USAMO setup with Reaper

[derjay]

Hey everyone,
I am trying to set up the USAMO box to sync some drum machines with Reaper.
So far after several hours of trying to set this thing up I can't make any sense of this device: the best towards a working device is that after a lot of fiddling around I can get the activity and clip LEDs to light up and blink rapidly.
The only test that appears to give me more positive than negative results is the Midi clock test but bizarrely the patterns of results appear the same regardless whether the audio cable is plugged in or not...
So I am beginning to doubt that the device is functional at all, any help would be greatly appreciated in order to end a day of frustration.

This is my hardware:
Macbook pro on Sierra
Motu HD 896 with an 828 slaved via ADAT running at 48khz sample rate
the test midi clock comes from a Roland TR 8

And this is how I have connected the devices:
I have connected the USAMO to an external out of the Hd896.
I am running the signal out of reaper with an attenuation of -1,4 db so it doesn't clip at this stage, and left the USAMO's output control at the default value.

The output is wired into a Mixing desk (Soundcraft spirit M 12), because by itself the 896 Hd did not the USAMO's Clip LED to light up.

So for testing I am running the interface output into a mixer line in where I had to give the signal another 10 db amplification until I get both the clip led to flash. Via the channel insert of the board I then run it into the USAMO.

I have tried different amplifications and attenuations at different stages of this chain but don't see any change at all. Usamo's trim setting is at 12 o clock the rest likewise is set on default.


best regards

j.

[derjay]

here some photos of the panel and routing.

[derjay]

second panel

[os]

This:

the test midi clock comes from a Roland TR 8

leads me to think you may have misunderstood what is needed during the test. You don't want another device sending a clock (or indeed any MIDI) to the plug-in. You want the plug-in to be receiving the MIDI that it itself is sending out.

This would also explain

bizarrely the patterns of results appear the same regardless whether the audio cable is plugged in or not...

[derjay]

Hi OS,
thanks for the quick reply, you were right I did get the test procedure wrong, however, the device is still not working I encounter following set of problems.

a) Plugin behavior:
The plugin does not consistently show up as a midi device in Reaper, sometimes it is listed, sometimes not can be within the same session or after starting the daw new. I should usually see it listed as a midi device right?

b) midi sync (manually)
the test results are still totally erratic - I have tried different midi interfaces, with different results - I can get USAMO to send out a clock syncronizing the internal metronom with up to two drum machines (via midi splitter) but this is only "by ear" results are again not consistent, next start everything is messed up again, also the bug about not playing the first bar in Ableton reappears in Reaper.
Usually when I hit a point at which the USAMO transmits a message that gets the drum machines going, the readouts are actually worse than at points where USAMO does not even get their sequencers started.
I did ensure, when Reaper saw USAMO as a midi device, that it was not selected, still this does not change the situation. Midi sync is also not necessarily stable and in time with internal Metronome.

c) midi sync (test procedure)
I have in various hours tried to go through the test again but have never achieved a clocking test without the majority of the messages being read as wrong. Furthermore the test results are not consistent. In the last set of test i did, I used the Electron A 4 and an LXR Drum as the midi input to get the readout. Via these devices I get no midi coming back - which again is odd since at least the LXR can be clocked by

c) Product Activation bug:
I tried to deinstall and reinstall the plugins yesterday - no I get the plugin activation error described on the homepage. The expert sleepers activation manager claims that the product is activated, once I start Reaper, I get the message that the plugin would not be -
I cannot follow the instructions step by step - since MAC OS Sierra has no function anymore to repair permissions, other than that I deinstalled all folders mentioned (step by step) and also deinstalled them all and reinstalled the Activation manager, to no avail.


I bought the device from a dealer in Cologne where it appeared as a retoure, is hardware failure an option to explain the erratic clock out behaviour?

Is it possible that the plugin does not work with Reaper or the Motu 896hd as such? In that case I better stop waisting more time.

I really hope there is something incredibly stupid I oversee
best regards
J.

[os]

The plug-in should always appear as a MIDI device in the DAW, but I see that in Reaper it doesn't. This points to a bug in Reaper though, since if I add a USAMO in Reaper, its MIDI port appears elsewhere e.g. in Live.

Don't do anything else until you have the test procedure working. You need to find a MIDI input that can reliably transmit MIDI into the plug-in. When in test mode, the right hand panel is showing any input it receives. Even without the test running, you can feed MIDI into the port and it will be displayed by the plug-in. Get that working before tweaking the USAMO further.

[derjay]

Hey OS ,
thanks for the input - so a little update :
I changed midi interfaces and cables and also connected the USAMO directly to the soundcard output (rather than the mixer channel) and finally got it to produce stable test results for clock, notes messages etc. and managed to sync two devices to the metronome.

Regarding the integration of the VST plugin to Reaper, the buggy behavior is still prevalent, once I change the interface from the MOTU to the internal input the plugin is generally not visible, with the external interface it shows most of the time but not always .

Furthermore, I observed that sometimes devices did not start, this behavior stopped once I sent only clock messages and no song position pointers, furthermore I have the engaged the delay start - stop functions, so I still have to test which of these options makes the difference.

Another issue is that the external devices generally start a bar late, do you know whether there is a fix for this?

cheers!

[derjay]

Hey OS ,
thanks for the input - so a little update :
I changed midi interfaces and cables and also connected the USAMO directly to the soundcard output (rather than the mixer channel) and finally got it to produce stable test results for clock, notes messages etc. and managed to sync two devices to the metronome.

Regarding the integration of the VST plugin to Reaper, the buggy behavior is still prevalent, once I change the interface from the MOTU to the internal input the plugin is generally not visible, with the external interface it shows most of the time but not always .

Furthermore, I observed that sometimes devices did not start, this behavior stopped once I sent only clock messages and no song position pointers, furthermore I have the engaged the delay start - stop functions, so I still have to test which of these options makes the difference.

Another issue is that the external devices generally start a bar late, do you know whether there is a fix for this?

cheers!

[os]

The plug-in starts at the beginning of the bar at or after where the host tells it it's starting. So if the host is telling the plug-in that it starts slightly after the start of bar 1, it will start on bar 2.

This sometimes happens when delay compensation is in effect.