Overbridge as control-surface only

Beta Public Beta
#1

hi there,

hoping someone is having the same usecase, the question goes like this:

is it possible to completely disable usb-audio for overbridge and using the overbridge gui only as a control-surface?
i want to incorporate the gui (and some midi-mappings for it) into my hardware only setup.
because this would open up the possibility of a better workflow with the a4 synth as well as patch-recall.

i would want to sequence the a4 with a hardware sequencer over midi while controlling the synth over the gui (usb).

cheers and thanks for every and any input on this :slight_smile:

1 Like
#2

Hi.
I just tested and it already works!
I started only the control VST in my DAW.
Playing notes from a hardware sequencer and manipulating A4 settings in the plugin. Sound comes out from A4 main outs. :+1:

#3

fwiw. i’m slightly confused - you talk of hardware only & running a GUI !
you want to map to vst and then to a4- why not just map direct to a4 ?
what patch recall are you referring to ?
.
overbridge is an overall term for a few things - i believe the control panel will not allow you to turn off all i/o - and i’m not too sure why you want to turn them off tbh - just don’t use them, no ? the vst doesn’t deal with audio at all
.
maybe be a bit more specific about the workflow ideas - have you not just tried it out, what’s the issue ?
.
for sure you can control different aspects over DIN midi and USB midi or via OB usb

#4

The VST does deal with audio. I can have my Firebox selected in Live, yet the VST brings in audio from the AK. Oh, maybe you meant the VST GUI, vs the control panel where you enable the various IO?

That said, I was unclear what the OP meant too. Overbridge also comes with the separate USB audio driver, which is completely independent from the plug in, and each can be used without the other.

#5

okay. i´ll point out the issue a little more.

so i have a hardware sequencer sending midi note information to the a4.
aside of the a4 another synth as well as a drum module is sequenced.
now, im using ableton live to play some samples along to the sequenced
sounds.
so, not “strictly hardware” in this regard.
and when i run a laptop anyways i figured it would great to overcome
a major LACK of the a4 - the missing ability to react to a midi dump request for the actual
parameter setting state of the a4 (its not implemented yet, maybe it never will be).
i would want to do that by mapping out
the parameters using the a4 vst plugin to my controller (which has endless encoders).

now, as the a4 is connected directly to a hardware mixer,
i dont want the vst plugin to use precious resources for piping usb audio I/O.
i just want the plugin to control the sound parameters.

this is the usecase described in detail.
maybe i have to count in the usb audio resources - even if i wont ever use the usb audio side of the a4…

#6

okay - sounds like you’ll get your wishes by setting the minimal i/o options in the OB control panel - iirc you have to have a minimum requirement and not nil i/o but that may change or have changed - it should work fine anyway as the full audio is meant to work in parallel with the control stuff, if you run the minimal channel count it ought to help

#7

hey avantronica - thats what i thought in the beginning.
i really hope, one can (in the future) disable usb-audio
just for the sake of overcoming the pesky midi dump request issue
which is somewhat annoying and renders a dedicated
hardware control surface useless…
and, in my opinion, this is what the a4 sorely needs!

#8

okay, I see.

In my test, I was streaming 16 channels of audio from an X32 rack at the same time as (not used) usb audio from the A4. While doing this I was sending MIDI notes to the A4 via DIN connection (Faderfox SC4 -> iConnect4+ -> A4).
My usb bus seems to hold up to the task(MacBook Pro Retina mid 2012).
I did not do any long running tests or measure any difference in latency though,

#9

[quote="=FFW=>>"]…

and when i run a laptop anyways i figured it would great to overcome
a major LACK of the a4 - the missing ability to react to a midi dump request for the actual
parameter setting state of the a4 (its not implemented yet, maybe it never will be).

…[/quote]

I’m not sure whether I understand your requirement fully, but in case it’s of any use to you then Jakob Penca has mapped out the current AF SysEx implementation here. Apologies in advance if this is not what you’re looking for.

#10

guys, thank you very much for thinking through the situation.
as it stands now, i will just use the plugin and mute it.
it works whith mapping out the parameters i need and getting them updated on my controller using the plugin.
i will just forget about the resources thrown out for the usb-audio - which can (unfortunately) not be disabled.

going on a hacking/sysex spree now is just not within my timeframe :wink:

#11

I was hoping to use overbridge as a midi DAW controller too. It would be better if it was possible to completely disable the audio driver/facility and use the midi controller aspect of overbridge only. Are you guys saying that currently, it is not possible?

#12

Haven’t tested to see if it will still function if you disable all the IO, but is it really using THAT much of your system resources if you do have to have a couple outputs enabled?

#13

actually i do, in fact, not know how much of a drag the usb-audio is.
but nonetheless, i need the usb bandwidth anyways, as well as the
cpu resources…
for now its absolutely okay to just mute the plugin.

#14

I was just looking for a way to only use the control side of overbridge without the audio. So a little bump from me here. Hope we will be able to disable the audio side of overbridge in the near future.

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#15

Can you not get the outcome by disabling all audio throughput in the OB control panel. Then the usb machine control and other control aspects are all that are sent ?

1 Like
#16

haven’t tried that yet after reading the thread. I thought that you can’t disable all audio via Overbridge. But I will check that myself :slight_smile: Thanks for the hint!

1 Like
#17

Yeah, that part works.
What doesn’t work is that the sync is screwed up between the DAW and the elektron device (rytm in my case). Overbridge locks on to the internal DAW clock and is only in sync with the DAW if i use the audio in from overbridge. As soon as i mix my DAW and the Rytm externally the sync is shit with no way to adjust it. Completely useless in that case.

#18

Make sure that in your MIDI settings in Ableton the RYTM is not set to sync so that only the plugin is handling the sync.

#19

Well, that’s not the problem. Overbridge is already doing the sync and it locks well. BUT the sync is not the correct one for external mixing. It is only good if you use audio over overbridge. So when i mix my device externally it will be locked, but shifted. What i need is to offset the overbridge sync so i can match it to the DAW. Basically a shift option on top of overbridge. But there is no option to do that.

#20

I have found that the overall latency compensation in Ableton’s audio settings does a lot to tighten up the OB sync.