Pro Control 24 Questions/Interfaces

Posted: Mon Apr 09, 2001 5:46 pm

Hey, i'm new here and about to buy protools. when i saw the pro control 24 (and the 16 pre amps!), it made my decision to buy protools a lot easier.anyway, i've been doing my research on protools so how does the Pro Control 24 hook up? according to EQ magazine it goes into one of the interfaces..well, how? do you need the 1622 or one of the others? hopefully you guys will be able to help me with this.Also, i have a lot of old drum machines and samplers. Being that they certainly aren't anywhere near 24 bit, what would be the advantage of getting one of the 24 bit interfaces to record these? would it matter or should i save cash on the 20 bit interfaces. ok, thanks! i'll have plenty more questions i'm sure. bob <A HREF="http://www.xhiphop.com" TARGET=_blank>http://www.xhiphop.com</A>

Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2001 12:07 pm

Hi Bob,I take it you mean the C24 control surface rather than the ProControl.I've seen and played a little with the C24 but I can't say for sure how it's connected. I would guess there is a 25pin D-Sub connector at the back allowing you to create a breakout cable to connect to your interfaces. Communication between the C24 an PT is probably ethernet.As an interface, if you are only using samplers/drum machines, etc., there is no need for anything more than a 1622. If you are going to be recording live musicians I would definately go for a 24bit interface, either the 888/24 or if you can afford it the Apogee AD8000. Another piece of kit you should definately consider is a Rosendahl Nanosyncs master clock source.Greg

Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2001 5:51 pm

Gday, The Control24 has Dsub connectors on the back to go to your patchbay or interface.Mic and line inputs on the back using XLR, Jacks etc etc.

Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2001 6:33 pm

Thanks a lot for the responses. Can you explain the function of the nanosync? As you can tell, i'm new to the digital domain Smile

And as far as the Apogee converters go, are they so popular because they are 24/96 or is there something i'm missing. what makes them better than the digidesign 888/24. Does protools support 24/96? if so, how would having the Apogee converter and the 1622 affect the way i record? would i have to resample anything.THANKS AGAIN! bob

Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2001 2:46 am

Hi Bob,<< Can you explain the function of the nanosync? As you can tell, i'm new to the digital domain >>I explained this somewhere before but I can't find it so here goes again, from the beginning:Let's take the example of recording at 48k sample frequency. Somewhere inside your AD converter there needs to be a clock measuring out the the length of each 1/48000th of a second duration sample. If the clock isn't very accurate you end up with what is called digital jitter. In the worst cases jitter results in clicks and pops but usually it manifests itself as a thin, harsh sound quality with poor definition. Obviously the amount of this effect depends on the amount of jitter. When you connect two pieces of digital equipment together (in the digital domain), clock information is passed to the second piece of equipment through the digital audio connection. The second piece of equipment is said to be slaved to the first, which is the clock master. This daisy-chaining of the clock adds futher jitter. If your master clock is not that good to start with and you add several pieces of digital gear to the chain, say a DAT machine and/or maybe a second converter, then you are likely to suffer from moderate to severe jitter. If you take the embedded clock info out of the digital audio signal by using the word clock connectors on your equipment this will improve matters slightly but what you really need is to remove the daisy-chaining and have a really high quality master clock. Enter the Nanosyncs; which contains a high quality clock and six word clock outputs. Set each piece of digital equipment to slave, and feed each one it's own independant word clock connection from the Nanosyncs. So now you've got a very accurate master clock and no daisy-chaining, result: A drastic reduction in system wide jitter. The aural effect will be a noticable improvement in sound quality; richer, more warmth, more clarity.Even many of those who are quite experienced with digital equipment are often ingnorant of, or just choose to ignore word clock issues and subsequent jitter. The sound quality of 888s and 1622 can be drastically improved with the addition of a good master clock.<< And as far as the Apogee converters go, are they so popular because they are 24/96 or is there something i'm missing. what makes them better than the digidesign 888/24. >>The Apogee AD8000s have the same resolution and sample frequencies as the 888/24s. IE. 24/44.1k or 24/48k, not 24/96k. ProTools is not currently able to deal with 24/96k files.There are a number of reasons why the AD8000s are better that the 888/24s. Firstly the AD8000 has a much better clock than the 888s. Secondly the analog components in the AD8000 are of higher quality. And lastly, the AD8000 has a couple of useful, high quality features not in the 888s, Soft Limit and UV22 processing. In short it just sounds better and makes your mixes sound better. There again, it's about twice the price. I found the inclusion of a Nanosyncs in my system improves the sound quality of an 888 enough to make it comparable (though still not quite as good) as an AD8000.Greg

Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2001 11:41 am

Thanks a lot! that response was perfect. i found out a lot of that information through my own research but you just filled the holes and answered most of the questions i still had.

Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2001 8:53 pm

In reguard to the original postI sell digidesign gear - and have been playing with the control-24 every day for about two weeks now on a G3 mix+ system.all of your analog i/o work on DB-25s. You are still going to need Digidesign audio interfaces though. Id say if you are doing hiphop as your name suggest, and can spring the wad for the control-24, get a 1622 to go along with your mix+ system. The control-24 is pretty easy to work with. I had a pretty well know hip hop producer come down to demo it - we hooked up a MPC that was midi'd up to a triton, hooked the 8 outs of the MPC to the control-24, then went back and plugged a bass directly into channel one's DI - amp farmed it, and then we cut the vocal. Pretty good sounding track in under an hour, and the client is almost sold Very Happy

take care - Jason C. Crouch

Posted: Wed May 02, 2001 10:29 pm

We had someone in last week with a little Tascam USB controller, and he hooked it to his PT LE and 001 system. I thought it was so cool I went and got one and have been messing with it on our TDM system. It won't pass any audio except in SoundManager, but it controls lots of stuff like faders, transports, arming, mutes, and even some plugins. It's not a Pro Control, but it does a lot for a $500 box. And I'm thinking of the possibilities - we tour several months out of the year, and this with my powerbook is enough to lay down basic ideas that I can bounce to the G4 later on. Its a pretty neat little toy.

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