Patchbay W/ Dark Trinity

The Lounge Other Gear
#2

You didn’t mention how you will mix the outputs of the two effects units and any untreated instruments, unless you intend to only be using one instrument and one effects box at any time.

For maximum effectiveness from a patchbay (to prevent switching cables), you need as many inputs and outputs as your gear has inputs and outputs.

Your chosen gear has 10 main inputs, and 8 main outputs, because you appear to be spurning the individual outs on the AR and the Cue outputs on the OT. I strongly recommend that you include the Cue outs on the OT in your plans. Therefore you would likely want a patch bay with at least 10 inputs and 10 outputs.

Note that by losing your mixer, you would be losing a LOT of flexibility in routing because you do not have the aux busses that it provides.

Is there any possibility that you can keep the mixer in your space?

I used to have a small setup using a Shure Auxpander matrix mixer to route any of four groovebox-style instruments and effects units to any other. I don’t use the Auxpander any more, so I will be selling one or two of those soon.

In my current setup, all outputs from MM, MD, and OT go to patchbays, with the main outputs semi-normalled to input channels on my mixer. The aux sends and returns on the mixer are also routed to the patchbays for maximum flexibility.

#3

My plan would be as follows:

A4 Main out -> OT in (A/B)
AR Main out -> OT in (C/D)

So, I’m miffled about this:

The Biscuit and the BigSky: My options are to:

  1. have them connected to the main outs of one of the machines (If they’d be after the OT, they would be on the main bus, so to speak)

  2. Have them connected to the CUE outs of the OT (So I can use the OT to route either of the Analog machines to them, or individual OT tracks)

  3. Somehow use a patchbay to keep each of these options open to me. This is the difficult part.

So basically, in my patchbay, I would need jacks for:

A4 main out (2TS)
AR main out (2TS)
OT main out (2TS)
OT cue out (2TS)

And, of course, this is just if I want to keep the BigSky and Biscuit chained together…

To answer your question: I would very much like to let go of the mixer – it’s a nice Allen&Heath ZED14, but it’s very big and space is going to be very limited.

How do people set up their live rigs? The trinity with two effects boxes shouldn’t be a massive hurdle, right? :slight_smile:

#4

… not if you have a mixer. :wink:

A patchbay is unlikely to be very helpful for the small setup that you’re envisioning.

You could put the Biscuit on the main output from the OT, and have the BigSky return go to the inputs on the AF or AR, and not need a patchbay.

You might find that for the minimal set-up you require that you should also get rid of one or both of the effects units. There’s a reason why Elektron put effects in their instruments.

#5

Okay, thank you for the help.

How did you find the matrix mixer in your old setup? Would that do the job?

#6

The matrix mixer is especially nice if ALL the machines can treat external audio in different ways, so I was able to spontaneously send any MM, MD, OT audio to any of the other instruments. A Shure Auxpander is unlikely to fit your requirements if you want to reduce space, though.

The more I think about your situation, the more I think that you can go with the AF, AR, OT, and maybe one effects unit, and not need a mixer and certainly not a patch bay.

#7

The matrix mixer is especially nice if ALL the machines can treat external audio in different ways, so I was able to spontaneously send any MM, MD, OT audio to any of the other instruments. A Shure Auxpander is unlikely to fit your requirements if you want to reduce space, though.

The more I think about your situation, the more I think that you can go with the AF, AR, OT, and maybe one effects unit, and not need a mixer and certainly not a patch bay.[/quote]
Okay – thanks for all the help, it’s really valuable to me as patching and routing is really my weak point!
And yeah, your advice makes a lot of sense. Can’t really see how I could make the most of a reverb unit without sends…

#8

I’ve been in a similar situation.
Decided to start building a case for the trinity, with a patchbay.
This will allow me to access all I/O of each box, and somewhat treat all 3 boxes as one semi modular instrument.
I intend on incorporating a mixer for recording, as well as swapping out fx monosynths and some eurorack eventually.

Although it’s no in my pics yet, there will also be jacks for midi and USB.

http://www.elektronauts.com/t/dark-trinity-case-wip/15593

#9

This is the ultimate swiss knife to route FX in a Live settings

http://www.soundsculpture.com/products/switchblade8f.htm

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#10

don’t overlook the possibilities offered by using the ‘mixing’ and bus configuration offered in standalone mode with devices like the MOTU UltraLite 10/14 i/o and later ones have FX
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very handy for quick routing and it allows you to patch in vsts when you’re near a computer
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haven’t looked, but i’m figuring it may allow midi swapping of the configuration templates
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may be a little shy on i/o for patch bay, but offers added flexibility if you already have one/similar

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#11

This is actually a pretty great idea. This would allow me to eliminate the mixer, swap the old audio interface for a new one, AND give me an FX loop. What it isn’t is cheap, but by selling stuff I might be able to do it.

EDIT: By the way, see how this works? In my first post, I attached a pic of a mini patchbay, and now I’m looking at a MOTU interface, goddamnit :smiley:

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#12

sweet - those old ones work well for this purpose and you can sometimes see similar or s/h ones on teh cheap - obviously connector format may be the driver - FW for me ! The later versions have FX and the comment I made about plugging in VSTs would require a daw or Max/MSP to do the more advanced plumbing - but teh CueMix software for the devices can be configured to provide quite flexible routing - I use it standalone to use the pre-amp but fed internally to add some stereo FX send/returns on the spare i/o and then send to OUTS - simple enough to patch in an instance of valhalla-vintage-verb to spice it up but to still be essentially working outside of the computer
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for the trinity it would be ideal to have a few extra pairs of i/o given that some of the 10/14 are sp/dif
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these ‘built in mixer’ interfaces are quite old now - so maybe other manufacturers have funky options to explore

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#13

Sorry. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: The soundcard should be a soundcard first and foremost.
I’ve got eyes on doing something more interesting with a spare Behringer patchbay as it happens ! :wink:
I’d also like a small mixer with very basic options - actually thinking of making one - hoping Elektron doesn’t make something like this !

#14

Yeah, but the solution actually seems perfect for me:

A) I don’t really do a lot of actual mixing on my desk, it’s more for routing purposes. So the clunkier interface of the MOTU as opposed to an actual mixer is not that huge of a deal.
B) There are very few small-footprint mixers with 2 sends, which I’d like to have.

Could you elaborate a bit on your example of using Valhalla? So you have it routed through a DAW with an instance of Valhalla running?

The huge selling point for me is standalone operation – and being able to use a pair of outs and a pair of ins as an FX loop, I gather that’s fully possible without a computer?

EDIT: Oh and sorry, one more question: Can I save ‘snapshots’ of different sets of settings, or do you need to adjust manually for each use case?

Thanks for all the help!

#15

Right, you’re in luck - my 3000th post gets to be a slightly luxurious one, normal short replies from now on in … :wink:
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I’ve grabbed a screen grab of a (very paired down) working Max patch
On the left there is a configuration that could only work in A DAW or Max that allows internal routing - should be very simple in even the most basic DAW - Instances of vst there are inline plugins
On the right of the ‘patch’ there is a part which could theoretically work in standalone - it only exploits send/return and the other internal wiring is done in a Mix BUS
That whole Max/MSP patch would run as is, but to achieve the right hand side with e.g. a guitar going into Input 1 and being sent/returned and pushed out main you’d need 2 Buses on my version of Hardware (out of 4)
Each bus can be sent to one output pair - note the numbering convention is a bit fiddly on Outs to allow the Main Outs to be named 1/2
So you can work with that info to see what sub mixes of inputs to 4 different instances of output pairs can do for you
Obviously in the example I posted (if set up in isolation) - there’s no need for the last internal connection from 5/6 return to Main 1/2, you’d just come from the FX direct, but you see what’s possible - you can mix to the same Output pair on different Mixes
It is controllable with snapshot configurations in hardware, but i’m not sure if those are midi selectable - the Mixes are also HUI etc drivable - so it’s possible an iPhone could be handy to set levels if needed
There will be more purpose built solutions than this, but if a sound card upgrade is on the cards then go for it, i needed this for an octophonic project.
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I’m in same boat as you, so quite keen to see how much i can push this to be my mini mixer - and if i needed FX for a session, i’d just run it with a headless Mac Mini to provide the send/return to valhalla etc, in which case the Bus Mixes are less restrictive - make it as you like.
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Food for though;, i think you’d need to get your head into a manual before going down this road and consider all the issues - i can’t really add much more to this - well, i can, if you have CV gear - the MOTU Ultralite can push out very tasty DC coupled voltages … +/- 4ish volts iirc super handy with Max/MSP for creating custom/extra CV signals for other gear
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Great box - wish I had the FX one, not sure if it’s global fx or not
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Best thing you can do is draw it all out - same applies to patch bay especially ones with selectable routing switches like PX2000 PX3000, but they’re better for distributing rather than mixing
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1st Image is basic MSP patch - 2nd/3rd are bus mixes to achieve RHS of example patch in standalone mode - see caveat above !
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#16

Heh, thanks so much :slight_smile:

Great stuff with the MAX patch!

Yeah, I think the audio interface upgrade makes sense – in addition to getting rid of the mixer, I can use this to record the Octatrack along with A4 and AR – I’ve been routing the Octatrack through the A4 ins, but that poses problems of its own. Not least the fact that it’s a royal mess, trying to route JUST the Octatrack over to … Ah well, this isn’t too interesting. :smiley:

But yeah. This is the plan.

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#17

looks like a modest mixing requirement when you bring most of it back out to the OT - there are two pairs of outs defined - so i guess two buses are required -one is (maybe) everything to Main 1/2 & one is ‘what-u-want’ to Send
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just keep in mind that the Bus Mixes run concurrently - so you may have sent and returned(with FX) coming out at the same time - bit easier with a wet-only reverb
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but as long as you think of these things ahead of time there may not be too many roadblocks ahead - i.e. Do your research - but if a multi i/o card has uses anyway then it’s all a bonus - it’s great that the headphones Bus can be totally different (i.e. 1 of the 4)
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run it past some ‘active’ MOTU users as the later boxes may have their own idiosyncrasies - i may have got some things wrong above too - yhbw :+1:

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#18

I read your post yesterday after a few beers and was pretty confused. Now it makes perfect sense :slight_smile:

Yeah, I don’t think at the moment that there will be big surprises. Will report back with my findings!

#19

Reporting back.

Still have an Octatrack, and a similar interface to the MOTU. All else has changed. But still, as few boxes as GAS permits and minimal mixing seems to be working.

Will get back later.

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#20

“Still have an Octatrack […]. All else has changed.”

The beauty of that. <3

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#21

Also this…

IMG_1458

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