard. Not all soundcards support this but I believe if it shows the option at all then yours does. The disadvantage is that you don't hear any of the effects you might have on that channel since the signal is coming pre-Cubase.

You know, why hasn't a clear and concise explanation like this been posted on the web, sheesh!! I searched for a couple hours yesterday and got nowhere but a bunch of undecernable tech-speak.
Thanks for clearing that up! This would definitely help, IMHO, when recording a in a band situation.....nice.

so next question, hear it where? if that box is ticked does that mean all tracks that playing will be heard like that over the master?

[admin]

Ok say you have a guitar signal being sent into track 1 on your project. Now in order to hear it you need to click the speaker icon (moniter) on that track. This assumes you aren't using an external mixer to listen to the guitar.

If you select direct monitor then the signal from the soundcard itself will be heard directly out of the soundcard, without going to Cubase and back (no latency). In this case the soundcard is sending the signal to Cubase to record, but it's also sending a copy directly out the outputs so you can hear it with no delay added.

It would just affect that input you had selected. So if the guitar was on input one of your soundcard, only that input should be echoed out the soundcards outs for monitoring.

[Bitfiend]

gotcha, gotcha, gotcha!
I will definately have to play with this with the band.
SO, is this where all the claims of zero latency monitoring come from with all the sound card companies?

[admin]

It could be. Some systems like PT and Scope have very minimal, like 1.5 ms latency from the converters (not the drivers) and claim that as well. But they aren't using direct monitoring but instead dsp to achieve almost nil latency to do that.