Mackie Controller Tests

[Guest djaychela]

Hello All

I'm new here, and really interested in building a controller.  I've had rather a long and sorry story having been an owner of a Houston, the tales of which can be seen at www.houstoncontroller.co.uk.  I didn't find out about this site until way after getting the unit.  Anyway, to cut a long story short, I'm getting a full refund on the Houston this week as it still doesn't work properly and Steinberg have quit even speaking to me on the subject.

My retailer is going to let me try out a Mackie Control for a couple of days to see how I get on with it.  I have a feeling that I'm not going to like it enough to buy it  ;) but I would like to help contribute to the development of the MBHP by doing any testing / data acquisition that is needed for making the Mackie Controller emulation better.  I did work out the whole Houston MIDI implementation as part of my long, horrible relationship with that unit (which anyone is free to have if they want to), and I'm reasonably savvy tech-wise and I am an Instrumentation Engineer by training, so I can do any kind of testing that is practical.

Anyway, I thought I'd just say hello, a big BIG thanks to Thorsten and anyone else who's helped with the development so far.

I plan to build a unit with moving faders; should I wait until the new board/software is complete, or just get on with it?  Ideally I'd like to get 16 faders running, but am I right in thinking will mean using two core modules?

Sorry to have rambled on a bit!  :)

[Guest djaychela]

Hello All

I'm new here, and really interested in building a controller.  I've had rather a long and sorry story having been an owner of a Houston, the tales of which can be seen at www.houstoncontroller.co.uk.  I didn't find out about this site until way after getting the unit.  Anyway, to cut a long story short, I'm getting a full refund on the Houston this week as it still doesn't work properly and Steinberg have quit even speaking to me on the subject.

My retailer is going to let me try out a Mackie Control for a couple of days to see how I get on with it.  I have a feeling that I'm not going to like it enough to buy it  ;) but I would like to help contribute to the development of the MBHP by doing any testing / data acquisition that is needed for making the Mackie Controller emulation better.  I did work out the whole Houston MIDI implementation as part of my long, horrible relationship with that unit (which anyone is free to have if they want to), and I'm reasonably savvy tech-wise and I am an Instrumentation Engineer by training, so I can do any kind of testing that is practical.

Anyway, I thought I'd just say hello, a big BIG thanks to Thorsten and anyone else who's helped with the development so far.

I plan to build a unit with moving faders; should I wait until the new board/software is complete, or just get on with it?  Ideally I'd like to get 16 faders running, but am I right in thinking will mean using two core modules?

Sorry to have rambled on a bit!  :)

[TK.]

Hi,

your inputs are welcome! :)

Your website is very interesting; hard to believe that such issues have not been fixed yet, in spite of your detailed descriptions. It seems that Steinberg isn't interested in improving the Houston driver anymore (or in other words: the devlopers left the company or they are doing something else), on the other hand it would be interesting of the integration of Mackie Control into Cubase really succeeded. Ok, you will test it :)

I'm interested if the faders are really sending MIDI values with a 10-bit resolution (what is the minimum increment value when the fader is moved softly), and if the faders are moved with the same resolution from the application (I don't think so). Also the sending speed would be interesting; I mean: how much values will be sent when a fader is manually moved up and down very quickly (this could be recorded in a MIDI file to have a time reference and compared with my results).

Btw.: I read on your website:

and the top 5-6mm of travel is 'dead' (so 6dB is reached around the half-way point between 4 and 6dB on the Houston's front panel).

I noticed the same with the LC emulation when the faders control the volume, which is displayed in dB. When I assign the fader to a MIDI value instead, the whole range is used for values between 0-127

Should I wait until the new board/software is complete, or just get on with it?

My recommendation is to wait 2 or 3 weeks, until more people have tested the new firmwares and until all issues have been solved.

Two core modules should be ok for a simple emulation without v-pots

Best Regards, Thorsten.

[TK.]

Hi,

your inputs are welcome! :)

Your website is very interesting; hard to believe that such issues have not been fixed yet, in spite of your detailed descriptions. It seems that Steinberg isn't interested in improving the Houston driver anymore (or in other words: the devlopers left the company or they are doing something else), on the other hand it would be interesting of the integration of Mackie Control into Cubase really succeeded. Ok, you will test it :)

I'm interested if the faders are really sending MIDI values with a 10-bit resolution (what is the minimum increment value when the fader is moved softly), and if the faders are moved with the same resolution from the application (I don't think so). Also the sending speed would be interesting; I mean: how much values will be sent when a fader is manually moved up and down very quickly (this could be recorded in a MIDI file to have a time reference and compared with my results).

Btw.: I read on your website:

and the top 5-6mm of travel is 'dead' (so 6dB is reached around the half-way point between 4 and 6dB on the Houston's front panel).

I noticed the same with the LC emulation when the faders control the volume, which is displayed in dB. When I assign the fader to a MIDI value instead, the whole range is used for values between 0-127

Should I wait until the new board/software is complete, or just get on with it?

My recommendation is to wait 2 or 3 weeks, until more people have tested the new firmwares and until all issues have been solved.

Two core modules should be ok for a simple emulation without v-pots

Best Regards, Thorsten.

[Guest djaychela]

Well, I've got the Mackie for the weekend, and I've got it running with Cubase SX.

I've done a quick test, and Cubase is definitely sending both bytes back to the faders of the Mackie; I drew in a volume control line with a slow increase in level and played it back, and it was increasing one bit at a time, from 00 00 to 70 7F, with every value inbetween.  I think that makes it 14 bits being sent.

As for the frequency of the data being sent, it looks pretty intense; I did an automation pass where I was moving the fader over it's full travel twice in a second, and when playing that back, 48 pitchbend (fader movement) messages are sent to the Mackie - this is less data than was recorded by SX (which registers 54 points over that time in the automation view).  Coincidentally the control method in the Mackie means that this doesn't get physically reproduced by the fader on playback; it doesn't get to the bottom each time as it takes about half a second to get to it's final position.

Anyway, I must say I'm impressed with the Mackie, as it works so much better than the Houston.  I've found what looks like a couple of little problems (with the 'Signal' lamps), but it seems great aside from that.

If there's anything  else that you'd like me to do, just reply and I'll get onto it as soon as I can.

[Guest djaychela]

Well, I've got the Mackie for the weekend, and I've got it running with Cubase SX.

I've done a quick test, and Cubase is definitely sending both bytes back to the faders of the Mackie; I drew in a volume control line with a slow increase in level and played it back, and it was increasing one bit at a time, from 00 00 to 70 7F, with every value inbetween.  I think that makes it 14 bits being sent.

As for the frequency of the data being sent, it looks pretty intense; I did an automation pass where I was moving the fader over it's full travel twice in a second, and when playing that back, 48 pitchbend (fader movement) messages are sent to the Mackie - this is less data than was recorded by SX (which registers 54 points over that time in the automation view).  Coincidentally the control method in the Mackie means that this doesn't get physically reproduced by the fader on playback; it doesn't get to the bottom each time as it takes about half a second to get to it's final position.

Anyway, I must say I'm impressed with the Mackie, as it works so much better than the Houston.  I've found what looks like a couple of little problems (with the 'Signal' lamps), but it seems great aside from that.

If there's anything  else that you'd like me to do, just reply and I'll get onto it as soon as I can.

[Dimitris_FX_freak]

Hi there

Since you got the mackie in phisical dimmention may be you want to help me (and the forum) by getting the dimmentions of the spaces between faders buttons etc... I know its kind hard to get a ruler and start mesuring but in that way (having all the spacing diameters) I can make a autocad drawing and a pcb so all the buttons, leds, faders are in position and will require even less effort for the ones with less electronick knowlege to build an emulator. If you have 15-20 mins spare I will appreciate the inputs.

PS if you have the pdf from emagic there is a draw in  there so writting the values in aprinted copy and then scan it will be easier. The dimentions have to be center to center for buttons, leds for faders the screws above and below.

Best...

[Dimitris_FX_freak]

Hi there

Since you got the mackie in phisical dimmention may be you want to help me (and the forum) by getting the dimmentions of the spaces between faders buttons etc... I know its kind hard to get a ruler and start mesuring but in that way (having all the spacing diameters) I can make a autocad drawing and a pcb so all the buttons, leds, faders are in position and will require even less effort for the ones with less electronick knowlege to build an emulator. If you have 15-20 mins spare I will appreciate the inputs.

PS if you have the pdf from emagic there is a draw in  there so writting the values in aprinted copy and then scan it will be easier. The dimentions have to be center to center for buttons, leds for faders the screws above and below.

Best...

[Guest djaychela]

Hello Dimitris.

Consider it done.  I'll measure the positions of all the controls and put them on a diagram, scan them and then post the URL to the picture here.  Probably won't be before Sunday though as I have some work to do tomorrow, mixing with the Mackie! :)

[Guest djaychela]

Hello Dimitris.

Consider it done.  I'll measure the positions of all the controls and put them on a diagram, scan them and then post the URL to the picture here.  Probably won't be before Sunday though as I have some work to do tomorrow, mixing with the Mackie! :)

[TK.]

Hi Djaychela,

thanks for the informations. I don't have further questions so far, as I'm still waiting for the ordered components which enable me to build all the required modules for working with the emulated MC more efficiently. However, good to know that the MC isn't able to update the fader positions faster than the MIDIbox MF (which requires about 0.2 ms in worst case :))

Best Regards, Thorsten.

[TK.]

Hi Djaychela,

thanks for the informations. I don't have further questions so far, as I'm still waiting for the ordered components which enable me to build all the required modules for working with the emulated MC more efficiently. However, good to know that the MC isn't able to update the fader positions faster than the MIDIbox MF (which requires about 0.2 ms in worst case :))

Best Regards, Thorsten.

[Guest djaychela]

Dimitris: I've done the measurements of the button positions.  I've only done them in pencil on a couple of sheets of A4, and my scanner is broken, so I took a photo of them instead.  They're on my webspace, at:

http://www.triac.freeserve.co.uk/mackie_control_buttons_dims.jpg and

http://www.triac.freeserve.co.uk/mackie_control_faders_dims.jpg

I hope they're OK; I think all the dimensions are there, but they're not the best drawings in the world.  If there are any questions, just post them and I'll clear up whatever mess I've made!!

[Guest djaychela]

Dimitris: I've done the measurements of the button positions.  I've only done them in pencil on a couple of sheets of A4, and my scanner is broken, so I took a photo of them instead.  They're on my webspace, at:

http://www.triac.freeserve.co.uk/mackie_control_buttons_dims.jpg and

http://www.triac.freeserve.co.uk/mackie_control_faders_dims.jpg

I hope they're OK; I think all the dimensions are there, but they're not the best drawings in the world.  If there are any questions, just post them and I'll clear up whatever mess I've made!!