MR816 + Studios

Cubase
1

Hi. I’ve recently switched from Cubase 5 Studio and an old MOTU 828 to Cubase 6 and an MR816csx. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the Control Room/Studios functionality to replicate the same monitoring setup I had before. I’ve read the manual, checked out some YouTube videos and read postings here, but there’s one thing I’m still puzzled by.

Here’s what I had before, and I’m trying to get back to:
Using a somewhat kludgy but functional set up I was able to feed over to the tracking room a 2-track playback, click, vocal monitor as separate signals. This gave the performer the ability to have independent volume on the 2-track playback, the click track, and their vocal monitoring (using a small mixer).

With my current setup I’m not having any trouble setting up a separate 2-track send (using Studio 1 assigned to hardware outputs 3/4) and the click (using Studio 2 [out 5/6], panned to one side), but what I can’t figure out is how to send the vocal mic monitor to a dedicated output (i.e. Studio 2, hardware output 6).

Ultimately I want two things:

  1. To hear the vocal mic in the control room monitors (outputs 1/2) 100% of the time, regardless of the track monitor button’s state (so I can hear comments from the singer on playback).

  2. To always send the vocal mic to outputs 1/2 and output 6, and no other outputs.

Or, if it’s easier to work in pairs, have the outputs as:
1/2 - Monitor 1 (2-track playback, vocal mic monitor 100% of the time)
3/4 2-track playback only (no vocal monitoring to tracking room)
5/6 - click only
7/8 - Vocal monitor only

Outputs 3/4, 5/6, 7/8 go to tracking room (probably set up as Studios 1,2,3).

Is this possible? Am I approaching this the right way?
Thanks.

-Jesse

2

Yup, just create one additional audio track with monitoring always on (and no rec) and never use the monitor on the actual track you want to record on. That way it’s only heard during playback. The only issue would be if you use lots of effects during tracking, then I’d suggest binding monitor on/off to a key command if you don’t have it already. Select both tracks and switch monitoring between the two depending on rec or playback.

edit The more I think about it I realize that the studio sends are quite unnecessary for what you want, they are there for you to control what you want your singer to do and you could set it up with traditional output busses just as well. To fully make use of the studio sends there should be something like a tailor made “satellite” wifi/cat5 linkable midi controller (incl. headphone amp)

/A

3

Oh for f-cksake. I wrote a nice long response to your reply, and the site popped me to the log-in screen when I hit ‘submit’, losing everything I’d written :imp:

Anyway,
TwinOak, thanks for the reply. That makes sense, and in fact I think I need to just take the Control Room out of the mix and do this all with traditional sends like you’d mentioned.

Thanks!
-Jesse