Does anyone have experience with direct monitoring while tracking with Cubase 8 Pro using the RME HDSPe MADI card? I’m really hoping to achieve latency free tracking!
Thanks!
Gantt
This isn’t a direct response to your question but maybe helpful… ignore if not. My rig (I7 3930K -Windows 64bit) has 2 RME Raydats configured and I track with efx @ 32 samples which is near zero latency (imperceptible) . I routinely track an 11 mic drum setup, guitar, bass and at least one mic with cue sends and headphone mixes live off the floor. I thought that direct monitoring would be necessary but as long as I choose zero latency plugins on my live tracks for efx and the master bus it is better than director monitoring for me. I suspect that you will get very similar results with your RME Hdsp madi system. Obviously once I get into mixing I replace some of the plug-ins with others that may induce added latency. If you haven’t tried to do this, I suggest giving it a shot. It is very convenient to to track with efx engaged and good sounding headphone mixes. The RME drivers as very smooth and up to the task. - Scotty
No problem here but I’m using outboard mixers/Fx and no vst fx/instruments as insert in Cubase during recording.
Hope this will help a little,
Peter
If you send me your RME MADI interface, I’d be happy to thoroughly test this for you. 
The new ASIO Guard 2 should give you the lowest latency possible, on Record Enabled tracks, while still providing CPU-sparing latency for the other tracks – all things being equal.
Also, you can double your sample rate and cut your latency in half.
You don’t say if you’re on Mac or Windows, but Mac does not have Direct Monitoring with RME hardware. I use TotalMix which works very well for me.
Thanks for the responses! I’ve been running the buffer at 64 - the lowest I can go, apparently - and with Greg Ondo’s help I’ve changed my setup a little. He enable ASIO Guard, and at 64 samples we measured about 4 ms input to output. My old PARIS system, which was pretty amazingly transparent clocks in at about 3 ms, so that’s not bad. Roughly the same as sitting 3’ from my guitar amp. Maybe I should shut up and not worry? Still, I’d like to at least know how to set the RME card up for zero latency tracking, whether I end up using it or not.
@ ffg - I’m on PC; Windows 7; i7 3.5gHz 4 core (2 threads per core, whatever that means!) processor; 16GB RAM; RME HDSPe MADI > Antelope Audio Orion-32. I have Totalmix, but the routing is a bit of a mystery.
Thanks!
Gantt
On Windows, you’re set. Direct Monitoring on RME MADI works like a charm.
Not really an answer to your question, but Paris latency, analog in to analog out through an EQ and compressor, is 1.5 ms at 44.1K Amazing even now, 18 years later.
http://www.kerrygalloway.com/WikiPARIS/wikka.php?wakka=ParisLatency
The good thing is that you don’t need to worry about the routing - that’s what direct monitoring does automatically for you. All you need to do is enable it in cubase under devices - device setup - vst audio system.
Michael
Update -
I am, in fact, on a Windows machine and Direct Monitor and TotalMix do seem to work together pretty well. There are quirks that I haven’t quite figured out yet - and you need to have the direct monitor rack enabled under the cue mix rack, the TotalMix faders will move to match cue mix settings if “cue” is selected for cue mix, mixer settings if “mix” is selected. There are some buttons on the TotalMix faders that I’m not clear on - a “T”, that, I think, locks the fader across all outputs. It does, however, allow for latency free tracking and overdubbing - I use an outboard verb to provide some ambience for the direct tracks. I’m still baffled that PARIS had near zero latency with native fx working back in the late '90’s with the computers we had then. Amazing that feat can’t be duplicated!
gantt