AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |
Back to Blog
Dsp factory drivers11/3/2022 Many other software companies currently are supporting-or are soon to release-DSP Factory-savvy upgrades, including Cakewalk, Canam Computers, Emagic, Innovative Quality Software, Musicator, SEK’D and Sonic Foundry. Though it’s far from the scope of this article to include comprehensive reviews of all DSP Factory-supporting software products and the ever-changing Read Me files, I will include comments on how each of these three host programs interfaces and interacts with the DS2416’s onboard tool set, as each program takes a different approach to integrating the card’s use. Dsp factory drivers Pc#I installed and used three PC packages that currently support and integrate the DSP Factory’s features: Steinberg’s Cubase VST/24, Minnetonka Sofware’s MXTrax for DSP Factory, and C-Console from C-Mexx. The actual “face” of the DSP Factory is completely dependent on the third-party software developed to take advantage of the DS2416 card, and so far the real estate looks pretty good. Give Yamaha kudos for shaving software development dollars off the list price and assuming that most computer-based recordists are already using and/or happy with a host recording program, but those without recording software to access the DSP Factory’s laundry list of dedicated features are in for a very bad tease until some kind of supporting host software is installed. NAKED FOR NOWSurprisingly, the DSP Factory comes completely sans software-not even a basic audio control interface, just a handy little audio utility for testing the ports. The analog inputs go through 20-bit A/D converters with 128x oversampling when capturing audio, the outputs are 20-bit with 8x oversampling going D/A, and the coaxial digital I/O ports will sync to other digital equipment in up to 24-bit wordlengths. The I/O boxes provide four unbalanced analog ins and four outs each, two inputs of which are switchable between line and mic input levels and there’s a stereo headphone jack with its own front panel volume control. The DS2416 card itself offers four analog stereo RCA I/O jacks and two coaxial digital ports, and there are optional AX44 Audio Expansion Cards ($299 each) that can piggyback with the card to provide analog-to-digital I/O ports that are front-mounted into empty and available 511/44-inch drive bays. Limbo’ing in at just under a grand ($999), the DSP Factory offers 24-bit performance that will evolve to 32-bit when software exists to support it, 16 channels of playback, up to eight simultaneous record channels, two dedicated REV500 digital stereo effects processors, flexible digital routing options in the 24-channel virtual equivalent of a Yamaha 02R digital mixer, a host of great-sounding dynamics processors and musical 4-band parametric EQs on every channel, and a number of optional I/O and MIDI expansion units to pave the expansion pipeline. The DSP Factory seems to have been well worth the wait for people who do computer-based recording. This product was announced more than a year ago, and it’s finally here thanks to shipable Yamaha hardware and the good efforts of a half-dozen or so software developers. In fact, it goes a long way to further the state of digital audio and MIDI production on the PC, for the price of a decent mic. Yamaha’s DS2416 PCI audio card, the heart of the company’s DSP Factory system, conjures up no early-adopter technology nightmares whatsoever. Somehow that helps in keeping the whole studio-on-a-chip concept in perspective. Mine is about an untunable $3,000 guitar synthesizer that I financed it sank a band in 1983, but that same $3,000 would today fund a 48-track, automated, computer-based, digital mixing and recording system replete with multiple effects, EQ and dedicated dynamics processing on every channel. Everyone needs a typical gear story to maintain historical perspective when products like the Yamaha DSP Factory come along to shatter price and performance expectations.
0 Comments
Read More
Leave a Reply. |