sync problem (cubase to logic)

Helix

wanna sync cubase 4 (slave) up to logic pro 8 (master) via mtc and as far as i can see ive got everything done write apart from some unknown (to me) which is giving the following error in the cubase transport bar when i hit play on logic: lock 25

after hitting play, 25 frames later it locks up and does nothing

im sure its something relatively straighforward so all suggestions welcome

can provide more info if theres not enough above

studiorat

Are they both at the same frame rate?
Are they connected digitally? Is it a sample rate or external/internal clocking affair?
If it's none of those, it probably needs a new spring or something?

Helix

theyre both running at 25fps

theyre connected via midi from the audio interface on the mac to the audio interface on the pc, and both routed correctly (so far as i can see) in their respective software's sync settings

im sending mtc out the midi out of the mac audio interface at 25fps, and its being recieved at the midi in on the pc's audio interface. pressing play on the mac as i say causes the pc to do nothing for a second, then display "lock 25" in the sync info bar on the transport panel, and the play marker goes to bar 300, beat 1 and stops

doesnt make a huge amount of sense to me, but im new to logic and i have to say im finding its sync settings a little less than comprehensive compared to cubase 4, but i want logic as the master and not the other way round

Helix

got it (ish... im still half a bar off, but its in time, so im not too worried)

it seems logics 0 point is actually not zero in terms of mtc at all, but about minus an hour in real time, meaning that coz the cubase project was set to 10 minutes length, when i hit play the playhead in cubase went to the last possible point of the track (10 mins in) and could go no further, so didnt play at all

ill work on figuring out the half bar offset tomorrow

Helix

urgh

this is proving to be a disaster

right, its all synched up and works fine... once its at the default 120bpm

if i change the tempo of the master (logic), the slave (cubase) fails to play at the new tempo

which makes sweet fcuk all sense to me to be perfectly honest. surely if logic is the master, itll dictate the tempo of the slave through mtc? or am i missing something here

studiorat

Are you sending out midi tempo information from Logic, midi beat clock?

Helix

im synching it up via mtc

so i assume the mtc tempo is different depending on the tempo of the project no?

there are no options for sending anything that im not already sending

midi clock wont work because cubase cant be slaved to it

studiorat

Hmmm. No, I don't think there is any tempo information on the MTC signal. It's just timecode as far as I know.

Did you try set up with a new session where you haven't got the the running before zero issue?

It sounds to me like it's getting code and trying to start and then something is dragging it down like a miss match in tempo or word clock.

It's been a while since I saw a Cubase session, are you positive there is no way to set up Cubase to recieve a MIDI clock signal? Sounds like Cubase should be picking up the MIDI clock info and adjusting it's tempo to the incoming tempo.

Did you enable sync on the Transport Bar?

Did you make sure that the SysEx option is enabled in the Thru group of the MIDI Filter panel in the Preferences window? Apparently thats an issue with some versions.

I did find out one thing though, unlike Cubase VST, SX/L can't be slaved to MIDI Clock, due to the newer timing engine being based around linear time rather than musical time. Could this be the problem?

Helix

yup, cubase definitely cant take midi clock unfortunately. nor can logic. both can send but not recieve

sync is enabled, and both play in sync at 120bpm, and out of sync at any other tempo as soon as i hit play on logic

ill have a look at the sysex option tonight

its cubase 4, full version and the clock issue is definitely the problem

bit of a nuisance that mtc doesnt send any tempo data, kinda makes it impossible to sync cubase and logic up any way usefully if thats the case

connekted

I have been trying to do the same thing, its nice to know you got it to work a tiny bit, i read the follow stuff on the apple site and began to lose hope...

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1387837

although it is saying about logic being a slave, they make reference to cubase, etc etc

whats your thoughts, i need to get them to work together... sigh

Neurojazz

- the Project's frame rate is instead determined by whichever device is sending the Master timecode to Cubase.

So... in transport/project synchronization settings

Clicked midi time code?
Selected MTC source (the port the midi comes in from)?
MC Master - Unchecked
MMC Slave Active Unchecked

Midi Timecode Destinations All Unchecked

Midi Clock Destinations:-
Select Port MTC should be received on.
Select Midi Clock follows position (so project starts and stops at right position)
Check the Always send Start message.
Leave Midi Clock in stop mode (unless previewing things with timed delays remotely on Cubase)


Then try to click the little sync button on transport bar...
...and it's always good to have a bar of silence at start to let things settle

Hope that helps.

tweeky

Helix wrote: »

yup, cubase definitely cant take midi clock unfortunately. nor can logic. both can send but not recieve

sync is enabled, and both play in sync at 120bpm, and out of sync at any other tempo as soon as i hit play on logic

ill have a look at the sysex option tonight

its cubase 4, full version and the clock issue is definitely the problem

bit of a nuisance that mtc doesnt send any tempo data, kinda makes it impossible to sync cubase and logic up any way usefully if thats the case

Logic will sync to nearly everything! I sync to and send both MTC and MIDI clock regularly. You need to set your tempo in "tempo list", sync flavour at the "blue sync" button and sync prefs if you are sending midi clock or mtc.

See Attachment for the relevant windows.

Helix

tweeky wrote: »

Logic will sync to nearly everything! I sync to and send both MTC and MIDI clock regularly. You need to set your tempo in "tempo list", sync flavour at the "blue sync" button and sync prefs if you are sending midi clock or mtc.

See Attachment for the relevant windows.

im transmitting from logic using it as master, im not looking to set it as slave to cubase

also, that bar in the top right with the smpte position stuff, where do i get that? and the transport panel looks completely different to mine, is that logic 8 or where do i find that panel?

thanks a million

tweeky

Helix wrote: »

im transmitting from logic using it as master, im not looking to set it as slave to cubase

also, that bar in the top right with the smpte position stuff, where do i get that? and the transport panel looks completely different to mine, is that logic 8 or where do i find that panel?

thanks a million

I also use Logic as the master to spew out code, open the tempo list by clicking and holding down the clock (blue) button on the transport and type in your tempo and start time, the default i think is 1 hour but make it your own say Bar 1 = 00:00:00:00:00. Close this window and open song settings and go to the sync option and the midi section as in the picture. Click whichever type of code you want to send, say the standard mtc and select the port or all ports in the drop down window and that you want to send on and close the window.
I took the pic on Logic express as it's the only seq i have on my laptop but i use Logic 7 in the studio and it's pretty much the same.
If you still have problems PM me.

ajw

tweeky wrote: »

I also use Logic as the master to spew out code, open the tempo list by clicking and holding down the clock (blue) button on the transport and type in your tempo and start time, the default i think is 1 hour but make it your own say Bar 1 = 00:00:00:00:00. Close this window and open song settings and go to the sync option and the midi section as in the picture. Click whichever type of code you want to send, say the standard mtc and select the port or all ports in the drop down window and that you want to send on and close the window.
I took the pic on Logic express as it's the only seq i have on my laptop but i use Logic 7 in the studio and it's pretty much the same.
If you still have problems PM me.

Is this discussion still 'live'? I have finally cracked this one. I have Logic Express 9 controlling a PC running Cubase 5. The info above assisted in getting there, so if I can be of any help, let me know.

madtheory

You're a gent!

Hush Cat

I too am very interested in trying to achieve the same function of synching Cubase 4 (PC) to Logic 9 (Mac)

In order to connect via MIDI, how exactly do they both connect? is it literally midi out of PC to midi in on the MAC and vice versa, hence requiring two MIDI cables? Allowing MIDI information to be sent and recieved by both computers.

Also do both devices have to be connected up via a soundcard's MIDI interface, or is it possible to use a USB midi keyboard as the interface on one of the computers?

Suprisingly it doesn't seem like many people are doing this, well from these two programs anway and this is the only thread ive seen where someone has succesfully got it working. A few others in other forums have mentioned the same problems as in the eary posts from Helix.

Once it is working though, can you literally press play and stop from both computers with synching working much like re-wire, or will it only work from the Master sequencer and not the slave?

Thanks

madtheory

You will have to set one of them as the master, and you only need one MIDI cable, from master to slave. It doesn't matter what MIDI interface you use.

Hush Cat

But when people say master and slave, what effect does this have upon the way it works exactly? Can you only play from one sequencer (master) in order to get them to synch, or does it not matter which one you use?

Re-wire of course has a master and a slave scenario with (Propellerheads)Reason being the slave, but to me that's always been about the audio signal routing, effecitvely meaning that all audio has to go from Reason to the Master DAW instead of the other way round. This is why i'm a bit confused on the Master/Slave thing.

I've never delved into MTC before so it's all new to me really, despite having a degree in Music Tech haha.

madtheory

Hush Cat wrote: »

only play from one sequencer (master) in order to get them to sync

Yes.

I'm not surprised you don't know about it, there's not much use for MTC these days with everything going on inside the computer.

Hush Cat

It's a shame you can't enable both to play. I can see this being really annoying actually if you are trying to do things within the slave program.

ajw

Hush Cat wrote: »

I too am very interested in trying to achieve the same function of synching Cubase 4 (PC) to Logic 9 (Mac)

In order to connect via MIDI, how exactly do they both connect? is it literally midi out of PC to midi in on the MAC and vice versa, hence requiring two MIDI cables? Allowing MIDI information to be sent and recieved by both computers.

Also do both devices have to be connected up via a soundcard's MIDI interface, or is it possible to use a USB midi keyboard as the interface on one of the computers?

Suprisingly it doesn't seem like many people are doing this, well from these two programs anway and this is the only thread ive seen where someone has succesfully got it working. A few others in other forums have mentioned the same problems as in the eary posts from Helix.

Once it is working though, can you literally press play and stop from both computers with synching working much like re-wire, or will it only work from the Master sequencer and not the slave?

Thanks

I didn't use any MIDI cables at all. Both machines were hooked up to a local network, that's all it needed. MIDI commands are sent over the network to drive the other machine.

I documented all the Cubase and Logic settings in this PDF:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8217614/Logic-Cubase%20linking%20-%20Settings.pdf

To run MIDI across the LAN I used MIDIoverLAN CP III, a product from MusicLab (who make RealGuitar, RealStrat, etc):
http://www.musiclab.com/

Think of it as Logic talking to MoL which passes it on to Cubase. The manual for MoL CP III explains how to send MIDI between computers. I highly recommend this product!

I use Logic to drive Cubase, not vice-versa. Logic runs on a MacBook Pro with the latest version of Snow Leopard, Cubase is on a laptop running Win7.

Get back to me if you want more info. I'm no guru, but I did understand enough to make it work. End result: hitting play in Logic starts Cubase up automatically, synced with the same tempo. It's pretty cool. I use it as a way of accessing some Win plugins I have that are not available for Mac. (I migrated to Mac from Win last year.)

One tip - don't use a Wi-Fi network. It's possible, but all advice says to link them to the network with an Ethernet cable.

Neurojazz

Hush Cat wrote: »

It's a shame you can't enable both to play. I can see this being really annoying actually if you are trying to do things within the slave program.

Get a little usb transport control and control both that way - then you can plonk the unit within arms reach for start/stopping on both machines.

kpc3x

Hey I can't get it to work. Would really appreciate your help!