Best settings / practices for using protools with IDR via Dante
I am running IDR’s with firmware 1.9.2. Running Dante VSC and Controller 3.5. Protools version 10.6.
I actually connect the recording pc directly to the dante card, as opposed to thru a network.
Not sure it if matters, but i only use the ilive editor and not a surface.
Everything is working now and data is flowing in both directions. I am only recording 16 tracks at a time to a windows PC with an SSD hard drive. I should not be seeing performance issues, but i am getting clicks , or actual gaps in the recording about 10-20 ms long. The gaps are random and in the recording process , not he play back.
i am sure someone uses this type of config every week, so I am interested to know what protools settings, and what dante settings work the best for you.
Have you checked your clock source? Make sure the IDR is set to external option card for clocking. You’ll also want to make sure your sample rates are the same in the DVS and iLive.
I had similar issues at a venue last weekend with a Dante-enabled iLive and Reaper. Had clicks and pops everywhere in the recording. Adjusting sample rate and clocking seemed to fix it.
Thanks for your reply.
in the IDR I have the clock source as port b dante.
I will check and make sure all the sample rates are set to 48K.
Do you have any recommendations for buffer size and amount, in your protools playback engine settings? (not sure this would matter).
In the DVS parameters, there are settings for ASIO, samples, encoding and latency. What do you use for these?
I am using 128 samples, 24 bit encoding and 10 ms latency.
My protools session are set for 24 BIT, WAV files and 48K.
Thanks again for your response. I would like to get this reliable soon, so that I can record all my shows.
Knowing that someone is using this in production is a big help.
If your clock sync is good then your low buffer setting (128) can also cause problems on some systems. Try increasing this to see if it fixes the problem. The lower this setting the harder it is on the PC to process data on time and it is not important to have a low buffer setting unless you are overdubbing and need low latency monitoring. If you are just multitrack recording then you can have a higher buffer setting and less chance of problems.
Thanks for the reply and info.
I will give that a try.
I know that dante is simple and robust, but I still get the feeling that it is too many moving parts for local live work. Must just be me, I want things simple. but I believe in the concept and will keep trying. My son loaned me a MacBook pro, and I am going to try that instead of windows. One of my issue is that protools will not initialize asio and the Dante VSC reliably. Seems like I have to go into windows and mess with audio drivers too often. if you know of a good cookbook document for this set up , that would be a great help to me.
